Is there a way to fabricate the stock ac/heater box to delete the AC aspect of it?

I know the box consists of two sides, the blower motor side and, what I believe is the AC inlet side? Not sure, I'm not an expert here.

Could I just block off the AC inlet with some sheet metal, and then cut the box to retain the blower motor, and somehow block off the open part and incorporate a filter?

 

Here's acouple pics of mine. They should give you an idea what you need

 

I see, so you have to essentially connect the rectangular hole to the blower motor. How did you do yours? By what process? That looks clean as hell.

 

Its a standard non-AC box

 

The problem with the factory one is that it’s still really bulky and gets in the way, and it uses a different fan motor/fan which only has 3 speeds rather then the stock control unit’s 4.

This is one that I made specifically to address those issues and leave room for the biggest possible down pipe for a turbo install:


Installed you can see how much room it really clears up, and the sharp angles sort of make it fit in with the stock stuff, no one even notices what I did to make all the room unless I point it out (don’t worry about eh messy engine bay, I was rewiring and moving a ton of stuff around at the time):

 

Hey man, you made that yourself? It looks clean as hell, how did you do it?

 

yeah how in the world did you make such a nice looking box? do you have your own plastics shop or something? that is plastic right?

 

Uhh, to be technical the motor is a single speed, and the switch controls the rate at which the motor spins by applying more or less current (limited by the resistors mounted in the air duct/box), to the motor's input terminal.

 

Nope, fiberglass… and for that matter, the dreaded bondo brand ‘glass resin and their cloth/mat.

I pretty much did what I posted in the other fiberglass thread. I made a pattern out of cardboard that covered the areas on the firewall that I wanted to cover and then cut up a stock, AC box, attached the pattern to a chunk of plywood that I covered with plastic, then made up most of the form out of a few pieces of the cut up AC box and mostly out it out of cardboard and duct tape which were glued/taped to the pattern.

Covered the whole deal with duct tape and then waxed it all (like 3 heavy coats of car wax, mold reliese compound would be better), laid on the glass cloth (2 thin layers with all the extra carefully squeezed out, popped it off the form (some if it stuck some so I had to break it up some) and laid the rest of the mat and cloth on the inside to keep the outside shape pretty close to the original mold.

Trimmed the edges (the pattern left a nice rased edge in the ‘glass piece that I just followed with an abrasive cutting wheel), smoothed the outside using some bondo mixed with ‘glass resin (to give me a thin, self leveling filler that didn’t need much sanding), cut out the bit for the fan and the resistor coils, drilled the mounting holes and then painted and finished the thing.

What you see is the end result. Probably weighs about 1/5th of the original AC box or one of the factory non AC boxes (they’re smaller but they’re also made of steel), works with the stock, larger fan assembly, leaves more room in the passenger compartement and is just trick enough to do the job without sticking out like something that doesn’t belong there.

 

that is a real nice piece, and you still have the mold you made it from right? you could sell those things and make a pretty penny off of them. a real professional look. great job!

 

Ya you really could, that is one nice looking piece for sure!

 

Hello 83 Crossfire,

If you have one for sale I would buy it!

Thanks, Ed.
nushi@charter.net

 

Hey 83 Crossfire....Is there a thread that outlines how you made that ac box??

 

he pretty much said all of what he did to make that box in this thread. you just have to do a little reading

 

looks nice man i need one now

 

You could find an OE A/C delete box like I did, but they are becoming scarce. If looking on E-Bay, look up as a 1LE delete airbox. Other than a 1LE, you are gonna only find them on original canadian destined vehicles and older 2.5L F-Bodies. Not too many ones made for the states other than the 1LE had them. I had started to use my A/C original box as a template by cutting off the front bulk section and glassing it back closed. But I found a 1LE box in the process and abandoned the task. I saw someone mention the speeds. They were correct in stating that the fan is a single speed with a ground and 12volts applied. The thermal resistor ,which is the part attached to the box with 2 7mm screws and partly triangular shaped, reduces the voltage by resiatance to allow for the slower speeds. Just wanted to back that up for all to understand. BTW, nice job on the fabbed box!!

