Rear Heater Soft Lines - PITA. Tips? (1 Viewer)

[bicycleagent003]

Hey Guys,

I'm in the midst of replacing the soft lines to my rear heater, the four sections about 6" long each which sit behind the heat shields above the exhaust. Uhhh...this job sucks.

I'm using Gates 1/2" Green Stripe. Getting the two pieces of hose to slip over the rear most two brass nipples which are embedded in the the truck above the exhaust is extremely difficult! I've used a little lube (yes, sex lube, it's water soluble) and small amounts of Sil-Glyde on the outside of the brass pieces, but the hoses just want to bend and not get on as far as the white painted index lines. I'm assuming I'm supposed to cover those white lines because the original hoses did.

Also, once I got the hoses on and was trying to reuse some of the original spring clips I realized they won't fit over the hose I'm using. The Gates stuff is Slightly larger OD than the OEM 13 mm hose, and that difference makes the original clamps no worky. Arrrrrggggghhhhhhhh!!!!!

Any tips or suggestions you can offer would be greatly appreciated. My original hoses looked fine, but I'm about to install sliders and I didn't want to have to take them off later to get to one of these hoses if it burst, particularly on the trail.

Thanks
Russ

 

[2fpower]

Yeah, same issue here. Not a fun job. I replaced the clamps, and one still leaked, so had to double up the clamps.

I had my cats out at the time, so made it a lot easier.

I ended up pulling them out of the car, the hard lines, cleaned them up, painted them, then put the lines on off the car, and installed them whole, and connected to the last two (four) points.

I ended up using crimp clamps Oetiker (sp?) .

 

[bicycleagent003]

Thanks

 

[JCruse]

If it's not too late could you snap a pic or two under there? I'm considering replacing my rear heater with a flat plate heat exchanger for showering and would like to see what I'll be up against. Thanks.

 

[Hornd]

I too bought a heat exchanger last week. Plan to put under hood for shower. Intend to replace Rear heater lines with Green Stripe (unless location looks too hot) and do PHH bypass.
This will be after I install air springs I have sitting on counter.

 

[Chris FJ80]

Subscribed. On my to-do list

 

[bicycleagent003]

I'm waiting for my new clamps from Amazon today. I'll get some picks up this week of the during and after. Thanks, guys.

 

[Golgo13]

It is absolutely amazing how much that push-on force increases with small changes in the hose OD/ID. Heating the hoses a little should help. Either way, it isn't going to be a fun job. I recently wrestled with my fuel filler hoses in the same way, but I found that using some parts cleaning solvent worked really well as a lube to get them in place. Works great for vacuum hoses too.

 

[greentruck]

It is absolutely amazing how much that push-on force increases with small changes in the hose OD/ID. Heating the hoses a little should help...
SNIP

A heat gun might help with that.

 

[Chris FJ80]

I have not looked but am wondering if there is 13mm (or whatever the OEM hose size is) hose readily available. Would that make it possible to push onto the fittings with reasonable force?

It was a PITA to get my PHH on (PHH OEM style close up pics).

 

[Hornd]

Tried using a set of the bent long or long needle Nose to push hose on?
Just an idea since I don't know what hoses look like.
Be careful using lube as the rubber to brass connection is what keeps it leak-proof.

 

[1ststatecruiser]

Did mine , it's a rewarding job lol

 

[2fpower]

yeah, but you used silicone. Once and done. NICE!!

 

[mod5csi]

Yeah, same issue here. Not a fun job. I replaced the clamps, and one still leaked, so had to double up the clamps.

I had my cats out at the time, so made it a lot easier.

I ended up pulling them out of the car, the hard lines, cleaned them up, painted them, then put the lines on off the car, and installed them whole, and connected to the last two (four) points.

I ended up using crimp clamps Oetiker (sp?) .

I did pretty much the same as 2fpower did. I was replacing cats anyway, so did those hoses while I was in there. Gates Green Stripe and Oetiker's FTW.

