2002 Ford Ranger. So I want to replace my blower motor fan. No sweat, I remove the cruise control module, undo the 4 screw holding it in ... and it doesn't come out. The reservoir tanks block it by like 1/4 inch. Awesome

So I go to remove the reservoir tanks. 2 bolts going to the side, no sweat. Then there are 2 nuts on the bottom. I can get to one, but even though I can get to it, I don't know how I would get it off since once it gets loose it will just spin the bolt, right? I figure I will tackle that issue later. The other bolt is blocked by the airbox

So I take the top cover off, remove the air filter, and acording to tthe videos I watched, you just pull it up to get the box off the rubber grommets. Easy right?

We had THREE FULL GROWN ADULTS pulling on the airbox as HARD AS THEY HUMANELY COULD. It would not budge. The guy in the video gives it a little tug and it pops right out. We probably had over 1000 pounds of lifting force on that box, and nothing

There has to be a trick to it. How in the world do you get that box out? And once out, how in the world do you get the nuts off the bolts holding the reservoir down without getting to the bolt heads, which are hidden behind the wheel cover? The videos make this look like a 5 minute job, we were fight thing thing for NINETY minutes before we gave up.

 

PB Blaster or some other form of lubricant sprayed all around the grommets at the bottom and in the fender. A small pry bar or screwdriver helps to give them a little leverage.

If you remove it enough times, it does get easier, so the one in the video has likely been removed a few times.

 

I found this video ( ) that shows the blower motor being removed without removing the airbox... is that really doable? How do you move the reservoir without breaking the tang that it still screwed in?

 

Do you have a 2.3 in your truck by chance? If so, they use a different coolant reservoir so what is shown in the video is a slightly different process.

 

No it is a 3.0

I cannot use a prybar or tool, it will absolutely crack the airbox. I cannot overstate how much force we put on this thing and it did not budge. Applying that much force to a small spot like the end of a prybar would absolutely break the plastic. PB blaster and WD40 are both bad for rubber, and either way there's no where to spray a lubricant. There is no gap between the box and whatever is holding those bushings in

The only option I can see is to drill out the lugs in the airbox, destroying it, then buying another airbox for $100 or so and hoping that one can be hammered into place without breaking it which is not likely

Honestly its is so incredibly frustrating I am thinking of selling the truck. Without a blower motor is has no heat or AC so it's not useful in the northeast, I'm not paying a mechanic the $1000 or more it would take to fix, and it's so incredibly stupid to design the reservoir tank 1/4 inch to far back to prevent the fan from coming out, I just feel like getting this thing out of my life.

 

I've used PB Blaster on mine, as well as a pry bar and had zero issues with what you mentioned. My grommets have not disintegrated, and my box is not broken. If you did not break it with three guys pulling on the box, then a small prybar used in a gentle manner will not break the box.

If you won't listen to me, here's a how-to for modifying the airbox, which requires you to remove it. Shows you exactly what I've told you, and has been the preferred method for the 15 years I've been working on Rangers.

How To: Air Silencer Removal - Ranger-Forums - The Ultimate Ford Ranger Resource

 

We were pulling on the sides, all that force concentrated in one spot (like the end of a prybar would) will absolutely break the plastic. As for the guide, my air box does not look like the one in the guide. There are no open "holes" in the top where you could spray a lubricant in. There are outlines of circles showing where the lugs are, but it is a solid surface, there is no opening down into the lug/grommet. If I sprayed lubricant on them it would just sit in the airbox. If there was some sort of gab between the airbox and lugs I could try and get some lubricant in there, but there isn't. Maybe I have a special Ranger who knows, but absolutely none of the guides or videos result in getting the airbox out no matter how perfectly I follow the instructions.

I looked around for any aftermarket screws or bolts that may have been added and didn't find any, my only guess at this point is that some sort of permanent adhesive compound was applied to the bottom of the airbox to "weld" it to that bottom plate.

Either way I just submitted my return for all the parts I bought for the job and and close to just writing the truck off. It's been a warm-ish winter so far but in a week or two when that ends and it gets to cold I'll just dump the thing to someone else and make it their problem. Either that or turn it into a "Sword in the Stone" style roadside attraction, I'll offer anyone who can remove the airbox $1000, and it costs $20 per attempt, and try and recoup my $$ that way. Depressing after all the time, energy and money I spent trying to find a Ranger, I finally get one, and a freaking plastic airbox of all things ruins it.

 

If it breaks taking it out, why not source a replacement and 'git er done'?

 

I looked around, they are like $100 or so, and there's no telling if I could ever get it into the grommets since they seem completely impervious to letting things move through them.

