So yesterday I open up my passenger door and find a pond of anti-freeze at least 4 inches deep in the footwell! Apparentally my heater core broke, so I took it in to get it fixed and they told me it would cost at least $300. Has this happened to any one?

 

heater core. Have fun!

 

Happened to me too. I just finished replacing the burnt heater hoses, stsarted it up to look for more leaks. none. I sit in the drivers seat to take for test drive & green pee, about 3-4" in the footwell . At least the dash isn't all together yet. I just diconnected one of the hoses from in the engine bay & bent it to the other heater pipe, basically the tb bypass mod w/a bigger hose.

 

Yup, defenetly a heater core. Same thing happened to me. If I had a picture I would show you how I bypassed my heater core to 'fix' the problem.

 

When mine went i replaced it took about 11 hours including the part store giving me thr wrong part it is easy to do most the process is takeing out bolts and nuts.


First off all make sure you have a day where you don't have nothing else to do. Take your time.

1. Disconnect the battery.
2. Drain the cooling system.
3. Remove the heater cores hoses from the heater core inlet and outlet pipes. If you find them hard to remove just cut a slit up the side of them to remove them. It's a good idea to replace them anyway.
4.Remove the lower hush panels from your instrument panel.
5. Remove the dash pad. The retaining screw are located in the defroster vents and along the underside of the rear edge of the pad.
6. Remove both front speakers. Also remove the right side speaker bracket.
7. Remove the screws side window defroster ducts, the front carrier braces and carrier shelf and remove the side defroster ducts.
8. Carefully disconnect the ECM box and set it aside.
9. Remove the radio trim plate, the upper console trim, and the glove box assembly.
10. Remove the parking brake handle grip, the screws retaining the console body and position the console back, out of the way.
11. Remove the trim plate underneath the steering column. Remove the two nuts retaining the steering column and carefully lower and support the steering column down out of the way.
12. Remove the two nuts and four screws retaining the instrument panel to the firewall and move the instrument panel back far enough to access the heater module.
13. Remove the screws retaining the heater core cover and remove the cover.
14. Remove the screws retaining the shroud. Remove the shroud and the heater core.
15. Installation is reverse of removal. Be EXTRA careful when you put the new heater core back in. Don't bend anything when slipping it back through the firewall.

 

geez..$300 for a heater core/labor?? wow i just had mine replaced & it was only like $120 including labor

 

Mine cost me 20 bucks it is worth it to do it on your own if you have the time. Just remeber if you bypass it and its cold as hell outside you will be freezing because you will have no heater in your car.

 

Biggest pain on those guys is trying to reach under the dash... those blasted 9/32 (or 7mm) screws are everywhere you don't want to be

I had to yank mine when I rebuilt my car after totalling it... and stupidly didn't borrow $30 off my dad to get a new heater core... wound up putting the original back in when the car came back from the welder's. Which reminds me, I was supposed to replace that sucker this summer. Hm...

 

I think im just going to get a little plug-in heater unit, and forget about my core I'm confident about my ability to work on my car, but not quite that confident.

 

Finally got my car back, $45 for the core and $255.10 for labor. Second day after driving it, I turn the car off and steam comes rollin out of the hood. Whats that about???

 

I do the heater core bypass every summer on my Bird and Wagon. The cars seam much cooler without all the extra hot coolant sitting in the dash.

Matt

 

Probly one of the lines that go to the heater core got cracked and the coolant is buring on your exhaust manafold.