Critter in the air conditioning system?!?

After starting my Blazer (1998 LS) the other day, I turned on the air. I immediately heard a violent thumping noise coming from behind the glove compartment area and smelled a foul odor. I quickly turned it off and the thumping stopped but would recur when it was turned back on. A strong vibration you could feel in the dash and steering wheel also accompanied this. The smell continued whether the air was on or off (stronger when on). We took it to a couple of shops. The first one said the evaporator core had gone bad, hence the smell, and that the motor mounts had also gone bad (the vibration) for a total of $750 to repair. Not buying this explanation, we took it to another shop who opened the hood and confirmed what we thought... that something was dead in there and that the dash would need to be pulled off and the air conditioner/vents/dash would need to be cleaned out for a cost of $629. The smell has gotten worse and now the flies are congregating over the blower housing and the passenger side grille near the windshield. My questions are: Whether this is something we can attempt ourselves? What is the best way to access the blower housing? Any other ways to tackle this problem?

Thanks in advance for any help!

You might be able to pull off a vent and afix a small treble hook to a flexible wire (Suggest doubling the wire with the hook at the center.) Buy several hooks of different size and practice inside an old plastic pipe or some such. Use hooks light enough to bend if you hook something you can't get loose from. The critter is almost certainly a mouse :eek: . If you get his/her stinking little carcass out of there, there are chemicals around which soak up lots of smell, though the memory will linger a while whatever you do. If you do get him out, use the wire with a swab on it to apply whatever chemical you select. I would talk with a janitorial supply company for possible chemicals. You may want to consider just making a wire hook. Use three wires bound together about 1.5 inches from the end, and form a grappling hook of the three pieces sticking out of the binding. This is less likely to puncture anything holding freon... Just keep thinking "six hundred dollars! :mad: " while you are going through this ordeal. There are high tech fibreoptic (sp?) cameras around, and if you can borrow one of these, it will make location and extraction simpler. Another option is, once the body is located, to use a dremel tool to cut a section out of a duct, remove the corpse, and epoxy the section back. When it's dry, use a matching spray paint to cover the scar. I know all of this is bubba stuff. Just keep thinking "six hundred dollars! :banghead: " CB
<edit/add: Just for the heck of it, check with your insurance company :disappoin regarding your comprehensive coverage. If a goat got in your truck and ate the seats they would cover that, and if the goat died, it'd ... you get the picture. It's worth a try. Additionally, not all systems require removal of the dash. If the little guy was in the fan, and it appears so, lots of GM fans are really easy to remove. Not sure about yours--too new for me. (I am--on this forum--a lonely '84 Blazer owner) Good luck. Let us know how this plays out. > CB

Hello;
man!!! i feel sorry for you. I just checked to how see how hard it would be to remove the fan. I have a 99-S10 blazer, come to find out,well ,it seems they went and made it really hard to remove the fan. you have to remove the Whole dam ac unit just to get to the fan from under the hood. they make these vehickles harder and harder to work on. from what it sounds like the critter is in your fan. you will have to get the fan out, thus that seems to be where the critter has had his demise. on the older blazer,s it only took four screw to remove the fan. i can see where thier getting a 600.00 price tag, mostly labor to remove all the equiptment just to get to the fan

Well, thanks so much to all of you who weighed in on our problem! After much wrestling, my husband and I were finally able to get to the blower motor/fan and once we pulled that out (and recovered from the stench) we found the remains of a pretty decent sized rat laying just beyond the fan (I guess that's what we get for living out in the country). We got him out, vacuumed the area as well as we could with a shopvac to get any residual, and wiped it out with bleach wipes. So, hopefully this solves the problem.

Thanks again candywrapper and criticalbass for your help and support!

Hmm!
I,m glad you got the rat out.What i cant figure out ,how in the world could he got in the blower assembly.What you might want to check to see if you have any holes in your floor board,firewall,(look under your truck to see any of the water drainage plugs got knocked out) they,re rectangular shaped plugs under driver, and passanger side floorboards. also in the back floor boards,one on each side too.is any of your vents chewed up on the inside on dash. check where heat vents on the floor come out to see they were chewed on.the only way i know of this rat to get in is from the inside of the truck. all that on the outside is sealed up.look the whole truck over to see if there is any other way he got in.
Maybe you left your door open for a while and he crawed in when stepped away from the vehickle