Mold smell...again

[Juelze]

So, I had my car in late fall of 2006 to have the mold smell eradicated due to use of my defrost. Now that it's summer and I'm using the A/C I smell some mold for a few minutes then it goes away. I recall people saying that it's best to run the vent (with A/C turned off) for 5 minutes before you park your car. I don't know if it's in the manual or not but I find that suggestion ridiculous. There is no reason that you should have to sacrifice comfort by turning off your A/C to prevent mold from growing in your vent tubes.

Anyway, when I brought my car in last time they found no clogs in the drain tubes but sprayed some mold killer in my car which lasted for a few weeks. I want to bring it in again but they don't provide a loaner car which sucks big time. Should I live with it or should this definitely be something should be prevented?

[kc5f]

From what I've read, you don't need to run with the A/C off before you park, but you do want to make sure you don't leave it in "Recirculate" when you're not driving it. Otherwise the moisture in the car stays in the car instead of having some airflow while it's closed up.

I've also seen suggestions to run it with "Recirculate" off and the windows open for the first few minutes when you start up in hot weather, and then turn it to "Recirculate" if you want. (I run mine in "Outside Air" all the time, since I like fresher air, and have never had a mold problem in any car.)

[CodeRed]

i ALWAYS leave mine on recirculate. my parents have used it on there cars for yeard and never had a problem and i live in Florida where its humid. ive never had a problem thus far but i mostly drive with my windows down.

[proxim2020]

Try to run without using the recycle setting and see how it goes.

[Eastval1]

I'm having the same problem with my V, and living in Arizona makes it just about impossible to drive with the windows down. I'm going to try taking it off "recirculate" while parked and see if that helps. However, I've never had problems leaving any other car on recirculate.

[StanBo]

I can see where the problem arises leaving it on recirc as it will just keep recircing the moist air.

These don't have a natural flow even though the hvac is shut off? I thought this was put in so they wouldn't get moldy.

[Juelze]

Try to run without using the recycle setting and see how it goes.

I actually have my on the setting that shows the arrow bringing in air from the outside to the inside. In fact, I don't think I ever used recirculate on it. I tried using it the other day on a whim and it seemed like the mold smell wasn't present at all. Looks like I'm going to drop my car off and take my motorcycle to work for a few days and have the stealership look at it if it doesn't improve. :-(

[proxim2020]

You're upset because you have to ride your bike to work I wish I had one Stupid wife and finances

[Juelze]

You're upset because you have to ride your bike to work I wish I had one Stupid wife and finances

Riding your bike when it's 70-80 degrees is one thing, riding in 55 degree weather when it's raining is another.

So my car is at the dealer. They said they didn't smell anything, of course. I explained that it happens within the first 5-10 minutes of using the defrost or A/C and then it goes away. They said they called Nissan was told that if I have the A/C on and I park my car to run it with the A/C off for about 1 minute to clear all the moisture out of it. Sounds like B.S. to me. I explained to the svc tech that I haven't used the air in months and when I turned it on the mold smell was obvious. He said that Nissan said they can remove the heater core and soak it in anti-bacterial soap for 3-4 hours to kill any bacteria and that might be another option. However, the service tech at my dealership (Gandrud Nissan), said that they don't like to take apart a taste if they don't have to as it that's when rattles and the like start to occur. So, what they are going to do is spray some GM disinfectant in the vents and see if it goes away. I explained that this was done last time "Not according to the computer" the svc tech said. I advised that a disinfectant was sprayed last time, but again was told that if they did, it wasn't stated in the computer. I must be an idiot then because that's what I told and I smelled a lemon scent in my car after they did that.

So my options are:

1. Hope the General Motors disinfectant works.2. Have them tear my dash apart to get to the heater core and clean that in hopes it rids the moldy smell.3. Live with the fact that when the A/C or defrost is used on my car I have to breathe in mold for 5-10 minutes.

I told the service tech "I guess when I have a passenger ask why my car smells like mold I can tell him or her that all Versas do that."

Anyway, I'm hoping the disinfectant works again otherwise I'm going to be a bit po'd. If I had a loaner vehicle it would make my life easier.

[StanBo]

Riding your bike when it's 70-80 degrees is one thing, riding in 55 degree weather when it's raining is another.

So my car is at the dealer. They said they didn't smell anything, of course. I explained that it happens within the first 5-10 minutes of using the defrost or A/C and then it goes away. They said they called Nissan was told that if I have the A/C on and I park my car to run it with the A/C off for about 1 minute to clear all the moisture out of it. Sounds like B.S. to me. I explained to the svc tech that I haven't used the air in months and when I turned it on the mold smell was obvious. He said that Nissan said they can remove the heater core and soak it in anti-bacterial soap for 3-4 hours to kill any bacteria and that might be another option. However, the service tech at my dealership (Gandrud Nissan), said that they don't like to take apart a taste if they don't have to as it that's when rattles and the like start to occur. So, what they are going to do is spray some GM disinfectant in the vents and see if it goes away. I explained that this was done last time "Not according to the computer" the svc tech said. I advised that a disinfectant was sprayed last time, but again was told that if they did, it wasn't stated in the computer. I must be an idiot then because that's what I told and I smelled a lemon scent in my car after they did that.

So my options are:

1. Hope the General Motors disinfectant works.2. Have them tear my dash apart to get to the heater core and clean that in hopes it rids the moldy smell.3. Live with the fact that when the A/C or defrost is used on my car I have to breathe in mold for 5-10 minutes.

I told the service tech "I guess when I have a passenger ask why my car smells like mold I can tell him or her that all Versas do that."

Anyway, I'm hoping the disinfectant works again otherwise I'm going to be a bit po'd. If I had a loaner vehicle it would make my life easier.

That is weird. I have a couple friends that worked at a Nissan dealer in NJ and he did a cleaning on my Integra HVAC with the Nissan cleaner.

All we did was run the Integra on full blast cold and he shot the canister thru the system. It was funny as all hell. Foam came out of all of the vents like a washing machine overfilled in the movies.

Car smelled great after that. Smelled like a laundrymat for a couple days but it was well worth it.

[proxim2020]

I've seen something like that before on a car show. It was an evaporator cleaner or something along those lines. You squirt it up the drain tube and it creates foam in the evaporator that's supposed to eat debris, bacterial, and mold and leave a pine smell.

[motoguy128]

I've never owned a car that didn't have at least a slight mold smell when using the A/C for the first time after being unused for more than a few days.

[StanBo]

I've seen something like that before on a car show. It was an evaporator cleaner or something along those lines. You squirt it up the drain tube and it creates foam in the evaporator that's supposed to eat debris, bacterial, and mold and leave a pine smell.

Yep worked great. It was also a plus because I was selling the integra so the new owner got it smelling all nice and fresh.