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Thread: Heater core removal and reinstall

  1. #11
    Join Date
    Jan 2004
    Posts
    1,171

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    Stephen, post a picture of your set up and the board should be able to help. Bottom line is the aluminum piping as Robin mentioned is not a wear item.
    The O-rings however that seat the pipes to the core MUST be replaced and they cost pennies. You may have a car that does not have a plastic piping manifold. BTW do you have climate control thumb wheels in your HVAC control panel for respective foot wells? My guess is no and you have manual heating controls...only a guess and perhaps why you don't have a plastic piping manifold that connects to the cores two right hand side inlets. I have not seen that design but doesn't matter....the job is not that difficult...don't be daunted. You can also use the ETK as a pictorial reference. If you don't have a digital camera and you get stuck, simply borrow one so you can illustrate to the board what your problem is.
    Good Luck,
    George
    Last edited by George M; 02-08-2005 at 07:38 PM.

  2. #12
    Join Date
    Jan 2004
    Location
    Knoxville, TN
    Posts
    60

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    More documentation is always better, and I say that because I'll be changing mine out soon and I'm rather curious about how to go about it.

    Best of luck!

  3. #13
    Join Date
    Jan 2005
    Location
    Reno, NV
    Posts
    128

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    Aaron,

    The whole tear down took me about 2 hours. I started at the back of the car and worked forward. Probably the hardest thing was not knowing how it was all held together, and then I got the the heater box and it looked nothing like what anyone else had discribed (no way could this be done in a "short Cut Method"). Last night when I got home I got back into it. I have a 1990 535i with an automatic trans. that was built 01/90 and it has the knob like climate control that you turn like a dial. I think this is why I have the three aluminum line, with 2 going into the top left hand side and one going into the front (I think anything after this date will have a three hose connection across the front of the unit with plastic lines that connect to aluminum lines). Anyway, the first heater core that was sent to me was the later of the two I am talking of and only comes as a heater core. when the correct one arrived it included the aluminum limes that were already conected tot he new heater core. What I was thinking I was going to have to do was to fish these lines into the aready confined space and then through the firewall. After reading Robin's post I decided to just disconnect the new lines that were sent, put new o-rings on the old lines, put it all together and purg the system. guess what...........NO LEAKS!!!!!!!!!! This took about 2 hours as I wanted to make sure everything was correct (I suck at plumbing in the house, and was hoping it was not going to be that way on the car). I figure now I have about an hour to put the dash back together. 5 Hours!!!!!!!!! (better then the 10 that I was told it would take by the repair shop at $1,200 to complete). I am into it right at $200 with parts and supplies. Works for me and that included cleaning the carpets and all the parts that needed it.

    It is not a hard job at all. I think that it is more intimidating then anything. I used a Chilton manual for the tear down and a whole lot of looking around at the parts for the actual removal of everything. That is why I thing I can have it back together in about an hour.

    Good luck to anyone doing this repair.

    Thanks everyone for helping me on this. Next it is on to the driveline, that one seems real strait forword.

    Stephen

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