Any tricks for bolting back the pipe holding clasp on the heatercore...

[ryan roopnarine]

with the three aluminum tubes? (not the three aluminum tube, two plastic tube one like on most m30s and m20s). im thinking that i may have bent one of the tubes, and that's the cause of it not letting me bolt the pipe holder back on. right now, the clasp will not fit over both pipes when both pipes are inserted into the core (and without the clasp, the pipes and their o-rings are free to move about. the pipes i'm talking about are the two larger side ones, the front pipe seems to bolt back up in any orientation. im hoping that winfred or lowell are on right now :D , as i don't think that most home brewers will have enough bmw heatercores under their belts as to have bent a pipe during their experiences. thanks

ps. im thinkin maybe ill leave the sob disconnected and put the dash back together. if its bent, and its expensive, ill just ask vines to sell me one on ebay.

[Johntee540]

to crack the code on this one.

I assume you are talking about the 2 pipes that attach to the left side of the heater core.

They are held in place by a clip that is attached to one of the pipes and rotates around to hook over the second pipe.

Then you insert the bolt and cinch them both down.

The challenge is that you have to seat both of the pipes ALL THE WAY in - in order for the retainer Clip to find the proper space in the Heater Core to drop in. It is keyed.

Take a good look at the core and pipes you removed and it will become more evident. I just did this repair 3 weeks ago with a buddy on the Roadfly boards in my garage here and we got hung up at the same point. hope this helps - Jt

[ryan roopnarine]

john, where did you buy your heatercore? im not looking to put down money to have somebody special order one and find out that its the old style unit. also, how did you force the tubes in there with enough "oomph" to get the clasp to engage?

[DaCan23]

Oh I remember that clasp was a MAJOR PITA, took forever to get them seated all the way and locked in.

The heater core is such a PITA job because of that, and gettin the pipes out, and then using rocket science, luck, and tetris to figure out how to have the pipes intertwined back in through the firewall so they lineup w/ the core.