Heater core time. I was assuming that I’d just spend a couple bucks and buy a new one when everything went back together but no such luck. They don’t seem to be reproduced plus they have a built in heat valve that only one guy seems to be rebuilding. I’ve got 3 cores and 3 valves. 2 of the valves are Harrison, one is missing the thermal coil. The other is a Ranco that’s badly corroded. Squirrel did the only tutorial I found on the entire internet on rebuilding Rancos but I think it’s too crusty to mess with. The Harrisons seem to need to go to the heat valve guy. I messed one core up getting the crusty old heater hoses off and being careless before I knew it wasn’t replaceable. I was figuring that if I was going this deep I’d put new parts in just so I wouldn’t have to later. Core, valve, thermal coil. I’m pretty sure this is from the ElCo. Cleaned the better two with hot water and finally white vinegar. Here’s the forbidden blue ice Gatorade pouring out of the ‘59 core. I scienced on the thermal feature on the better Harrison valve and it seems to be working. Room temp: And hot I put together a very sophisticated pressure test rig. And got some bad news. This is the 59 core. And not bad news from the ElCo core Then I was have too much fun making bubbles and popped my test rig. There’s an old radiator place in town I’ll hit up next week and see what they can do. I *think* I might be able to use the better Harrison valve as is. I didn’t manage to make it leak. I did replace the O ring between the valve and the core. I got bubbles everywhere other than that valve.
Really like this build and your positive attitude dealing with the cold, and tight space. Montana is beautiful, but I would really have to get used to winter. Keep up the excellent work! My grandson was in Great Falls (USAF), whereabouts are you?
Hey Lewk, don't know what kind of shape mine is in, but if you need it I'll pull it apart and check it out. I'm not using any of it, just haven't gotten around to taking it out yet.
I did the same thing with the heater core from my ‘56 Chevy. It looked terrible at first, but it cleaned up, tested and worked just fine. A little effort saved me some hard-earned money.
The car tent isn’t ideal, but I’ve had it worse. I lived in SF for a while and built a Honda in the bottom of a parking garage while the building manager was asleep. The car had to look squared away every morning and you couldn’t leave anything around or the crackheads would steal it. Lost a whole set of wrenches…. I’m in Missoula in the western part of the state. The winters do get old, but July and August will make up for it if the smoke isn’t too bad. It gets the job done! I’m trying to pinch those pennies where I can, but this one might cost me.
That’s a hell of an offer Lloyd. I’m going to see what the radiator shop can do and go from there. Do you have the deluxe fresh air heater? I did more research today and there are a couple new options but they aren’t cheap. One was out of stock last time I had looked and the other is a kinda cobbled together looking aluminum thing. I’ll keep everyone posted and I may take you up on your offer. Thank you sir!
Feel like a real maroon here. Ride BMX for S&G. Plenty of patched tubes laying around. Some with so many patches, just too heavy to use in normal riding, but good at keeping tires in shape. I'm on the cusp of being mad for not thinking of(or remembering) this trick.
I honestly have no clue what's in there, I was gonna take it all out for weight loss, I'll run up on the bank and take a picture, see maybe if you know what it might be.
Thanks for the pics. That's the Deluxe heater like I have. 4 levers vs 2, and bigger ducting on the engine side vs a plate. My core is at the shop right now and I'm waiting on a quote. If they're reasonable I'll just get it re-cored. Do you have the little trim strip that mounts in those two holes above the key? Says accessory, on etc. Do you want one? I'm using the long Impala style but have that one too and I'm not going to use it.
OK man, anything you need just yell, I know the feeling of not being able to find any parts, I've just about gave up. No I don't have the tag above the switch, everything was robbed from this car over the years. I do have a front bumper that's in pretty good shape if you need it also.
The part that's wearing me out is a damn driver's side vent window and the door glass regulator!! Talk about unobtainable! My wife bought me a vent assembly as a surprise gift and it turned out to be for a hardtop. If I could get my hands on the guy that stripped my old car.... lol
I bought a whole box of stainless from Mr Chevrolet last year, I used a couple of pieces, but there's still a bunch of it left. I'll lay it all out on a table and get a picture, if you need any of it I'll send it your way
I should have an extra driver's wing window and maybe a door window regulator, assuming that the 4dr and 2dr sedan regulators are the same. All that stuff is buried in my storage garage since I'm not doing doors right now. There's no power there so it'll probably be the weekend before I can dig around with daylight. I'm curious to see your stainless box!
