The Stovebolt Site Forums The Parking Lot '60-'66 Trucks heater Blower Question

My old blower kept popping the fuse and although not frozen, I thought it was time to replace it. It moaned and groaned and made a lot of noise. I put in a new blower and fuse, I believe 20 amp. The new blower seems to run great.
Days later my truck would run and then just die unexpectedly. Sometimes it wouldn't start. It wouldn't keep cranking and cranking, it just wouldn't start. Then sometimes it would. I have been pulling my hair out trying to figure out what is wrong with my truck. Then today I think it hit me. As I was driving down the street with my heater "on", my truck just died again. Turned heater off and started right up and came home. Ran her in the driveway, then turned the heater on and simotaneusly the truck died.
I guess my question is what gives? Does the blower require a ground? Could wrong fuse be doing it? Something shorting out?
My motor/carb is in EXCELLENT condition, turn key start everytime, ran flawless before this.
I am running an HEI distributor.
Any help would be great. Thanks!

There should be a ground wire from one of the mounting screws to the firewall ground usually were the engine small ground wire attaches from the valve cover,if my memory is still working.
Never the less you should check to be sure all grounds are in place. Cab to frame,cab to engine front core support to frame or battery,etc.
Good luck,
TGP

I know it's a long shot, but I had a similar problem with my truck a few years ago. If I ran my heater on speed 1 or 2 everything was fine, when I ran it on high - my headlights and dash lights starting going nuts dimming out, coming back, etc. I diagnosed everything I could think of and couldn't find a problem.

It turned out to be my beautiful chrome plated Powermaster alternator. Apparently something internal was failing. During normal operations the engine and vehicle worked perfectly. I don't have many electrical accessories on my truck that draw many amps other than the starter, and I never have the lights on when starting the engine. I discoverd the alternator issues when I started having battery problems. I replaced the alternator with a plain ugly one and I haven't had a problem since. You may have a similar issue.

If not - I'd start by running a new fused power feed for the heater directly from the battery and a new ground wire to the frame or engine block. This should identify if there are too many amps being pulled through the circuit that is currently providing the juice to the heater.

Make sure the heater is wired through the acessory side of the ign. switch. When you turn it to the start position it should turn off the heater. Are you sure the HEI is not useing the resister from the original ign. system.

Once again the stovebolters came through for me. I investigated it further today. After a good nights sleep and a cool head I checked everything under the hood. Perfect....so I went on to under the dash. When I started inspecting the ignition switch, I noticed the pink wire was barely clipped into the ignition switch. As you guys know, the wires go into a black plastic plug, then the plug snaps into the back of the ignition switch. The pink wire was basically falling out of the plug. So, I took her completely out, rebent her a bit, snapped her back into the hard black plastic plug, smeared a little di-electric grease on to the ignition switch, then snapped the plug onto the ignition switch. Whooppeee! I don't want to get to confident yet, but drove her all day and no problems. Also, while running I put a meter on the posts with the heater running and pulled about 14.5 bolts! I think I caused this problem myself, because when I put the new blower in I also installed some new vent tubes under the dash. In wrestling these things, I probably banged some things around under there. Rookie mistake.
Anyways, thanks to all who through in their 2 cents, I will let you know if this is the fix. keeping my fingers crossed.
On another note, my blower also blows the 10 amp fuse consistently. It is a new Thriftmaster. I popped in a 15 amp today and so far so good!

some good info there. I'll be careful when i change my heater hoses next week haha