Hey all, I had a small scare with my 74 duster. It got a little chilly here 2 weeks back and I had to use my defroster. Went fine until I stopped in traffic. Then the smoke began rolling uot of my vents. Freakred out everybody around me,scared me, I don't want to lose my Duster. Couldn't see sh--. Luckilly there was an entrance to a parking lot, I pulled in, shut off the engine and bailed out. After realizing it was pine needles in the heater box I grabbed the gallon of water from the trunk and emptied 3/4 of it all over my dash and down the vents to try to save the thing. About 10 min. later I thought all was good so I started the car to see if anything was screwed up. Problem was, in my haste to put out the fire I didn't shut off the fan motor. Turn ign., fan runs, fire gets air, blah, blah, all starts again. Anyway after concluding that no real damage was done, I went on and drove home,LMAO the whole way. This car, I have no doubt, will carry me through winter and into next summer without any real problems. They don't make 'em like they used to. Love my DODGES and PLYMOUTH.

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ifyoubegintothinkyou'relosingcontrol...it'salreadygone

Glad you saved the car.
Hope you cleaned out the heater box. Or might have to replace the heater box.

The fire was started by the resistor that is mounted on the heater box. The wires get hot when the fan motor is running and with leaves and pine needles piled up around it, it gets red hot and starts on fire.

This works on a heater only car....... you can fit a piece of window screen in the box between the temperature door and the heater core where the resistor is. There is a flat surface on about 3 sides and the other side (top?) you need to cut the screen to fit. Then glue it in with some RTV silicone. That's what I did with my car. It kept all the junk out of the heater core and resistor and then I just open the vent door to scoop out all the junk stopped by the screen.

Good idea, Thanks for the info. As I didn't have time, all I did was remove the resistor from it's mounting place, plug the hole and continue on.

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ifyoubegintothinkyou'relosingcontrol...it'salreadygone