My car was a "field find" from Southern Colorado--no rust, tons of tumble weeds in the suspension and inside. Otherwise, no problems except for cat pee smell(I changed seats and got rid of that) and rat or mouse poop smell. I cleaned out the trunk very well and sprayed Lysol. It helped for awhile but today, I was in traffic and the cooling fan kicked on. The result was strong mouse or rat poop smell. When I got home, I sprayed some more Lysol in the areas where I originally dug it out but it stll smells. Now I am getting tired of Lysol smell. No new mouse droppings that I could see so it is the old stuff that just won't go away. Anyone have a solution?

LMAO !!

I bet a good majority of that smell is in your HVAC ductwork. To totally get rid of it you may need to pull out your dash so you can get the ductwork out and hose/bleach it out. May be a nest in your heater core too !

You haven't truly experienced life until you are stuck in traffic, and kick the fan on high, only to discover that your fiero's AC no longer works, and at the same moment you bang on the dash in frustration you see out of the corner of your eye a rodent dropping flying towards your face.

quote Originally posted by Mike Gonzalez: LMAO !! I bet a good majority of that smell is in your HVAC ductwork. To totally get rid of it you may need to pull out your dash so you can get the ductwork out and hose/bleach it out. May be a nest in your heater core too !

Exactly.

The concentrated liquid Lysol rocks in comparison to the spray or you can use a mild bleach and water mixture. The truck carpet is nearly 100% synthetic and you can literally drown it in cleaning / deodorizing solution and not harm it and best of all, it'll dry fast for you. In some cases that I, as a professional cleaning technician, cannot get totally rid of an odor, we'll overcome it with another scent. Do a quick search for OdorX bad odor block, these little powerhouses will cover up a skunk. As with most odors, you'll have to let everything "off-gas" for a while, keep the windows open as much as you can.

Good luck.

Open the front hood and pull off the heater blower motor, and the resistor panel right next to it. It's very easy to pull out. Then take the vacuum cleaner and clean out your mouse nest. Do both holes.

You had to smell that stuff while you did my conversion, Mike. Sorry. No wonder you finished it in three hours. But thanks for the idea of checking out the HVAC. I bet the Princess smells like a rose.

I appreciate the OdorX and other suggestions that should get rid of it. I need to get inside the heater/AC ducts anyway so this is a good opportunity. If things work out, I'll drive the Fiero to Texas in October and possibly Mississippi and I sure don't want to smell rat poop for 2000 miles. Texas in October is like Colorado in July.

Took the Fiero out for a spin after I originally posted and it still has a faint odor of rodent poop.

The stuff in your heater box is a fire hazard

Better wear a respirator when cleaning that mouse crap. The dust from that (deer mice) will kill you.

See this thread to give you some idea of what you will find

https://www.fiero.nl/forum/Forum2/HTML/110196.html

quote Originally posted by aaronkoch: You haven't truly experienced life until you are stuck in traffic, and kick the fan on high, only to discover that your fiero's AC no longer works, and at the same moment you bang on the dash in frustration you see out of the corner of your eye a rodent dropping flying towards your face.

OMG that made me laugh so hard i about spit my coffee out.. and yes.. I know that all too well.

Pretty much on any new to me fiero, one of the first things is to pull the carpet, take them to a car wash and power wash them.

While the console is off, use compressed air to remove any and all debris (usally cigarrette ash, but occasionally something worse.

Then pull the HAVC cover on the spare tire side and clean out the area.

The fiero heater fire is my slide show. Any fiero that sat for a long time could have leaves/nest stuff in the heater box that could burn down the car. For a quick check, just remove the heater blower resister, stick a wire down to the bottom to see ( feel ) for any thing. You get a lot of respect in traffic when the car is on fire!

I would also remove the interior carpet the power wash it along with the HVAC duct work.

My Fiero sat in a field for 15 years. There was a mouse nest in the console, along with a dea mouse and ptrobly two nests in the air input and AC ducting. It is real important to clean out the ducting. I have washed and scrubbed trunk carpets outside the car with a bleach solution and it does not fade the color. I would also pull the carpeting and if the jute backing is smelly, replace thew backing as well as it is not expensive.
Jim

It looks like I have a lot of work to do. I think the mice brought in seeds, grass and other things into the heating ducts.

One day right after I got my Fiero back from Mike Gonzalez, I took my wife for a spin to impress her. About three or four miles from town I smelled smoke. She smelled smoke. I bought a fire extinguisher just in case. The smell of smoke got stronger but we couldn't see any smoke but knew something was burning. The car sat under a pine tree for about three months before I started work on it and before I handed it over to Mike for the conversion. I pulled a lot of pine needles out of the leaf guard and after reading this very informative thread, I see how they got into it. I have a lot of knowledge now and a place to start. Thanks so much to all who posted.

While out for my spin, my wife couldn't get out of the car without help despite not being overweight, I got stuck inside when the driver side door caught on a curb. At a stop light, I stopped a Ford truck from cutting me off. When we got home and still smelled the leaves, pine needles, rodent poop and after I turned off the engine, my wife said, "Well! That was interesting." She never rode with me after that but she still tells people the story of the smoke and beating a big Ford truck.

yeah... and watch opening the doors at gas stations.. that curb by the pumps is lethal to the doors. My wife keeps telling me to put a lift kit in the car or make it a convertable so she can stand up to get out of it.. I just laugh. The car is for me, it's my project car and if people don't want to ride in it, well they can always follow me in something else. lol.

my verry first fiero was the house of mouse it was a 84 I got last summer and i had to part it out I tried everything I gutted the car in and out and the smell was infused with the metal I power washed the chassi i painted it nothing helped grrrr lots of dead mice under the council and carpets will do that I guess.