 

[bicycleagent003]

FZJ80 REAR HEATER HARD LINES WITH PRIMES

• bicycleagent003
• Oct 7, 2015

FZJ80 REAR HEATER HARD LINES WITH PRIMES

So I made some progress on this last night. When I got home I got back under the truck and realized that if I just rolled the hard pipe over the cats and under the body toward the exterior of the truck, they would come out. Once I got them out I realized they looked like crap and needed derusting and painting. I live in SoCal and these things were in medium bad shape, IMO. For those of you in rust states I can't imagine you could do this job without replacing the hard lines and feel good about putting the hard lines back in.
So, I hit the hard lines with the abrasive wheel on my drill, and with the stainless brush wheel on my bench grinder and got down to some cleanish looking, though pocked, metal. To the touch it still felt sufficiently strong, so I hit it with 2 coats of UHT rust inhibiting gray primer and two coats of UHT flat black rust inhibiting paint. My 7 year old helped me paint, so I nearly wore a coat of primer myself and there were plenty of drips. Who cares, right? He had fun, which means we had fun.
Tonight I get the clamps and tomorrow the pipes go back on, then I drain the radiator and flush the system twice (don't forget the block drain plug!) with distilled water before I refill with half Prestone green and half distilled water. Most pics to come.

 

[Explorer4Hire]

I'm going to be doing this as I freshen the head and other things up. I'll have time to do it while I wait on stuff. Watching this thread closely for time saving tips. Thanks everyone who is posting

 

[bicycleagent003]

Okay, I got this job done and it wasn't so bad. A few observations and a few pics here. First, the only way I figured to get the hard lines threaded out of the truck and out where you can assess them, paint them, etc., is to slide the lines rearward about 4-6 inches after severing the four hose lines, then roll the entire hard line assembly outward over the frame rail and between the frame rail and the lower pinch weld of the body. It's tight and you'll need to manipulate the attached soft lines a bit but it will come out with no damage to the hard lines.

HOW TO GET THE REAR HEATER HARD PIPES OUT

• bicycleagent003
• Oct 12, 2015

Here is a pic, the bottom of the pic as it sits is the front end of the truck, top is rear end.

 

[bicycleagent003]

Also, because I was using Gates Green Stripe 1/2" ID hose (not the OEM 13mm) the OD of the hose I used caused a couple of problems. First, when I had the hard lines on the bench I could not get both new soft lines on the rear end of the hard lines because they sit just a little too close together. So, I used a pry bar to very gently spread them about 2 mm further apart. That's all it took to be able to get both hoses and clamps on, though it was tight.

IT MIGHT BE NECESSARY TO GENTLY BEND THE LINES APART A HAIR

• bicycleagent003
• Oct 12, 2015

 

[bicycleagent003]

Also, the lines which come out of the bottom of the truck and mate up with your soft lines to connect with the rear of the hard lines also sit very close together and I had some clearance problems there, too. I wasn't able to get my clamps to sit right next to each other because of the tightness, and I didn't want to try and bend the brass tubes coming down from the truck for fear of breaking or bending them out of round. You can see I got a good seal with each clamp sitting full on hose and above the flare in the brass lines, but my preference would have been for the clamps to sit right next to each to each other.

HERE ARE THE CLAMPS INSTALLED AT THE REAR

• bicycleagent003
• Oct 12, 2015

The Gates 1/2" hose measured 7/8" OD so I bought some good spring clamps off Amazon but they turned out to be slightly too small and I hard to reorder 15/16" clamps or they would not get over the hose while it sat on the flared portion of tubing. That was a bummer and cost me a 2 day delay. The clamps I used are Rotor Clip CTB-24ST FK, Steel, Constant Tension Band Hose Clamp, 15/16" Hose OD ($11 for ten), and they worked great. These clamps are thicker than the OEM clamps though, which when combined with the larger OD the hose I used caused me some trouble.

THESE ARE THE CLAMPS I GOT ON AMAZON

• bicycleagent003
• Oct 12, 2015

If I hard it to do over again I think I would try to find a smaller OD silicone hose with a 1/2" ID.

 

[bicycleagent003]

All in all this was a satisfying PM job. I got a big delay by ordering the wrong clamps, which was a hassle. While I like the Gates hose, the larger OD caused trouble and I think I'd source a different (smaller than 7/8" OD) hose if I had it to do over again.

One final note is that my truck is a SoCal vehicle almost its entire life. The front corner of my rear heater hard lines were in pretty bad shape, and I am happy I got them out and cleaned them up and painted them. I see now that the heat from the front cat was working hard to destroy those pipes. If you're on the fence about doing this job I'd say at least pull down the most forward, larger heat baffle and take a look at your hard lines. They probably look pretty wrecked. Good luck and feel free to PM me if you want to ask me anything about the job.

-Russ