cherokee's killin me
 

Howdy-Man I hope someone has some advice on this one-Recently bought a 90 Cherokee with 125000 miles, great mechanical shape BUT when I drive it for more than 15 minutes I start having trouble keepin my eyes open,get headaches, nausea, weakness-I'm not nuts although I'm startin to think I am-checked intake vents above hood and applied a cleaner that's injected through the resistor in the vent system under the dash-probably poured two spray cans worth of lysol into vents in every possible fashion. Anyone have any advice? This is about to drive me insane. The kicker is that the interior is immaculate with NO signs of any moisture-the only thing left that I can see is pulling the seats/carpet/dash/vents (FUN) and cleaning it all. Great. Help!

sounds more like an exhaust leak coming into the cabin.Check your exhaust system really good.

Thanks for the quick reply Mike-I should have mentioned that the exhaust was my first suspect-it was in need of replacement-everything from front down pipe to tail was replaced-however, both before and after that, a very sensitive carbon monoxide detector was used in multiple places as well as when jeep was stationary and moving and didn't pick up even a trace. The other thing I didn't mention was this only happens when vents are in use-fresh air, recirc, ac, no ac, you name it-in the off position, windows up or down, everythings fine. So I gotta figure its in the vents or the vents are stirring something else up. I must be nuts.

Do a carfax history of it.Maybe it was in water or something like that.

Maybe you should get one those cans that you blow a keyboard off and blow in your vents it might stir up some dust. and lift your carpet and check for rust.

Check for mold to under your carpets.

Pull your heater fan and duct work to see if there's a dead critter in there or maybe the last owner pimped you and put something in there you happen to be allergic to...

Check for an exhaust leak,i'm 99% sure that's the case.

Hey guys, thanks for all the replies-the next moves will be pulling carpet and vents-there is no smell but who knows. As far as gettin pimped out, I probably deserve it but the seller of the car doesn't know me or anyone even remotely connected to me so thats out. I think I might just pour gas in the vents, light it on fire, and hope I can extinguish it all before it blows up in my front yard.

Does anyone else get sick in it? Do you have any known allergies?

No known allergies-so far no one else seems to be sick but there's only been 2 or 3 other people in it and not for long periods.

EXHAUST LEAK its alot easier to check that then rip apart your interior! and if it is and you rip it apart then what?

Thanks for the EXHAUST LEAK info BUT as I said before, the entire exhaust has been replaced from front down pipe back. That leaves only the manifold. HOWEVER, using a carbon monoxide detector that is capable of picking up 5 parts per million, there is zero, doesn't matter where you put the detector and it doesn't matter if the cars been running for five minutes or one hour, ZERO. I should also mention that its not some cheesy detector from some infomercial-the unit in question is routinely used in a large hvac setting for home detection/repair issues, in other words, it works. Anyhoo, I don't think its the exhaust.

Kinda sounds to me like you might have mold under the carpet or something. Do you have problems sitting in the car with it not running?

It's an easy fix, you are allergic to Jeeps, buy an SUV... JK, If it dosen't affect anyone else, you are allergec to something that sounds like it's in your vent system or just Crazy.