I honestly don't know if the 4 door stuff will work or not. You would think that the vent window assembly would work, but who knows. I needed headlight doors, and they were ridiculous priced. I seen them as high as $750 for the 4 pieces. Mike sold me them for $40 and threw are couple extra in the box. Bunch of stuff in there. I'll get you a picture on Wednesday, I'll be at the firehouse tomorrow. You can have any of it you need. I've got front suspension stuff also if you need any of it.
It’s crazy what some really nice 59-60 stuff gets priced at. The 2dr and especially the ragtop prices have gotten nutty. I dug around in my Chevy 38-64 parts and accessories catalogue and it looks like 59-60 vent window parts are categorized as “exc. Spt. Mdls.” and “Spt. Mdls.” I’m assuming it’s Sport Coupes, Sport Sedans, and Ragtops vs everything else. I think our cars are everything else, so my extra post sedan vents should fit. Unfortunately, the door glass regulator needs to be 2dr, so no luck there. I’ll dig things out this weekend and see what I can do. Door glass regulator P/Ns
Yup, thats what I said when I saw yours! This is the photo that started it for me a few years ago when someone first posted it here. Does it get any cooler than this? @Fogger is legend. Oh, and here's my pile, originally black, St. Louis built. Left for dead in Nebraska. My cousin found it out there, bought it, threw a clip on it and sold it to yours truly. Hoping to get started on this very soon. Yeah, everyone says that lol.
All caught up. Been bouncing around this thread finally looked start to finish. Great job on the parts harvest! You got some excellent parts out of those 2 cars. Nice 63 hardtop as well. Don't think twice about the steel shims, I use em too. Aluminium heads I use Cometic MLS, but iron to iron, steel shim with copper coat all day every day. Never had one leak. Cheap compression. Would like to see you put that W engine in there but, man are they spendy. Not like anything's 'cheap' anymore but damn, W engines are like building a Mark 4 and then some. $$$$$$. Thanks, it's probably got all the same pinholes and problems that yours does. They all look great until you start digging in, you know how that is. Just hope I don't find a frame like yours had!! I don't have a backup plan for that.
Thanks for the kind words. I’ll get that W in there someday, but I really want to focus on getting on the road and the 350 is the fastest way to get there. I’m not working with a huge budget and the 348 would eat all my car money for a while! It’ll be interesting to see what the layers between bed floors look like in yours. I’m curios if the factory even primed in there. I sure didn’t see any evidence on mine. They did slob a generous amount of undercoating in my smuggler’s box.
Yup, exactly. Just get 'er going and have fun with it. Build thread might be in order someday. Saving for a rotisserie right now. I need to start splitting bodies and frames cuz this Camino is really crusty underneath. Nebraska dirt roads. Was yours built in LA? Not like it matters just curious. Was it originally red?
Mine is an LA 6 cylinder 3 speed car that was beige with a silver interior. It’s been painted both red and black. They did the jams and dash when they went red. It’s been off the road since 89, but someone was priming on it in the late 90’s based on the newspapers they masked the dash with. It had a floor shift auto, white tuck and roll, and duals with short glass packs in it at some point. It would be cool to know more.
You Guys have it Easy with the Deluxe heater. My 59 Had the Deluxe Heater, but it rusted out, and my dad picked a complete Poverty heater up for 10 bucks on Ebay. Great deal, Until trying to source a core, controls etc. Patience and a couple years of searching netted the controls, The heater core is out of a 79 El Camino, modified to fit with some grinding, and flared Copper pipe. Nothing real visible from the outside, and an Anode in the Radiator. I finally found a stock core at a swap meet, hope its good. Only took 5 years.
Lewk I think that is basically the same heater core for a 77-90 Chevy station wagon if I remember right but without the water valve crap. For the water valve crap you could use a Monte Carlo/Malibu in line one from 78 or so on up?
The cheap heater sounds like a PITA in every way. I'm glad I've got the deluxe for parts availability and function. I want to be able to run this thing in cold weather. When I was feeling dire about my options, I was confusing the availability of the standard and deluxe based on info I was finding on FB x frame Chevy groups. 5 years is crazy.... Thanks for the info. I may wind up going that way yet. The local shop jerked me around a week, and finally came back with a price $80 over a new reproduction core. They wanted a $50 inspection fee to even give me my part back. I argued that. Now it's in Oregon at a well known supplier who offers a re-core service. They just hit me up with an extra $70 fee on top of the price we agreed on. With shipping, it will still be cheaper than a new reproduced part but I'm not feeling warm and fuzzy. I need to adjust my attitude and call them back and get shit straightened out. What a stupid and boring part to spend all this time and money on. Ain't nothing sexy about a heater. I want to be buying a clutch right now.... In the meantime, I've started wiring things. At least there's progress.
The Jalopy Journal
