Rants and Raves vent hoses

Rants & Raves vent hoses

I know pictures are worth a thousandwords, but from here on as I stumble through with the Dart rebuild I will remind myself to do so, (take pictures). I like to share my experience with replacing defroster vents, vent hoses and heater box overhaul. All of these parts I ordered were through “Classic”,the defroster vents, vent hose kit and heater box overhaul kit. First the defroster vents, black a course no surprise there, but they look amazingly good. There is a left and right vent, I would suggest fitment first, turn the vent upside down and see if they will fit into the hole of the dash, this is where you may have to file and sand the outside edges of the vent so they can flush in the hole before you install them. Speed nuts that are supply with the vents,twist them on now, if you feel like its going to snap off one of the plastic studs, it probably will when you go to install them. Take a punch and gently push the speed nut down on the punch gently will not take much. After all the studs have been threaded, and your ready to install, remember to rotate the speed nut backwards first, you will feel the speed nut catch the threads you already made, thus increasing the plastic stud survival. Painting your vents, if you need to, I did, I used my interior paint code which was B7, and again your choice. I had my paint store make me up a rattle can of paint and first sprayed the vents with a plastic adhesive spray and then paint. If you just paint the vent it may start to flake off down the road. Vent hoses I got, what a bummer if I knew that looked like this I would have went to Farm and Home and gotten 2” sump hose at 69 cents a foot then paying what I did for these. This drastically cuts into my beer money! But none the less I tried them anyway, ever tried to push a garden hose. Finally got one, by the time I reach for the other hose install, the first already slip off, and yes the vent clips were used. What I did...I have been working on my daughters car, you know it pains me to say this but a 66 mustang. I had a set of defroster hoses new in the box, two foot long PAPER wound with flat metal band, that looked great, I am thinking I paid 14 dollars for these? Long story short, they went on easy and stayed, I had to use the vent hose adapters that came with the Classic hoses but all is well. I am sure if you went with the paper vent hoses you can figure out to adapted to fit them on the lower heater box outlets, me I would use the sticky insulation tape they use around doors and windows, again your call. Remember big hole drivers side vent, smaller hole passenger side vent.....Heat box overhaul, foam door gaskets excellent, it did come with the sealing rope, (more on this later). Most people would like for you now is to change the heater core while the box is out. Poor people have poor ways, I check my core using a vacuum gauge it held suction without dropping for over two days, good to go, but do check it for green corrosion that is a good sign it is leaking.. A can of weather strip adhesion spray both sides the foam and what you want it to stick to, let dry for a few and then stick together all is well. The seal “rope” or string puddy is little to be desired, yes try to work it with your hands to get it warm, bah bah bah...What I did use black RV ran a bead right in the groove of the heater box. My box was slightly warp on one end, I know if I used the puddy it would never seal and would encourage the heater box to crack and split. This is what I did to move forward on the Dart project. I hope this helps.


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