5th Gen vents smell awful when running?

I have a ‘22 ORP and recently the vents have started smelling like absolute shit when you turn the AC on. Truck has 11k miles on it, so practically brand new. Went ahead and swapped out the cabin air filter with no result.

What could be causing this? Is there condensation in the lines that built up mold/bacteria?

 

You are 100% correct. Find the inlet for the recirc and spray Lysol down them while it's running, then shut it down to let it set. My 4R hasn't done this, but I had another car that did.

 

You can pretty easily determine if this is the source or not, but I had a mouse crawl into my fresh air vent on an older 4Runner (1996). I tried but failed to find it until it mummified and got sucked into the fan motor and blocked the brushes. Then I had to develop go-go gadget hands to pull the motor out, and blow the remnants of the flattened mouse carcass out of the motor. It worked with some patience and a strong compressor. I put clean motor back in and never had that problem again. Knock on wood.

 

I don't have a link at the moment, but there was a recent thread about this very problem, with some suggestions and solutions. A search should turn up that thread.

 

It’s this one:

https://www.4runners.com/threads/this-damn-musty-smell.27786/