Under the passenger side of the dash board, there is what would seem to be an air vent duct with two electrical plugs / sockets going into the bottom of it.
The one near the passenger door burnt the top of my wifes foot this evening while driving on some errands,--the motor must have been running for a total of twenty minutes.
I checked the wiring and all seems well - except for the heat.
Once the engine is turned off it cools down, and it takes about five minutes to re-heat??

Any one have any input as to what this is caused by and the cure??

I will be going in to my dealership asap and post their findings, untill then....

 

If its the plug its self heating up youve got a loose connection.

However for speed control with these simple DC motors all thats done is to insert a resistance in series with the motor dropping the voltage across the motor. The current going through the resistor produces power and this power is dissipated as heat. These resistor banks are usually fitted to an aluminum finned block to help dissipate that heat.

My parents have a Honda something wagon (we call it the brown car, thank goodness they have cooler vehicles they can drive) and it had the connector that fed the resistor bank burn out about like you describe. The plug had a loose connection and was visibly discolored. I just did some splicing and hard wired it together. The Honda had the aluminum block for heat dissipation and I found that it would get decently warm if you ran it on lower settings.

I dont know if the Ram has this sorta setup with the finned aluminum and such but I DO know that it does use simple resistors for speed control (got the service manual right in front of me).

So you might have a loose connection or maybe you are feeling part of that resistor bank.

Do you have any visible effects from too much heating like burnt/discolored/melted plastic?

 

Thank you Dave B,
no I do not have any discolouring, only the electric tape seems to be unravelling due to the heat.
I just did not have the time to get into the dealership today, but the sevice tech I called said I need to bring her in asap.
This should be tomorrow,
will let you know what they find.

 

Davebin VA.
yes you were correct, this must have been a loose plug as you mentioned.
I called Dodge as I was heading out on a 250 mile one way trip, asked the service co-ordinator if I could bring her in to have someone varify that I could make the trip without getting caught on fire!
I was told that No! I could not bring the truck in as it would effect other customers if they had to spend any time on my truck!
Thanks to you and a few test drives all is well!

 

find another dealer. mine drops everything if i come in for something minor. my stuff is never a safety hazard either! good luck on finding out what it is

brett

 

Great advice,
I saw a new dealership approx' 10miles further, I will be looking them up!

 

....so if Dealer "B" was working on your truck, and then abandoned it to work on a few others how would that make you feel. You guys are just too much sometimes. Nobody is as important as "you" apparently.

 

it makes me feel like a million bucks. my service manager is the only reason why i would ever buy dodge again! the place where i bought my truck left me with such a bad taste in my mouth, that i was done with them. i switched to a dealer that was closer to my house and it made all the difference in the world. and its nothing major being done to mine...little things like checking the injectors w/ the star scan, tightening up my review mirror...little things like that. i did have to leave it for 4 hrs to get the blend door fixed and in the process they cut my dash. that might be why they are so helpful is becuase i didnt make a big deal about it and gave them 3 tries to fix it w/o having to buy a new dash! but they ended up buying one anyways and it will be installed shortly

brett

 

A good service rep and delaer are worth they're weight in gold...

 

JBODY,
I don't know which planet you live on, but here in the real world they way a topic is handled will either make or break a realationship.
All I needed was the assurance that I would be o.k to go on a long trip without my $40,000.00 truck catching fire.
Amazingly I was able to get info on this forum - not only what could possibly be the cause - but turned out to resolve the problem as well.
Thanks again to davebin VA.
Service and courtesy are lacking, I have always had good results from my dealership, but this new guy needs to learn he will be costing the dealership more than he is trying to save.
End Rant

 

Yes service is VERY important....but the "feeling" i'm getting here is that a few think that everyone should drop what they are doing and pay attention to "ME ME ME"!!!

....sorry Mr. Johnson. We were not able to finish your truck today because Mr. Smith came in so we dropped what we were doing to help him...


So do we want to be Mr. Johnson? or Mr. Smith?

Being on the "tech" end of this has given me a whole new understanding to waiting at the doctors office....it doesn't bother me in the least any more.

 

why did they cut your dash brett?