Heater Core Replacement Question

Howdy All

I have a 1970 Buick GSX (tribute car) , 455 Stage 2, TB 400 SB, with air conditioning.

I need to replace my heater core. The repair manual says I need to tear apart the inside quit a lot to do it.

My question is I've been hearing and reading a lot about having to remove the right fender to do it.

Is this true, do I really need to pull the fender to replace the heater core ??? Or is it just easyer to replace the heater core if you pull the fender ???

Click on the attached photo to see my set up, the heater hoses run to the fender side of the heater box.

I haven't worked on older cars for years so I have forgotten a lot of the old tricks, I still remember some though :Brow: . I'm relearning a lot now that I have bought this car. I'm remembering the old days when I worked on these cars when they were new and I was a young wrench turner.

It seems strange to pull the fender to do it but I have seen a lot of strange things that you have to do. I've worked on vehicles where I had to pull the Y-pipe to change the starter, remove a motor mount and lift the engine to replace a spark plug, remove the rear bumper to replace the rear spring shackle and so on, so it wouldn't suprize me if I had to remove a fender, it's just stupid if I have to ou: .

Thanks

David

 

Check this link....should do the trick.

http://www.v8buick.com/showthread.php?t=45622&highlight=heater+core

 

Great, Thank You, this should work (from that thread)

The manual says to remove the fender, but if you look at the plastic cover over the assembly on the inside of the car, you will see in the bottom right hand corner, a round emboss. If you drill a 5/16 hole through the middle of the emboss, you will take out the stud that requires the fender removal. Then follow the directions in the manual and you can pull the heater core . When reassembling the unit, a little dum-dum in the hole will disguise what you did, and the three remaining bolts hold the assembly just fine.

And thank you to "The Old Guy" Joe Taubitz for posting that help !!! :TU:


My manual doesn't say anything about removing the fender that's why I asked.

And a huge thank you for not being one of those guys that just yell at you to do a search :TU: .

I'll try to take some photo's and post them to help the next guy :beers2: .

 

David,

Similar to what you've seen I opened the wheelhouse of my REAL GSX (with A/C) years back to get to the bolt. I knew at the time that fender removal was the factory method. I unbolted the few bolts at the bottom of the fender where they meet the wheelhouse, pried the two parts open from underneath so that I could touch that bolt. I put my nose in the gap, lined up my fingers in stereo vision on either side of the wheelhouse and drew a chalk circle on the wheel side. With a one inch hole saw I opened the wheelhouse about 300 degrees at the chalk circle, pulled down the metal flap and found the bolt at my finger tips. After completing the heater core R&R job I folded the metal flap back in place and sealed it up with chewing gum or other appropriate goo. It could have easily been welded shut too.

My current car has a similar but more primitive solution completed by the original owner. They were not smart enough to only open the hole enough to pull down the flap; they opened a larger, complete hole.

Good luck with yours!

 

Thanks

I was thinking on the same lines as you.

I'm thinking about seeing were the bolt is like you did then cutting the hole open and then pluging it with a rubber drain plug like they use in JEEP floors, I think I still have a few of them kicking around, my JEEP was aways full of mud so I just left them out :Brow: . Or I was thinking something like one of the expandable freeze plugs might work.

Thanks again guys, as it's been said it is great to have a bunch of nice folks out here to help someone out, I know i always try to help also when someone asks for help.

I may just end up waiting till cold weather when I can just park it down in the garage and work on it, I don't want to tie it up now that we are having good weather and I don't need the heater .

I will make sure to get photo's when I do it though to share.

 

I will be doing this very soon, but the whole front clip is off of my car, so I hope it won't be too terribly bad. I usually don't have that kind of luck though.

Bob

 

I am doing that job next week. I thought the inner fender removal would be relatively easy. Any problems I am not thinking about?

 

fender liner is fairly simple, at least on the passenger side. have done it twice, once for painting and once for installing the front body bushings at the firewall base.
suggest that u support the open hood on that side witha 2x4 to relieve pressure on the fender.

 

On my '68 GS I had to take the hood and fender off. After that heater core went bad (about 8 years later) I did all the work again. This time I just left the offending nut off. I'm not sure that's much of an option with the AC box. Some large late '60s and early '70s Fords have the heater core under the hood, and they just drop into the AC/heater box. Good thing, too, some of them snacked on heater cores.

I've tuned up a '77 Chevy Monza in 45 minutes, back in the day. That's cap, rotor and all 8 plugs, check/set the timing. Mitchell manual says 3.2 hours. My little sis got a good deal on her tune ups.

 

On my '68, there is no way that I can see to remove the inner fender with the outer fender on. Unless maybe the engine was out. YMMV.

 

Well it can be done on a 71. It was pretty easy once I figured it out. Will be very easy if there is a next time. The bad news is I think I need a core support.