E53 AC blower

I have a 2002 X5 (E53) which has a bad blower for the a/c and needs to be replaced. The Bentley Service Manual states that the whole dash including steering wheel needs to be pulled to get to the blower. My question Are there any short cuts?????
Ron

Are you sure it is the blower motor and not the FSR that controls it?

Thanks for replying. I am going to say that I believe so. I live about 40 miles from a BMW dealer and that dealer did not impress me before. A local mechanic with BMW training checked the final resistor and stated it was good. However, he was wrong once before. I have the Bentley manual and wow. I have talked to several parts people and that is why I am rethinking on getting the resistor checked again. Do you have any experience with this?

Yes. Buy a BMW (Not an ebay special) FSR and change it out before you do anything else. They only cost around $60 and are a known failure point. The blower motors do fail and the whole dash has to come out to get at it. Go over to xoutpost and do a search there as they have a DIY for the FSR and a guy did a step by step with pictures of dash removal to change out the blower.
GL.