So I drove around for about 6 years without a heater.....
Never really thought about it much. But the wife had a good point, I've rebuilt the engine, the transmission, the rear end, etc etc, why the heck do I not have a defroster and heater?
so I took it all apart.
First thing, the blower motor never worked, I never looked into it really. So I took the cleanout apart and there was 400 lbs of dead leaves and dirt in there. Apparently this was dragging on the fan motor and it'd overheat and blow the fuse, thus why there was never a fuse there.
Since i had it cleaned out, I figured why not jumper the switch, and sure enough fan works fine.
Three nuts and two cables hold the box in, takes 5 minutes to drop it out.
Sadly, no one sells the 6inch by 6inch heater core. Only the higher output 6x8 inch core is sold.
If any of tall have seen how this goes together, the heater core is held in with rubber on the top and bottom and the Plastic heater box holds it in place. Well the new larger one is not gonna come close to fitting.
So I needed to cut the plastic bottom out and reattach it. Only way to do this reasonably is pull the sheet metal off the box and cut the plastic.
Ground off the factory rivets and hammered them out with a punch. I then cut the plastic with an air powered sawzall because it is really small.... that plastic is cool, it'd reweld itself before I was done cutting
So I had to work the saw back and forth to keep it loose.
pics:
cut it out
![Image]()
mocked up where it needed to be:
![Image]()
old vs new:
![Image]()
Just putting the plastic in place would make all intake air hot air, so I needed to seal it off in some way. I build a piece of sheet metal to bridge the gap:
![Image]()
Test fit again, smeared a lil silicone and used a few sheet metal screws to hold it all in place and help seal it all:
![Image]()
![Image]()
![Image]()
Sanded, ospho'd, washed, painted and ready for reinstall:
![Image]()
I didn't want to bore you all with a simple heater core R&R as it's really pretty basic, but just wanted to show how I installed a larger heater core so maybe it wouldn't be so scary to cut on the factory parts if you find you need to in the future.
Good luck!
Drew
Never really thought about it much. But the wife had a good point, I've rebuilt the engine, the transmission, the rear end, etc etc, why the heck do I not have a defroster and heater?
so I took it all apart.
First thing, the blower motor never worked, I never looked into it really. So I took the cleanout apart and there was 400 lbs of dead leaves and dirt in there. Apparently this was dragging on the fan motor and it'd overheat and blow the fuse, thus why there was never a fuse there.
Since i had it cleaned out, I figured why not jumper the switch, and sure enough fan works fine.
Three nuts and two cables hold the box in, takes 5 minutes to drop it out.
Sadly, no one sells the 6inch by 6inch heater core. Only the higher output 6x8 inch core is sold.
If any of tall have seen how this goes together, the heater core is held in with rubber on the top and bottom and the Plastic heater box holds it in place. Well the new larger one is not gonna come close to fitting.
So I needed to cut the plastic bottom out and reattach it. Only way to do this reasonably is pull the sheet metal off the box and cut the plastic.
Ground off the factory rivets and hammered them out with a punch. I then cut the plastic with an air powered sawzall because it is really small.... that plastic is cool, it'd reweld itself before I was done cutting
So I had to work the saw back and forth to keep it loose.pics:
cut it out
mocked up where it needed to be:
old vs new:
Just putting the plastic in place would make all intake air hot air, so I needed to seal it off in some way. I build a piece of sheet metal to bridge the gap:
Test fit again, smeared a lil silicone and used a few sheet metal screws to hold it all in place and help seal it all:
Sanded, ospho'd, washed, painted and ready for reinstall:
I didn't want to bore you all with a simple heater core R&R as it's really pretty basic, but just wanted to show how I installed a larger heater core so maybe it wouldn't be so scary to cut on the factory parts if you find you need to in the future.
Good luck!
Drew
