Okay guys the truck sat out all winter and became the home sweet home for a family of mice. Earlier this spring when I first started it the dash was covered in little mouse pellets and now when I turn the fan on it smells bad and blows more pellets out the floor vents. I tried to use a vacuum to suck it out of the vents and an air hose to blow it out but i'm guessing that this requires a more serious cleaning. Any ideas about where the major nest is? heater core? in the main intake line? I'm hoping there is an easy way to get to at it without tearing my whole dash apart. It looks like the intake is on the passenger side in front of the glove box. It wouldn't normally matter but the a/c is nice when I close the windows to keep the bugs out.
Here's an excellent post from Dynobob dealing with the same issue. http://www.minitrucktalk.com/showthread.php?t=9666 This is for a S210P Hijet with the air intake behind the left headlamp.
ahha! thank you! I should have tried searching for mouse instead of mice. dang I just figured where there is one there is many.
That really is a problem finding them. they don't like mothballs, but that doesn't do you much good at this stage. Usually they come home (your truck) at night to clean and sleep. In the daylight they seem to be out doing stuff and not at home I've found. I have been dealing with them lots here at our place and have learned a few things about them. If you use poison to kill them, they go out and find water then go somewhere to die (usually at home I found) Trapping them is best and they love peanut butter. I bet the're in a corner of the heater core entrance, but they could be anywhere in the air line. Try a compressor hose and blow the vent from inside the truck. plug one side while you blow the other though, if it's just a nest it could blow out and try to seal around the compressor hose with a rag or something. If it's dead animals in there too it might not loosen up. maybe also try some sort of "fishline" like a thin wire and snake it into the vent to loosen up the paper nest ball, etc. Just don't do this at night. I would move the truck for a few days to so they won't have the home to come to and will move off looking elsewhere. This is a very difficult time since most animals are having babies right now so they may be in the nest. Here's a pic of what I got out of my basement in a month. Good luck, Steve
Yep well I've been moving it around for several months so i'm not concerned with live ones. I have redone several clutches in WD-9s where they really seem to like. there is a gap around the bottom of the engine that originally had felt to plug it but that falls out after a few years. the first one I did was full to the top with a sort of nasty frozen dirt type of consistency with a few dead ones mixed in. the mummies always got stuck in the vacuum I also redid a 1966 honda dream and guess what that had in the frame... mice. they chewed up all the wires and wrecked the air filter. so yeah I'm sick of mice. At least its not rats
When I worked off shore in the G of M I would be gone for 14 days at a time. One time I rolled up to the house(living in the country at that time)around 2am. When I got out of the truck I could smell something awful. When I opened the door I like to have fell over. I walked into the kitchen and blood was all over the floor. Refrigerator had gone out. I turned around walked to my truck and slept in it. Day light I got up and cleaned up the mess. I used everything in the book (bleach, lemon juice ect) to clean up. For weeks the smell was still inside the refrigerator. I ran the smell problem by my wonderful mother. She said next time you go off shore get a couple of bags of bar-b-q bricks and put some in the bottom, up top, behind, kitchen counter ect. Guess what? Smell was completely gone. Those bricks sucked up every bit of the smell. Being a betting man I would have lost that round. With that said might be worth a try after cleaning up the mouse poop and mouse secretions.
Okay tore into the mini tonight and found some but not much mouse litter on the intake side of the a/c core. I tore my dash apart to fix a stupid cable and decided to pull out the main ducts directly above the hot cold fan levers. I could see the fan and what looked like feathers and other pieces of mouse nest inside it! stuffed plum full. sorry no pics yet it was getting dark and I was working outside. Does anyone know if I have to remove the entire dash to take apart the main duct and heater core area? I'm torn because the dash is already half off but I don't want to open another can of beans. You know what I mean? I think I remember trying to take the dash off quite a while ago but stopped when the gage cluster gave me troubles.
