Heater core box help

Finally got home at a reasonable hour and popped the box open. That thing was packed in there! Thanks making sure she was safe Brett. All looks good with it and hopefully i can reassemble the heater box this weekend and get it in the car.

 

When installing the heater core onto the metal plate w/ flap, do you loosely bolt on the metal clamps then slip them over the ends of the core? Or do you place the core on there and then try and bolt on the clamps. Having a bear of a time trying to the second route and thinking I might try the first route.

Thanks for the help.

 

Lay the core in place & install the clamps with screws loosely at both ends. Once the screws/bolts are started then snug them down & everything should go together nicely.

 

Make sure to use the short screws. Otherwise they will hit the core! And poke holes in it! Oh, maybe that's just the AC cars... I guess those photos are Brett's car.

 

I am using the same screws as were there (bag and tag baby).

I'll post pics tonight to illustrate the issue. Currently there is a 1/8" gap from the clamp to the plate making it very difficult to secure.

Ya I used 3m strip caulk between the core and the plate it mounts to. It varies significantly from the non-AC boxes.

 

Gaps

 

Welp, fiddled and fiddled with it. I’m not sure how the tanks may have changed but the metal clamps that secure each end just will not line up. Removed the 3m caulk and still a no go.

Had one of the aluminum cores still and decided to see how that one fit and it works fine.

Trying to stay positive cuz this is getting really frustrating. It looks like there is some solder that is in the way of one of the clamps. Should I try and file it down? I really don’t want to puncture the tank tho.

 

Gaps with no strip caulk and pic of plate.

 

Well through some “gentle” persuasion I finally got it together!!! Woohoo!!!

The clamps don’t all hit the plate but it’s holding it on there and that’s all that matters. I’m still 100% happy with this core and I know that it wasn’t easy for the shop to get it back to 100%. Had I sent it out in the first place I’m sure it would have gone together easier.

Lesson here is don’t trust just any shop. Research research research. I did quite a bit of homework with shops in my area, the shop I originally went with may do stellar work on radiators, but heater cores are different.

Now to assemble the whole box!!!

 

Rock Auto always has good quality parts.

 

Heater box is finally assembled!

 

Thanks Larry, they do carry quite a selection. However they only had aluminum heater cores, which I was trying to steer away from.

 

Went until the screws were tight. Didn’t want to crank much further and have something strip lol.

 

Ok, so now that the box is ready to go back under the dash, I have a couple more questions.

In the seal kit I got for the heater box and ac box, there is this one big seal that appears to go between heater box and firewall. What do you guys think? Does this appear correct?

I was gonna just slap some strip caulk there and mount it to the firewall. After finding this foam seal tho, I think this might be a better route. It will need to be glued to the box to hold in place while mounting. It also needs some trimming to lay flat in some areas.

Thanks again!

Scott