I have seen that a few guys used foam seal kits for 69-70 Mustangs to re-do there heater boxes, and heard that not everything fit, but that they were close. I wanted to see if anyone used any other kit and how well that worked. Right off the bat, since our cars cover more of the same years, has anyone tried a kit for a 71-73 Mustang heater box? My car is factory A/C.
I used some parts from a Mustang kit, but made most of what I needed from sticky foam tape. There is another post about this somewhere.
The reason we use the 69/70 AC (C9ZZ-18500-A) kit for the factory AC cars is that the AC heater box is listed in the interchange as the same as the Maverick -- even though it is very similar, there are definitely differences. That said, like Dave said, you can only use some of the pieces, the rest you have to make using the foam tape. The tape I used is Armacell item TAP18230 from Lowes. Worked great - it is 1/8" thick, 2" wide, and very sticky.
Matt, Thanks for the info on the tape. I got a look at a diagram of a 71-73 Mustang A/C heater box (CJs Pony Parts sell a kit for these ...). Externally, it looks structured very much like ours. I will pop mine open and see if it still looks similar.
Jeff, did you ever take that look into your AC box to see if it is similar to the Mustang box. I've switched over to a 70 AC box and am interested in the Mustang seal kit.
Bob, I did buy the 71-73 kit from CJs. So far, so good, but for a half dozen really good excuses, I am only halfway through rehabbing mine. So, I can't say conclusively yet that it is 100% right.... but it all does look very close. One of the reasons that I got sidetracked is that I scored all the ducting I needed plus a whole other A/C box. I have the defroster ducting and plenum rehabbed, but there is a flapper in there. I ended up going to Lowes to get some foam tape for that.
Thanks, Jeff. I was looking at the price of the kit and we're only looking at something that will cost around 20 bucks shipped so I'm going to order it. I have a good plenum and an inner blower motor housing coming from Craig Selvey and then I should be able to get it all assembled. This AC box will now function only as a heater/defroster box. I wanted to eliminate my non-AC blower motor from sticking through the firewall so I got this AC box which mounted in the same position as my original non AC box with only having to drill one extra hole in the firewall. This positions the blower motor inside the car above the transmission tunnel. I also picked up a new heater core and blower motor from Rock Auto during one of their clearence sales. This makes for some nice inside the house winter work
Like you, mine will be heat and defrost only, but that is because A/C is definitely not in the budget right now ... (what budget? ... I am building this with almost no cash right now ... good thing I have plenty of stuff squirrelled away to keep me busy). I will be putting the A/C condensor inside the box, hoping for "some day" that it will actually be reconnected to something ... hoping it will still be good at that time too ... I'm a real optimist .... realistically, I give it a 20% chance that it will all work out without me having to buy a new one and disassemble everything one more time. I like the idea of getting the fan motor out of the engine bay. That is neat thinking. Glad you got one of those fan motors on clearance ... when I posted here about those there were just three left.
With my steel tilt front end I wanted the firewall to be as clean as possible for visual effects plus the blower motor was getting a little too close to the Cleveland I'll stash my AC condensor away in a box for now but if you could ever use it, you would be more than welcome to it for just the shipping cost.
I appreciate the offer .... the reason why I give mine such slim odds is that according to a good A/C guy, once a condensor is 10 years old, it are pretty marginal as to if it will hold pressure. At least mine will already be in place ... heavy sucker, too. Hate carrying the extra weight in the car.
Well the one I have came out of a 1970 Maverick so I'm sure it is no good either. If that is the case, I'll just scrap it and get it out of my way.
I had my condenser pressure tested. I don't know abt the odds on how long it will last but as soon as weather gets gud enough to re-install the box, I will be putting it back. I imagine the only way to get a new one is to have it custom made unit.
