The blower motor stopped working this morning (19 Deg out[:@]). SO I start looking into things. Motor spins freely by hand, The fuse is blown but I unplugged the the wiring on the back of the Blower motor and than put a new fuse in and it blew right away. So I'm guessing that the motor is OK and that I have a short in the harness somewhere. Is there a common place that I should start looking for the short? FYI 98 A4 w/ climate control

 

Check for voltage and ground at the motor before getting into any wiring problems.

 

I can't every time I put a fuse in to check what is getting to the plug it blows a fuse before I can get to the plug

 

Ok then check for power at the fuse, if there is power present there then go back to the motor.
Place your ohmeter on the black lead on the connector and put the other lead on a known good ground on the body and see if there is continuity. If thats ok do the exact same thing on the power side THERE SHOULDN'T BE CONTINUITY TO GROUND ON THE POWER WIRE! then you have to trace the wire.

 

well I dug into it alot deeper tonight and I confirmned it is a wiring problem. When I placed a jumper cable in the Blower motor fuse spot I noticed smoke from under the driver side of the dash so I pulled all the covers off and did the jumper again and finaly found the wire that was shorting. I can only assume I need to buy a whole new harness becasue I have no idea how for the wire is ruined or what othes damage it has caused. I'll post pics when I can get them on the computer.
It's in the mess of plugs behind the driver side kick panel. 3rd row down and the last plug in that row. I can only assume it has something to do with the heating/cooling system.

 

You don't need to replace the harness, you can just run an over lay.
Basically take out the wire out of the connector from the a/c control head and plug in a new wire and leave the old one chillin in there. You can get a small wire that will connect into the factory connector then splice in a wire to run it all the way to the motor which is cheap and easy.

 

So if I told you what wire was the bad one in that connector would you be able to tell me where it goes? 3rd row all the way to the rightis the bad connector


I enlarged the pic above to show the melted wire

 

HOLY COW! That thing is toasted, it should go straight to the a/c control head, if you have a bentley manual with a wiring diagram it should tell you exactly where it goes. Is there any visual evidence of the old wiring covering left? Like if it was a brown wire with a white stripe kinda thing? Then you should be able to find the same wire on the back of the a/c control head and its all straight forward after that.

 

Ya thankfully that is a fused line because I'm sure the car would have burned to the ground. I'm gonna have to pick up a Bentley Manual. I have a Chilton but the wiring diagram sucks. I believe it used to be a black wire It is just wrapped around the brown wire. And it's toast all the way up to the main harness. I'll just do a color illumination to find out what it should be