Replacing a heater core is not a terribly difficult task, but it can be annoying and fiddly with the fender in place. Seems every vehicle has combination of fuel lines, AC hoses, wiring, etc that makes getting the actual box out quite difficult. There are only 4 fasteners holding the box in but even these can be a real pain.
The fasteners on top actually don’t have to be removed all the way, since the top of the bracket is open. The 6mm bolts on the bottom of the box can be downright terrible. Not only is there no clearance for a socket, the nuts are inside the footwell and you can‘t hold them in place without a helper unless you remove a door. And if you have an AC unit in the footwell, then you might not be able to reach these nuts at all. Then you have to carefully drop the AC unit to reach behind it. I dealt with this problem by installing rivnuts at the lower locations.
Again, this box had no coolant in it since I was just upgrading the core to an Allisport one while the engine was out. One thing that adds fun to this job is the fact that you have to twist and maneuver the box all over the place to remove it with the fenders in-situ. That will ensure you dump coolant everywhere unless you very effectively plug the tubes. Unfortunately that probably won’t be possible because there is a high likelihood that you’re only doing this job because one of the tubes snapped off...
The fasteners on top actually don’t have to be removed all the way, since the top of the bracket is open. The 6mm bolts on the bottom of the box can be downright terrible. Not only is there no clearance for a socket, the nuts are inside the footwell and you can‘t hold them in place without a helper unless you remove a door. And if you have an AC unit in the footwell, then you might not be able to reach these nuts at all. Then you have to carefully drop the AC unit to reach behind it. I dealt with this problem by installing rivnuts at the lower locations.
Again, this box had no coolant in it since I was just upgrading the core to an Allisport one while the engine was out. One thing that adds fun to this job is the fact that you have to twist and maneuver the box all over the place to remove it with the fenders in-situ. That will ensure you dump coolant everywhere unless you very effectively plug the tubes. Unfortunately that probably won’t be possible because there is a high likelihood that you’re only doing this job because one of the tubes snapped off...
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