 

If you don't have the holes in the bottom of the airbox, then you have something funny going on. I just checked my 2002 3.0 and it has the holes in the bottom of the airbox just like the how to shows.

I'm starting to think you have the newer style airbox in there that doesn't have the holes, and maybe somebody did apply some sort of glue to the bottom because the newer box had broken posts. These things aren't easy to get out, but 3 of you should have been enough.

 

We practically had that corner of the truck off the ground.

 

So for all the money and time you've dumped into it, you're willing to scrap the whole project because of a c-note?

 

The job is f'in DONE

I decided to give it one more try. First I looked at the airbox and under closer inspection, I DO have holes in the lug area, they were just packed with ****. I used a screwdriver and wet dry vac and got them cleaned out, then shot a bunch of WD 40 in there and let it soak. After 10 minutes I started pulling again, and it started to give a little more, but I noticed the bottom of the airbox was bending at a peculiar point, right in front of that mouth opening attachment on the front. I shone my flashlight in there, and some genius had DROVE A SCREW through the box down into the plate. That's what was holding it down and making it impossible to get out. I removed the screw, and with a few tugs the airbox was free.

But the night was just getting started

I removed the two side bolts of the reservoir, they came out just fine. I ratcheted loose the screw on the bottom front tang, it loosed and then spun freely, and I learned from the video I posted above it was supposed to do that since once loose you slide it forward into a bigger hole and it pops out. I then went to the screw on the back tang that I could now access that the airbox was out of the way, and this this was a DISASTER. Whoever had last touched it has completely screwed it up, the tab that was supposed to be on the top of the plastic was on the bottom, and the nut has been drive so far down onto the bolt it has literally squished the plastic on the tang. A ratchet just turned the whole assembly, the bolt itself was frozen to the screw.

After a liberal amount of WD40, a pair of vice grips on the screw, a 11mm wrench on the nut, and 45 minutes of very colorful language, I managed to get about 2 revolutions out of it, which loosed it enough to wiggle and slide the entire screw, nut, and clip assembly off the plastic tang and pop it off completely out of the truck. It wasn't even in the correct opening on the body, they just tightened the nut down OVER the square part of the bolt that is supposed to slide into the smaller hole and hold the bolt in place, and had the nut clamping down on 1/2 of the plastic tang. It was ugly.

So at this point, the reservoir was free, I slid it out of the way, and was finally able to get the blower motor out. I think they heard my screams of triumph in Taiwan. The blower motor housing area was pretty dirty with twigs and leaves, and the fins of the blower motor were all filthy. I put the new motor in, screwed it in, hooked up the wiring, and went to test. It worked, but on low speed, it made an annoying whine noise (it was a $32 cheapo part off Amazon). So I cleaned up the OEM motor, sprayed the fins off, got all the crud out, put that back, and it seemed to work fine, so I just left it in there

So now to re-assembly. I had to get this frozen nut from the front tang of the reservoir unscrewed up the bolt to expose the square part of the bolt that slides into the the smaller hole and holds the bolt in place, so you can then tighten the nut. I had to dremel off to side of the round screw head, so my vice grips could have something to grip on, and with even more WD40, I was able to ratchet the nut about 1/4 of the way up the screw, which I thought would be enough to get it in the slot properly. I was trying to get the clip through the opening in the tang, and it wasn't fitting, the bolt head would NOT slide into the smaller slot in tandem with the bolt in the front, and any attempt to ratchet the nut just turned the whole thing, it was not working, when suddenly it occurred to me, why am I even trying to put this bolt back in? If I leave it off, I still have three bolts holding the reservoir in place, which should be fine, AND if I ever need to get the blower motor out again, if this bolt isn't here, I don't have to screw with the airbox at all, this was the bolt the airbox was blocking. So to test my theory I reattached the reservoir using the 2 bolts to the side, and the one bolt going through the front tang that did properly insert into the slot that holds the bolt in place, tightened everything up, and the reservoir tanks were SOLID. I took the mangled, rusted, dremeled, destroyed nut and bolt and clip assembly from the front tang and tossed it in the garbage,

I bit of finagaling getting the airbox back in, making sure I had any tubes out of the way, got it in nice and tight, I reattached the hidden screw, air filter back, top cover back, MAF clipped back in, some unknown tube had popped off the hose coming from the airbox so I pushed that back on, bolted the cruise control unit back, and the job was is done, and if that OEM blower motor ever does die, swapping it out is now a 5 minute job since I don't need to touch the airbox at all, just three screws and the reservoir is free

I'm going to bed now

 

Well, glad you finally figured it out. Sucks that you had to deal with someone else's screwups, but at least you were able to overcome it.