I was lucky. they chewed my blanket behind the seats and took it outside to between the tool box and the bed and made a home!
Go ahead and pull the whole dash. Its not fun but with two people its not that bad. Warning!!! Anything that can be picked up and thrown against the sheet rock/windows needs to be placed in a secured area. You know what I mean. The hard part is stabbing the speedo cable when reinstalling. Got to have two people, one on each side. Make sure you have some adult beverage around and take plenty of breaks.
Reminds me of when I went to sell my old '89 Corolla All-Trac wagon last year. It had had a mouse problem for a while. I had been setting one trap at a time with peanut butter and getting a mouse a day for about a week. I noticed that I'd have one mouse in the trap but the peanut butter would be gone. Thus proving the old adage "The early bird gets the worm but the second mouse gets the cheese" I always pictured the second mouse eating away saying: "you gonna finish this? Hey, you don't looks so good!" Anyway, I finally got smart and set about 7 traps at once. Finally got em all after a day or two.
Oh! I remember one more vehicle that had mice problems. Last year I worked on a 1972 super bug that had been sitting for 20 years. they got in by eating through the heater ducting and then built a nest in the rear passenger floor vent. I'm perty sure they also had one inside the fan shroud but I never got ambitious enough to tear that apart. they also pissed all over the fuse connections making me replace all of them and that was a rats nest all by itself! so for the speedo I have to unhook it at the front wheel? or wherever it goes to?
okay first is of my fan not sure how visible it will be second is of the tin walls and barred windows of my shop so I'm not too worried about breaking windows and sheetrock the b-ball hoop is why they're barred Third pic is of the front of my shop 50' by 80' hope nobody gets jealous In between the pics is a 8120 caseih combine that will be combining a whopping 90 acres this year. so yeah to say we got a little to much rain this spring is understating it I'm thinking I will try blow out everything before I suffer the hell that will be the removal of the dash. I think I can get at everything it's just a question of whether of not it will come out.
okay I think I solved this the easy way. Instead of tearing my whole dash out I took my air compressor 120 psi and put it right on the fan. It spun that baby super fast and threw out all the mouse nest. I alternated between blowing on the fan and blowing in behind the a/c unit and that seems to have done it. sprayed some lysol in there and now the truck smells like lysol with mouse nest visible everywhere. no mouse smell anymore but it may return. fingers crossed
I know you said not to but I can't help myself....shop envy....yup....my 2 car garage just doesn't cut it.....hope yer proud of yourself jk...glad you got the eviction worked out I work in a 120 year old building and we have our share of mouse issues....the inmates have always made 5 gallon bucket traps and they work perfectly...always used toilet paper tubes instead of pop cans/bottles http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jezQKOl5q-w&feature=related
It sounds like you need to get yourself your own farm shop! lol but yeah I hate mice with the passion of 10,000 undying suns and the little bastards still cross me. oh well and that reminds me I need to go do some mouseproofing sometime. Anyone going to the Farm progress show this week? It's in Regina I'm going tomorrow oh and on that video looks like that works good! I've heard thats how you catch escaped hamsters too and the comments made me realize that there ARE people who have never had problems with mice. here is another good mousetrap video the third mouse is crazy http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MV9woxUshuA&feature=related
I used an even easier version of that 5gal bucket method once for getting rid of a particularly overwhelming chipmunk infestation; just fill the bucket about 1/2 full, sprinkle sunflower seeds on the top (they float) and prop a 2x4 ramp on it. Wicked effective. I felt a bit bad though I'll have to admit. Mice, on the other hand, I have no sympathy.
crap! i was up there yesterday! if your going down hwy 39 to get home your gonna pass me! give me a pm and come check out the liteace if you wish
sorry stuff I missed u we went up and back through Fortuna on my side anyways so no Estevan in the itinerary. On the way back went by Rouleau to check out the Corner Gas sets never seen them in the flesh before! Very neat!
