2013 XC90 Blower Motor failure

[JNGgobills]

Hi,

When my car gets hot over 80 degrees the blower fan stops working. When it is cool out it works fine. The Volvo dealer says the blower fan & resistor needs to be replaced. Here is the big issue.

Apparently, in the 2013 they moved the fan. It is not under the glove-box and accessible. You have to take the entire front dash off. I had 2 quotes. One from Volvo dealer with parts and 10 hours of labor @ $1,990.00. They also charged me $149 diagnostic thet would go towards the repair cost should I move forward.

At a local mechanic who quoted parts and 6.5 hours of labor @ $1,200.00.

Has anyone come across this issue? Did they really mess up with this year and make the blower that inaccessible?

Jeff

[ggleavitt]

They might be referring to the 2015+ Gen2 model but for Gen1 it's right where it always is, passenger side right footwell-

XC90 Climate Assembly_2014.JPG (74.7 KiB) Viewed 2776 times

Couple threads and videos for doing the replacement without removing the dash (sacrifice a single blower enclosure screw tab), my resistor is original but I have replaced the blower motor (Behr). Pretty easy to do, think the only special tools you might need are a good Torx set. If you or someone you know is doing it, have patience in putting everything back together.

**The Volvo instructions do indeed note dash removal to get to the fan and the dealer will give you a "book" labor hour quote and both parts at maybe a small discount and that's what you'll pay if you go to them +/-. Wanted to add this as it's easy for me to suggest the cheap way to do the replacement but not everyone feels comfortable in pulling apart their vehicle floors and breaking something you cant see (that screw tab). Good news is you only need to break it once.

Thinking this could also be a good Independent Volvo repair shop job using quality aftermarket parts, might reduce the overall cost if a heat related blower issue is your problem.

Good luck with your repair.

Edit 070319- add additional **comment

[oragex]

As mentioned, a 2013 should still be the first gen for XC90, not sure what they say the blower has been placed in the center of the dash ? Maybe try to listen and to locate the blower. You should only need the resistor, not the whole blower (scroll for fitment) https://www.fcpeuro.com/products/volvo- ... 62#fitment