If you’re a car buff who likes to take a personal interest in the well-being of your vehicle, then this is probably a familiar story to you. Last night a friend told me that his E39 BMW 528i’s A/C system stopped working and that according to his mechanic (independent service shop) the blower fan was at fault. 
The mechanic said that in order to replace the blower fan he’d have to take out the whole dashboard. Leaving aside the “why are there spare parts left” factor, we’re talking about 6 hours of labor plus the cost of the blower fan (we reckon a total somewhere in the range of $600 to 800).
To make a long story short, we googled the problem to see what bimmer enthusiasts had to say about it on the forum boards. As anticipated, forum members advised E39 owners to check out the fuse box first. Easier said than done as the blower fan fuse on the E39 is located separately behind the glovebox. Following the use of foul language on German engineering, we discovered that the fuses weren’t to blame. -Continued
Next thing to check according to the helpful guys at “Bimmerfest” and “Unitedbimmer”, the number one suspect for E39 A/C problems: the blower motor resistor, a small part half the size of a packet of cigarettes located at an accessible point on the passenger’s side of the center tunnel. With this knowledge in hand my friend ordered the spare part and took it the mechanic. Turns out –surprise, surprise- that the $65 blower motor resistor was the culprit. While he could of done it by himself, he preferred to pay the mechanic another $100 to change the part.
We’re not saying that all car-related problems are as simple as this, but it doesn’t hurt to surf the internet for half an hour to see what other fellow vehicle owners on specialized forums have to say about it. Who knows, you might get as lucky as my friend…
