3.1 heater hose question. *FIXED* Thanks.

[NOHC_WBody]

As a few of you know, I'm lazy. What do hose need to bypass to cut off coolant flow to the heater core on my 90' 3.1 Lumina? It's not exactly "shadetree mechanic" weather here right now(there's 5 inches of snow on the ground) and I need a quick and easy fix to stop the leak until it warms up a bit to properly replace the heater hose.

[Bossman429]

On my friend's Escort when the heater core was DUMPING, we unplugged the hoses from the heater core. Then connected them together with an 11mm deep well socket. Pick a socket that fits snug into the hoses, and use hose clamps on each end. You're basically just connecting the two lines together, if you wanted to do it "right" you could go to the parts store and buy a hose coupler, but we did it the free way, since we already had sockets, and no one uses an 11mm deep socket.

It worked great for about 2 months until we replaced the heater core. 8)

[NOHC_WBody]

I already thought about bridging it, but the problem is, it isn't the heater core that's leaking, it's one of the soft lines going to it/coming from it.

[Bossman429]

OK,

Well since you are going to have to replace that line anyway.......

Cut it off where it is metal, then run regular heater hose from the metal section of the line to the heater core fitting.

 

OR

You could cut around where the hose is leaking, then couple in a piece of heater hose to fill the viod of where the leaking part of the hose was at.

If I were to do this, I could cut the bad section of the hose out. Take it to a parts store, get the same size heater hose, and 2 couplers for that size, 4 hose clamps for that size, and go to town!

 

This actually sounds easier than cutting the metal line, ruber = easier to cut, especially in the cold.

[mihela816]

If one of the rubber lines is leaking, it will be quicker and easier to replace it than to bypass it.

[NOHC_WBody]

Well "Operation : Knuckle Bash Bypass" turned into "Operation: Bulk Hose Cut to Fit". It wasn't the soft line leaking as I'd originally thought, it turned out to be the metal line that runs along the passenger side of the subframe. It was badly corroded and after a bit of hacksaw surgery on the offending metal line, a piece of bulk hose was grafted on, and connected to the heater core. All is well.

[1990lumina]

Awesome!