Learned about the Pesky Heater Hose on this forum last week.
I bought my '93 almost two years and 25k miles ago at 109k miles, and I figured I had better address the PHH. Decided to flush my system and replace the pesky little sucker before it decided to poop out. In a moment of laziness I ordered a section of fancy hose and fancy clamps from www.fzjphh.com and made a call to Dan for a selection of other coolant hoses that I planned on replacing on general recommendation from a variety of folks.
After draining and flushing via a Prestone kit, I started replacing hoses. Piece of cake. During the process I realized my hoses looked pretty darn good, but they got replaced nonetheless.
Saving the infamous 2 inch section of hose for last, I stuffed myself into the driver's side wheel well and finally laid eyes on the cursed little piece of rubber.
Looked great.
In fact, it had two shiny screw-type hose clamps on it--NOT the OEM clamps. I realized a former owner (I am the third) had replaced it sometime in the not too distant past.
Oh well, I'll replace it with my fancy section of blue hose and big-ass clamps anyway.
Upon closer inspection (as close as you can actually get to the damn hose, anyway), I realized that the both screws on both clamps were facing up and slightly toward the firewall.
NO POSSIBLE WAY TO UNSCREW THOSE CLAMPS.
(Without taking apart more of the engine that I was ready to at the time.)
Don't you just get uneasy when you're not quite sure what your rig has been through before you owned it? There's no way that hose could have been put on with the upper half of the engine in place. Someone in the past had had at least the top of the engine torn down for a reason I'll probably never know. Bugs me. My truck is super clean and by all accounts is in superb shape, but the mystery still bugs me.
Anyhow, I aborted the PHH upgrade. I doubt the hose on it has more than 50k miles on it, and I'll trust it for another 15k.
Maybe next year I'll flush the coolant again, attack the PHH hose clamps with a dremel, and use my $25 2 inch section of high tech hose.
Hayes
I bought my '93 almost two years and 25k miles ago at 109k miles, and I figured I had better address the PHH. Decided to flush my system and replace the pesky little sucker before it decided to poop out. In a moment of laziness I ordered a section of fancy hose and fancy clamps from www.fzjphh.com and made a call to Dan for a selection of other coolant hoses that I planned on replacing on general recommendation from a variety of folks.
After draining and flushing via a Prestone kit, I started replacing hoses. Piece of cake. During the process I realized my hoses looked pretty darn good, but they got replaced nonetheless.
Saving the infamous 2 inch section of hose for last, I stuffed myself into the driver's side wheel well and finally laid eyes on the cursed little piece of rubber.
Looked great.
In fact, it had two shiny screw-type hose clamps on it--NOT the OEM clamps. I realized a former owner (I am the third) had replaced it sometime in the not too distant past.
Oh well, I'll replace it with my fancy section of blue hose and big-ass clamps anyway.
Upon closer inspection (as close as you can actually get to the damn hose, anyway), I realized that the both screws on both clamps were facing up and slightly toward the firewall.
NO POSSIBLE WAY TO UNSCREW THOSE CLAMPS.
(Without taking apart more of the engine that I was ready to at the time.)
Don't you just get uneasy when you're not quite sure what your rig has been through before you owned it? There's no way that hose could have been put on with the upper half of the engine in place. Someone in the past had had at least the top of the engine torn down for a reason I'll probably never know. Bugs me. My truck is super clean and by all accounts is in superb shape, but the mystery still bugs me.
Anyhow, I aborted the PHH upgrade. I doubt the hose on it has more than 50k miles on it, and I'll trust it for another 15k.
Maybe next year I'll flush the coolant again, attack the PHH hose clamps with a dremel, and use my $25 2 inch section of high tech hose.
Hayes
