Airconditioning / heater blowers fix - Bosch relais switch faulty 0332014113 12V 30A

As mentioned in the blog about the IHWC roadtrip the air/ventilation blowers stopped working. The functionality of it were playing up before. So effectively I should have tackled this shortcoming earlier. At the time I did look up the involved relais switch and asked a friend who happens to work at Hella to obtain one. I was told they could not be delivered these as it was not recognized (cross referenced). So last Saturday I opened up the switchboard and took it out and went to the local spare parts shop. I was pretty sure it was a normal relais which should be available. And it was. To my surprise they came up with a Hella one. It did had this extra mounting holder though which was easily removed.

Clearly I had made sure beforehand it was the relais which was faulty by reusing the same relais used elsewhere on the board. And it was faulty indeed. So I replaced it by the new Hella relais and presto it was working again. Yes, another item of the list.

I have to admit I don't like the new plastic Hella relais though. The old Bosch relais with the metal housing looks so much more nicer. Despite it's all locked away and not visible I still prefer the old ones. I have seen used ones for sale on Ebay but that does not make sense to me as chances are bigger they can go faulty soon.

Another thought that occurred to me is that the other ones might go faulty/flaky soon as well. In this case the fault was instantly noticeable (and not a big deal) but what about if for example the radiator fan(s) stops working due to a faulty relais. So I'm now thinking to get them all replaced. Would be nice to get some NOS Bosch relais switches (if anyone knows of a batch I'm interested to hear from you). Else I will buy new plastic Hella's. I will also get the fuses replaced by new ones. I discovered one broken fuse used for the heated rear window.

And the new Hella relais (€ 15,-) with the extra mounting holder (which I cut off).