2003 E150 rear heater/ac removal
#1
04-06-2024, 11:59 PM
2003 E150 rear heater/ac removal
Hey guys, I just wanted to leave a step by step on how I removed the rear heater/ac on my 2003 ford e150.
This started when I had a coolant leak a year ago and I took it into a shop and he told me that he wouldn't be able to take it out to without myself losing heat, so since then I've been ust adding coolant when I needed to, and I finally decided to do something about it.
In this post I will be detailing just how to do the coolant lines, as thats the only one I've done so far. I will update it once I do the ac lines as well.
I started by looking at the rear unit and where all the hoses went from there. From everything else Ive read and watched it seems that the van that I have has then soft coolant and ac hoses running over the wheel well and going through a hole that was drilled through the body about 1.5 feet behind the drivers seat which then turn into hard lines and run back, the coolant hard lines go above the gas tank and then up and through the middle part of the front dashboard, which is removable by some latches (I've heard this termed "the doghouse" before, but I dont know how accurate that is.) The hard lines then return to soft lines that then run into the regular engine coolant system.
After taking off the "doghouse" I realized that there were 2 places that I could run the delivery coolant line into the returning obe. Where the soft lines connect to the hard ones underneath the vehicle, and where the soft lines connect to the hard ones in the "doghouse". I opted to go through the "doghouse" connections, as it was much more easily accessible and if could reduce the amount of coolant my van needs. One of these came to a t connector, which posed a problem, as these hoses had crimped connectors and this posed a problem for the disconnecting and reconnecting of the hoses.
First, I drained the coolant. I jacked up the car (I have a 3 ton aluminum jack) from the drivers side I-beam. I placed a 5 gallon bucket underneath the drain plug located on the drivers side of the bottom of the radiator. I then opened the coolant reservoir cap and let it all drain out. I then undid the quick disconnect on the soft to hard line connections in the "doghouse" and looked at what I was dealing with (I had no idea what I was doing). There was some residuaI coolant came out and dripped down onto the transmission. I came to the conclusion (with the help of my wife) that the best way to go about reconnecting these hoses the way I wanted to was to reconnect the t connector (delivering line) to the returning line and clamping it down.
I didn't have any special tools and believe me this would have been way easier if I had, you could get them, but the way I did it works. I started by disconnecting both of the quick connects and prying off the crimp connector with a pair of pliers and a razor blade from the t connector, and it was then free from being connected to the cooling system at all. I then cut the retun line from the crimped section of the hose and stuck it on to the t line that I had taken the other hose off. From there I placed a hose clamp (I took one from the connectors on the bottom of the van) placed it onto the hose and tightened it. From there I refilled the coolant and ran the van with a bubbler to get all of the air out of the system. I then removed the hard lines from the bottom of the van and removedthem, as they were no longer necessary.
The van is running fine and so far having no heating issues, plus my van seems to run a lot better. Hope this helps somebody whos doing the same thing and I will post an update when I am done with the ac part of the rear heater and the full take out.
This started when I had a coolant leak a year ago and I took it into a shop and he told me that he wouldn't be able to take it out to without myself losing heat, so since then I've been ust adding coolant when I needed to, and I finally decided to do something about it.
In this post I will be detailing just how to do the coolant lines, as thats the only one I've done so far. I will update it once I do the ac lines as well.
I started by looking at the rear unit and where all the hoses went from there. From everything else Ive read and watched it seems that the van that I have has then soft coolant and ac hoses running over the wheel well and going through a hole that was drilled through the body about 1.5 feet behind the drivers seat which then turn into hard lines and run back, the coolant hard lines go above the gas tank and then up and through the middle part of the front dashboard, which is removable by some latches (I've heard this termed "the doghouse" before, but I dont know how accurate that is.) The hard lines then return to soft lines that then run into the regular engine coolant system.
After taking off the "doghouse" I realized that there were 2 places that I could run the delivery coolant line into the returning obe. Where the soft lines connect to the hard ones underneath the vehicle, and where the soft lines connect to the hard ones in the "doghouse". I opted to go through the "doghouse" connections, as it was much more easily accessible and if could reduce the amount of coolant my van needs. One of these came to a t connector, which posed a problem, as these hoses had crimped connectors and this posed a problem for the disconnecting and reconnecting of the hoses.
First, I drained the coolant. I jacked up the car (I have a 3 ton aluminum jack) from the drivers side I-beam. I placed a 5 gallon bucket underneath the drain plug located on the drivers side of the bottom of the radiator. I then opened the coolant reservoir cap and let it all drain out. I then undid the quick disconnect on the soft to hard line connections in the "doghouse" and looked at what I was dealing with (I had no idea what I was doing). There was some residuaI coolant came out and dripped down onto the transmission. I came to the conclusion (with the help of my wife) that the best way to go about reconnecting these hoses the way I wanted to was to reconnect the t connector (delivering line) to the returning line and clamping it down.
I didn't have any special tools and believe me this would have been way easier if I had, you could get them, but the way I did it works. I started by disconnecting both of the quick connects and prying off the crimp connector with a pair of pliers and a razor blade from the t connector, and it was then free from being connected to the cooling system at all. I then cut the retun line from the crimped section of the hose and stuck it on to the t line that I had taken the other hose off. From there I placed a hose clamp (I took one from the connectors on the bottom of the van) placed it onto the hose and tightened it. From there I refilled the coolant and ran the van with a bubbler to get all of the air out of the system. I then removed the hard lines from the bottom of the van and removedthem, as they were no longer necessary.
The van is running fine and so far having no heating issues, plus my van seems to run a lot better. Hope this helps somebody whos doing the same thing and I will post an update when I am done with the ac part of the rear heater and the full take out.
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