Cowl vent clean out 1970 duster

[Toqwik]

My cowl vent is full of oak leaves. How do I go about cleaning them out? I guess some lighter fluid and a lighter would work but looking for a more environmentally friendly idea. Thanks in advance.

 

[RAT ROD AL]

get going about 80 and open the fresh air vents

 

[jonn6464]

My cowl vent is full of oak leaves. How do I go about cleaning them out? I guess some lighter fluid and a lighter would work but looking for a more environmentally friendly idea. Thanks in advance.

I have a '70 Duster. My cowl vent leads to air vent doors inside the cabin. I would simply tape garbage bags to the vents in the car and hit the cowl with a blower.

But, I don't know what car you have. So, not sure if that works for you or not.

 

[72bluNblu]

My cowl vent is full of oak leaves. How do I go about cleaning them out? I guess some lighter fluid and a lighter would work but looking for a more environmentally friendly idea. Thanks in advance.

environmentally friendly? That’s the least of your worries. If you have any amount of leaves in there it’ll get hot enough to warp the crap out of your cowl and melt all the seam sealer from between the panels. You’ll total the thing in a couple minutes flat.

Remove the fresh air vent and drop the heater. With that done you can reach up in there and pull everything out. Then blow out the remainder. If you have a lot of leaves in there it may take a few rounds. This is what I did on mine
My "new" '74 Duster- or why I need a project like a hole in the head

 

[Johnny Dart]

Open your doors and look for the drain holes.
Compressed air, blower, hose,screwdriver, dry vac, all tools of the trade. Blow, poke, vacuum, rinse, repeat.
Open the interior vents, and blow out while you are at it.

 

[Toqwik]

environmentally friendly? That’s the least of your worries. If you have any amount of leaves in there it’ll get hot enough to warp the crap out of your cowl and melt all the seam sealer from between the panels. You’ll total the thing in a couple minutes flat.

Remove the fresh air vent and drop the heater. With that done you can reach up in there and pull everything out. Then blow out the remainder. If you have a lot of leaves in there it may take a few rounds. This is what I did on mine
My "new" '74 Duster- or why I need a project like a hole in the head

I was joking about lighting them. It is about an inch from the vents. Thanks goodness it is dry and not rotting out that area. Thanks for the posts, guess there isn’t an east way. Great responses.

 

[mbaird]

My mother told me not to light fires inside my car .....bad things could happen !

Stuff your shop vac up inside the fresh air vents then use your air hose to blow into the cowl vents

 

[Demonic]

The drivers fresh air vent isn't too hard to drop. An air hose from the compressor with a 1/4" copper tube end is handy, it you make it long and bend it to fit around a corner. Put on some good gloves if you reach your hand up in there, the edge can be sharp.

 

[Tooljunkie]

Just turn it upside down and shake it...

 

[Johnny Dart]

I was joking about lighting them. It is about an inch from the vents. Thanks goodness it is dry and not rotting out that area. Thanks for the posts, guess there isn’t an east way. Great responses.

Remember: Nothing worth having is easy.

 

[pauly]

Mine was full of mouse nests, but I had the entire air box out of the car and cleaned the vent holes out, then, using a wand, introduced liberal amounts of compressed air through the system, blowing mouse nest and mouse poop all over the place. I had the interior completed gutted when I did this. Makes me itch just thinking about all the nasty crap that came out of there! But, I believe the bag idea would work, though you may need a vent hole in the bag to keep the air flow going. I was amazed at how much crap was in there!!!!

 

[retroron]

well, if you run a A/C you don't need the cowl vent so cut it out and fill it.

 

[TrailBeast]

My cowl vent is full of oak leaves. How do I go about cleaning them out? I guess some lighter fluid and a lighter would work but looking for a more environmentally friendly idea. Thanks in advance.

I did mine when I first got the car by running a mild stream of water down the cowl from outside and using a wire to clear the drains that Johnny Dart posted a picture of.
(you can get to those with the fender in place)

As the junk coming out got lighter I turned the water on higher until no more junk came out the drains.
Of course I kept checking inside the car to make sure I wasn't overflowing in there.