 

Damn, at $140 for a used one, I don't need heat THAT badly...defrosters are for wimps anyway =P

 

yeah, my ac delete box will consist of a nicely trimmed (flat) piece of sheet metal. until i stumble across a cheap one.

 

Haha, yeah thats how it's looking for me too. At least until the summer is over.

 

I’ve posted this and more info in assorted posts on this board, but as far as making them… to be honest with you, I’m not really interested in getting into mass producing them, I already have a real job, and I’m sure that none of you are willing to pay for a custom piece.

Really, this fiberglass thing is not that hard, if you want to, make your own… I’ve reinforced things with ‘glass before, but that was probably my first piece that I made completely of it and it turned out fine…

 

Hey 83 Crossfire, could you please update your pix. Im doing the same in my car, and i was going to use yours as a reference.

Im just going to fabricate it out of home ducting metal, not sure what it is (tin maybe?).

Having a few fitment issues, just wanted to see what your final product looks like. Thanks.

 

I’m sorry, the web space that I was using was taken down by some hackers, and since the owner was letting me use it for free, he’s not been in a hurry getting everything up and running again and I haven’t been giving him a hard time about it (it’s not like I’m paying for service or that he owes me anything).

I’ll ping him again and decide if I’m going to wait some more or do something else (this isn’t the only thread people are asking), but in the mean time if you want pictures of something specific…

 

Id just like to see the overall shape of the thing head on. I had 2 problems.

1) Obviously the offset of the blower motor and the entry holes.
2) when i cut the remaining housing off the blower motor section, i didnt cut it perfectly vertical. If you look at my pix, you'll see the angle im talking about.

Taking these two things into account, i kind of ran into some clearance issues at the bottom where there looks like its a corner missing, to clear the fender.

Just little stuff like that, i want to see how you got such a clean fit. I realize you used resin, but it would be nice to see none the less.

 

Sorry it took so long, but the server was never put back up and I haven’t had much time to worry about a replacement. In the mean time my wife finally talked me into starting a blog so I decided instead to write a description and add what pictures I had as a blog entry:
http://mpikas.blogspot.com/2007/12/m...3rd-gen-f.html

Hopefully I’ll be adding a lot more car stuff there soon… I have tons of stuff like this that I think I’m going to use the blog to archive.

 

Thanks a million, thats very helpful.

 

Thanks!!!

That is a nice piece! I need to make one for myself, because of a turbo setup I am building.

 

Thank you very much! I will now be making my own out of glass instead of sheetmetal

 

here's my custom delete box. you have to look under the msd control box. most people don't even notice it.

 

Bigdave, i tried to mimic your design, i see it gives even a bit more room than 83crossfire's design, but i gues smy fab skills arent up to par, and i couldnt do it with the sheet metal. Too many tight fitting angles needed, and i dont have the right tools. But i did try, put about 2 months worth of weekend time into it, and no luck... Your peice looks awesome though,

Also, i have a question for 83crossfire. I read your whole post about the fabrication and i think i may have misunderstood part of it. You start off with a peice of ACbox, and cut it as desired, then build the rest around it to create a mold.

THEN, you fiberglass overtop and you have a finished product. However, i didnt catch, whether the ORIGINAL peice is still part of this finished product, or if its just a mold......? The reason im confused is, i thought it was just a mold, and you created a completeley new part. But when you look on the back side, there are certain fins and curves that are true to the original peice, and hard to replicate with just fiberglass and no templates.

 

i made one a while ago with the stock AC housing. I removed the upper section completely. I took the lower part, which is attached to the blower housing, and cut it down to 1.5" deep, made a cardboard template to cover the hole and the top, then glassed over it on both sides. It worked well, looked ok. I still have it hanging on the wall in the garage. I could grab a pic or 2 if you want them.

its a lot easyer this way cause you can still use the factory mounting holes.

 

sure that would be awesome

 

well i got a little sidetracked when i went out to take the pics and started my mini-tubbing...

This is a real old pic i have of it