I was driving into work today and all of the sudden I started to smell something weird in the cabin. At first I thought it was smoke from a deisel car in front of me, but then a few moments later white smoke was filling the cabin coming from the footwell blower motors. I immediately pulled over and by this time the whole entire cabin was filled with white smoke. I freaked out thinking something is on fire etc. The smoke cleared and then realized the blower motor in the engine is not working anymore and my heater is not working.

Does this sound like a blown motor somewhere???

The heater does does not come on?
I checked all the fuses in the back of the engine and they are all fine?
Does this appear to be a blown motor fan? The big one in the engine area?

Any ideas greatly appreciated!!

 

oto - white smoke out the heating system is common if you have overfilled the oil reservoir. What model 911 do you have?

 

My car is a 86 coupe. The oil level is fine. The smoke was not a oil burning smell. The smoke smelled like something electrical???

 

I had the same thing happen to me. Smoke came out of the dash vents though. Fuse 1 popped. As expected my powerwindows dont work, but neither does the blower. Still not resolved. I had to put it away for the winter. I am curious as to how you fix yours. I will try the same.
Mike

 

Is fuse 1 in the rear engine compartment?

 

As I have discovered to my sorrow in my own 86 coupe, not all the wires under the dash are fused. If one has shorted it can get hot enough to melt the insulation off the wire, creating white smoke like you discribe and has it's own distinct bad smell. Yes there is a potential for an electrical fire. Either find a good P-car mechanic or get a wiring diagram and a VOM and start digging.

 

My bet is that your heater blower motor has crapped out. You can check it by removing it and putting it on a bench and running wires from a battery to the positive and negative sides of the motor to see if anything happens. If it comes on, you have a problem with the fuse(s) or wiring. You can check the footwell blowers the same way.

 

Fuse 1 in front compartment.
Mike

 

The Relay for the blower motor is in the engine compt. too. Fixed mine. Sounds like you have too high amp. of fuse somewhere that should have blown first. White smoke is as described by Chris usually wires burning since we don't have radiators. I would not drive it and tow it someplace reputable or have someone come to you before melting anything.

 

The footwell blowers are known to burn. The early carrera's left the factory without inline fuses to help prevent a disaster like this. Later years included a fuse and the blowers were wired in such a way that anytime you called for heat [ lifting the red levers] the blowers would slowly spin..even if the speed switch was in the zero or off position. What happens is there is so much heat hitting the blowers that the bearing cooks, seizes draws a lot of current and blows the fuse if you have one..or some wiring if you don't. Another scenerio is the plastic squirrel cage gets loose and works its way down the shaft and fuses itself to the plastic housing..another interesting smell, high current draw and hopefully another blown fuse. The spinning blower helps to direct the heat away from the bearing. Again, the cure is to fuse each one of the blowers and set them up so that they always spin when you call for heat.