What is this ticking sound?

Starting today, when I turn in my A/C fan, I get this ticking noise. It is there with the A/C on or off. It is also there regardless of where the air is blowing (toward my feet, straight out, up toward the windshield. Hopefully the sound comes through on the video.

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/d81zmDJ0gVk

 

Take the blower out. You may have a leaf or something stuck in the blades. Three screws plus the electrical connector - easy job.

 

Some debris got into your fan or a critter might have gotten in your truck and is starting to make a nest in the blower motor, if I had to guess. I would unplug the motor then take it out to check what's hitting the fan.

You can take it out without messing with the glovebox or dash.

 

Just watched a how-to video on taking the motor off. Seems simple enough. I'll give that a try in the morning.

 

I think I found the culprit...

 

Wow. That's gonna flow so much better once you put it back together. This is probably something everyone should do if they park outside under trees.

If that's what your blower looks like, I wonder how bad the evap coil and its housing are packed up?

 

I can already tell the difference in airflow. And all I did was dump it out and make a few scoops with my finger to get what I could out. I think this weekend I'll give it a more proper cleaning. I'm no expert, but I don't think it was a nest of any sort. The leaves were just loosely in there, nothing was packed down or burrowed into.

 

Yeah, there's no screen to keep that shit out of there. Here's what I'd do next: https://www.tundras.com/posts/3652709

As you'll see from that thread, this "tick" topic comes up pretty regularly. At least a couple times per year. The resistor in that red box of that reply I linked, careful when removing it. It controls your fan speeds and it's a tight fit in there. The ceramic can crack. But it's necessary to properly clean out the evap coil housing.

 

Yeah, I'm thinking I'll just add fan blower cleaning to my annual maintenance schedule.

 

I absolutely love BG's Frigi-Clean product for eating buildup off the coil, then draining it out of the evap housing's nipple drain on the firewall. I don't love that nipple drains onto the swaybar mount, but ...

You can get the Frigi-Clean kits on fleabay cheapest from resellers that shouldn't be reselling, but still do. DO NOT buy it on scAmazon, you'll pay 2x-6x as much. Like, on fleaBay right now I see one seller doing 2 full sets for $41.50! In fact, I just ordered it b/c that's too good of a deal to pass up

Guess I'll be doing the truck and our SUV again this month...

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Oh, that's not to say you can't use any HVAC coil cleaner. You can. There are plenty of foaming cleaners out there. You spray the liquid onto the coil thru the resistor slot, and wait for it to foam and drain. Even Toyota sells a maintenance kit. I can dig up the part number, but any parts counter can probably get it for you and it's around $25-35/kit.