Ive noticed a mysterious little puddle of antifreeze under my firewall on the passenger side. I fear it might be my heater core. I havent felt the carpet inside as of yet, and havent done anything to the heater hoses, or messed around under the dash at all. What im gettin at..is this a difficult replacement? Do you guys have any tips or suggestions to make this job a little less of a pain?
James

Yep, total pain in the butt... I had to take my fender and inner wheel well off the car. The darn bolts/caps that hold the heater cover are hiding under the wheel well. I'm sure there will be some input from others here, this is a common on these cars.


Jeff G.

Great....I really hope I dont have to take off the fender. I just got it put back together.
James

Sorry to break the news to you, it was the only was I knew how... There is a trick but its almost impossible to get your hand in there to get at those nuts that hold the heater cover....

:(

Jeff

Way back in the mid-late 70's I worked at a radiator shop. The way we changed heater cores on GM cars without removing the fender was to drill out the bolt on the lower outside corner of the heater box from the inside of the car. All the rest of the bolts could then be removed from under the dash or hood. Not exactly correct, but saved a lot of work.

That sounds like a leaky heater core. Make sure its not the hose leaking from under the hood before you take it all apart. Its not too hard to change the heater core. You have to remove the heater box from the inside of the car. It unbolts under the hood. And yes you have to remove the fender.

A friend of mine has reccomended a product called Mendtite. Anyone ever try this product? Its supposed to seal up small leaks and what not. Ive neer had much success with fixes outta bottle, and am curious if anyone has used this before.

Please no don't do that! You might block up a water port in your head or worse....
Dont do it....

Jeff

Do a search on heater core replacement. You do not have to pull the fender off!

Ok, Jim. Here is what you have to do.
First a 95% chance that you need a heater core.
Do not put ANY sealer into system. I have NEVER had the heater core stop leaking with one of them, Radiator many times, but not heater core. Don't know why ????

You do NOT have to remove the fender, but you do have to remove the passenger inner fender. Still a pain in the U know WHAT, but removing the fender is a much bigger pain. Just remove the tire and start removing bolts. After the bolts are out, you just have to kind of bent it (folt it) a little and it comes out easier than you might expect, but harder than it should. It is not the hardest part of the job. Once you have the inner fender removed I would like to tell you that all is well and good, but it is not. Once you remove the inner fender that gives you exposure to all the bolts, hose, A/C box, etc.


Now you can remove the fan, a/c box and heater box. Basically the heat box and a/c box are a unit. Each one is a piece of the pie. Do not replace the heater core without replacing the blower motor. Also, this is the ONLY time you will be able to replace the passenger Kick Panel. So replace the kick panel now and repuddy it. You are puddying it because water leaked in through here from the outside. Good time to restore the a/c & heater boxes. Send me your email if you want painting tips and the such. IF YOU HAVE BEEN DYING TO REPLACE THE FIREWALL INSULATION BLANKET, THIS WILL BE YOUR BEST TIME TO DO IT ALSO. I DON'T EVEN WANT TO TELL YOU WHAT IS INVOLVED IN THAT. BUT, IF MINE WAS BAD, THAT IS WHAT I WOULD DO NOW ALSO. NOT THAT HARD, JUST TIME CONSUMING.

Obviously the heater core is in the heat box. You will find that NO one sells the correct heater core. (At least no one last year.) Measure the size of your and call around. You are measuring the rectangular piece NOT the end caps. I did get one that the core was the correct size from a company called Classic Muscle, but don't complain to them when it does not fit. They have weak backbones and were not interested in talking to their supplier about a few changes that they could make to "make it fit." I sent this unit that did not fit to a radiator shop with my old one and the radiator shop installed a new end cap and put my OLD tubed end on the new core. This is a recore. Now it fits perfect.
And if you want to rebuild this heat box, that too is a pain but well worth it for how well it will look when you get done. Mine looks brand new. My A/C Box is also restored. If you need to replace the A/C box, NO ONE make OUTER part of the box. Take good care of both. You would rather use your old if not broke. If the inner is broke, buy a replacement from one of the parts houses.

When you remove the bolts and nuts, WRITE DOWN WHERE EACH ONE GOES. DO NOT FORGET THIS. If you get in trouble, I have a bail out sheet that I wrote. When you tighten the bolts to the cowl, it is VERY easy to tighten them too much and strip the cowl. Don't do that. They just need to be snug if they just attach to the COWL. Before you replace the Heat-A/C box, it is a good time to replace the Y Vent if it is all broken under the dash.

Now is a great time to replace anything that is old or not working on the A/C. I have lots of pictures, if I figure out how to put them here I will. It really is not that hard. But you will hate it because there will be many items that you can replace and restore at this time that you really can not do easily at another time. Put the hoses and clamps on before you put the inner fender back on. TAKE LOTS OF PICTURES BEFORE YOU TAKE IT APART.

Also somewhere in the web page is a detailed thread I wrote already on this and I do have a picture in My Favorites. I tried to put picture on this thread, NO successs.

