Hey guys, is there a forum location for making guides? I replaced my heater core on the weekend, and read multiple guides at little help but extra work i had to do was remove my clutch pedal assembly and cut the heater core pipes. I wasted a lot of time by unnecessarily removing the dash and other parts. Very rarely use aus300zx.com, just trying to help out future people hoping to do this headache of a job.
Did you remove and replace with same stock unit? You say replaced, but you also say "cut pipes" Does this mean you replaced it with something else? If you had a leaky one, and don't want to bother fitting a replacement, then the advice is to drain it and bypass it in the engine bay.
I replaced the unit with a new one, I couldn't physically see or feel any screw holding the heater pipes to the heater core box so I cut the pipe and removed the old one, used the same pipes just resealed it. Its already done, it works nicely now I just found the guide I used irrelevant as there was more work required, and I thought it would be helpful for other people wishing to replace theirs, if they knew an exact method than the ones I read. easily without removing the dash.
the reason you had difficulty was because you not only have to remove the dashboard but the plenum as well so you can access the ends of the heater core pipes in the engine bay. you can do it without some steps of course but to make things as easy as possible those 2 things must be removed.
I've done it a few times and not needed to pull the plenum. It's a bit of a pain, but definitely possible.
I must have read a different how to, mine is auto took me 2-3 hrs to change out the heater core, only thing i took out was the driver seat for easier access, the core came out the side reasonably easily, the difficult part was getting to the little screw that holds the 2 pipes pipes together I left it out on re-assembly. There was quite a bit of cursing involved.