THE HARDEST PART ABOUT DOING THIS IS THE REALIZATION OF ALL THE OTHER PARTS CONNECTED TO THE DASH THAT YOU CAN RESTORE TO ORIGINAL. If you are not restoring the car, just make sure that you are fixing anything that keeps you from ever having to do this again. Or, at least for a very long time. If your blanket is in great shape, I would not even think of going to the drivers side repairs at this time.

OK..Ill skipp the quickie bottle sealer fix. I had a few minutes yesterday to take a peek at my leak. I noticed that inside the car, the passenger carpet and underlayment wasnt wet at all. I havent checked the outter connections but Im trying to keep hope alive that its just a loose clamp.
James

Search for posts on this, there are lots of them. But you absolutely DO NOT have to remove anything outside of the interior besides the nuts holding the inside box on, not the fender or fenderwell. The more interior parts removed the better, so glove box, console if you have one, etc. You have to work the box out of there and the more room the better.
The nuts on the firewall are tricky to get to but all are accessible.
Definitely be sure your clamps are tight first, I've seen a loose clamp allow water to leak into the box before. But when my core went out, all the water dumped out on the engine side (thankfully) so it could be either.

I recently installed new carpet in the car, and had to "pry" the pass side kickpannel up a little to get the carpet under it. Do you guys think that this could have caused my problem? None of this was happening before I installed the new carpet.

I am lucky as I'm in the process of restoring the car and just yesterday removed the heater housing and core from a (non A/C) car.

I have no indication of any leakage. It appears to be the original Harrison core, and I recall seeing a date code (?) reference to 69.

My initial gut is to replace now while apart. Then again, if replacement core size is problematic maybe I'll take my chances and reinstall the original.
Thoughts?

For what it's worth, while you're at it, if a 69 car, check for the partial VIN stamping on the firewall under the fan unit.

I just took my heater box apart (’67) and I didn’t remove the fender or inner fender. You CAN do it without removing sheet metal.

Sean, James will need to clarify, but I thought he told me in a Private Message that it was Factory air.

Please tell us the magic you use to get the bottom 2 right hand screws of the heater box out of a factory A/C 67 Camaro, because when you go to the heater box to remove these screws they are not there. All there are is the clips that the bolts on the other side, under the fan and behind the inner fender are located. I can not wait to here this. I was 20 years old when a mechanic at Willowbrook Standard told me he could do the same thing. He took off the inner fender. There are 3 bolts around the A/C box at the FAN.
1) One at 1:00
2) One at 8:00
3) One at 5:00
4) And one at 4:30 but farther down.
There are more bolts but they are not a problem.

4) The one at 4:30 is easy to remove, because it is a bolt under the dash that you turn and any trouble removing it, just put a wrench on the nut from under car. Hard but not impossible.
1) The one at 1:00, same as 4:30 except one glitch. You can not touch the nut with the inner fender on. This one if you remove the bolt from inside the car, it just drops the nut and I guess you could leave off. Heaven forbid if it just turns on the stud. Which you can bet your life savings that it will.
2&3) The one at 8:00 and 5:00 are impossible to get at without removing the inner fender. They are not even touchable and you can not do anything from under the dash except break the heat box.

Just to clarify, You will never replace the heater core on a 67 Camaro with factory a/c without taking off the inner fender unless you modify the whole set up.

Sean,

Please tell us the magic you use to get the bottom 2 right hand screws of the heater box out of a factory A/C 67 Camaro, because when you go to the heater box to remove these screws they are not there. All there are is the clips that the bolts on the other side, under the fan and behind the inner fender are located. I can not wait to here this. I was 20 years old when a mechanic at Willowbrook Standard told me he could do the same thing. He took off the inner fender.

I have no idea on a factory AC car, I have never done one. But I never saw where James mentioned his car had AC, did I miss something?

?Replace it dude.
No one sees it. The problems don't seem to be with the 69's.
They cause to many problems, why take a chance.

My 67 does NOT have factory a/c...does this make the swap any easier?

My 67 does NOT have factory a/c...does this make the swap any easier?

Yes. You can remove the heater box (inside the car) without pulling the fender. If you need to get at the blower motor or remove the engine compartment box . . . well that's a different story.

Without factory AC, there is only one tricky bolt. That’s the bottom outside bolt/nut. I was able to get to it from under the car. I have manifolds and I was able to get my hand and wrench in between the manifold and inner fender. It's a tight fit, but you can do it. I can’t comment on headers—that may make it more difficult.

When you get all five nuts off the heater box, you will need to wiggle it free--down then up.

Thanks Matt. I think ill give her a go without removing the inner fender.
James

James, much easier.

I just took my heater box apart (’67) and I didn’t remove the fender or inner fender. You CAN do it without removing sheet metal.

I can confirm 100% that the heater core can be replaced without removing the fender or inner fender on a NON a/c car (mine is a 67 RS), because I just did it last night.

However, I would not recommend the technique for anyone wanting to do a 100-point resto because I had to trim a small portion of the flange on the box at the firewall to allow the fittings of the new core to come through. Once everything is put back together and the hoses are on, you can't see the mod and everything works fine, but it clearly isn't an option for a concours resto.