I'm not worried about someone having my number. I'm not hiding anything and I'm a old soldier and BIKER. I don't worry. Skidmark and Big G have been there. I did it by myself, but help (the wife) helps!!!

 

guys,
we had a late dinner and afterwards I just wasn't up for the fight again today on that radiator. I went out to the garage for about 10 minutes just to see how I have to loosen up the core support to lean it forward and saw the bolts come in thru the wheel wells and didn't want to deal with it tonight. Besides, I know myself and figure i'll be better off taking the night off and away from the car after a frustrating day and going at it fresh and clearheaded in the morning.
I DID also notice that even once I remove the top and middle core support bolts on each side so I can swing it forward for more room I'm not going to be able to swing it out of the way very far - maybe an inch if I'm lucky! The AC condensor on the front is already very close to the twin vacuum cans for the headlights.
Oh well, I'll do what I can do and see how far it gets me.

While i was in the garage I hit the studs and nuts of the exhaust manifold/exhaust system with PB Blaster to start to loosen them up a bit as i need to unhook them also of course in preperation of pulling the motor.

i'll let you know by tomorrow evening if I made progress on the radiator pull

 

Remove the core support bolts, and it will come out very easy.To get the bolts out in the wheel well ,turn the wheel full left on one side and full right on the other just makes it easy access. good luck

 

...Barry, welcome to the world of late model C3 cramped engine compartments. While you are doing this radiator & such, you may also want to replace your water pump too. When I put a new radiator & core support in my old Yellow '80 4spd car, I installed a new A/C Delco water pump, fan clutch, GM belts & radiator hoses and had the smog pump rebuilt. This was on my 1980 105K mile Bloomington Gold Survivor car, so it was unrestored, hence the pics aren't the prettiest.

 

well Paul. I like the looks of the C3's but so far i'm not enjoying the working on it part....... between all those d*mn vacuum hoses and the tight working space i'd welcome going back to work on my '65 again! SHEESH

I just spent another 2 hours in the garage. I undid the top two bolts on the core suppost and leaned it forward as much as it would go which isn't very much - maybe an inch before it hits against the headlight vacuum cans.
I tried manuerving that radiator in every possible angle or way I could and she ain't coming past the control arm on the passenger side. It the lower rad hose housing that is screwing me up!
About the only possible thing I can see to do now is to wait until I get the engine hoist here and pull the motor. With the motor out of the way I think I'll have enough room to angle the shroud out and than with the shroud out I think i'll have enough room to get the radiator out.
This is one of the dumbest things I've ever seen! image not being able to get a radiator out until you pull the whole motor out!
If I was willing to open up the A/C system I suppose I could just remove the entire core suppost and AC condensor but I really didn't want to deal with the A/C system at all since it's working, has a charge of freon, etc!
I am subborn and hate to give up on things so I'm sure until the motor gets pulled i'll play around with trying a few more times until than, but i'm basically now just throwing in the towel on it until the motor gets yanks because I see no other way it's going to come out.
This is just ridiculous!

 

Barry..I found my notes on removing my rad from the 78 SA...4 years ago !!! I did take shroud loose...and pulled it back..then,pulled rad out,but as I remember I had to juke it around to get lower hose connection free..just in case,I just called my bud who owns a Corvette shop...he confirmed...but added this: he says sometimes you must tweak/bend that hose bib to get rad out !!! (don,'t do that) anyway,just bugged me on how I did it.so hope this helps a little..
Rich

 

thanks Rich, I appreciate that but i've twisted, and manuaerved every posible way imaginable and it just doesn't want to come out.
It always seems to be the case - things I think should be hard turn out to be easy and the things that should be easy turn out to be hairpulling, cuss-producing adventures.
If it wasn't for the AC condensor I'd just yank the entire core support out and be done with it but I REALLY don't want to fool with the AC system.
I guess I'll have to wait until I get the otor out and try it again.

 

...Barry, remember these cars were built "around" the radiator.

 

And to think some of my customers complain when we charge them 2 hours labor to R+I a C-3 radiator......

 

big
after starting to work on my own cars just last Aug I've learned that I'll most likey never complain about what a mechanic lists as required hours to do something anymore. Than again, on the Vettes I started learning how to do stuff because I never found a competent mechanic local to me anyway but that's not the point.
If I had this radiator out in only two hours I would have been thrilled!

 

I started doing this many years ago, mostly because I was cheap...
But I ran into many obstacles along the way....trailing arms, wheel bearings, etc. I appreciate people who are willing to try to repair things themselves, as I consider it fulfilling and sometimes theraputic. You just happened to have discovered one of the more difficult jobs on a Vette!. BTW, when we do a radiator R+I, we have 2 people on the job, the radiator is heavy....lol

 

actually, it doesn't seem to be the weight as an issue trying to do this myself as much as the bulk of it and trying to reach acrss the car to grab the other side of it with one hand and the close side with the other hand. It makes for some interesting contortions. Two people would definitely make it easier but I only have me, myself, and I so I need to make do the best I can.

sometimes you gotta wonder though if the designers had a bad day and decided to "get back at people" by delibertly making some things extremely difficult just so they could spend years laughing about it imaginging mechanics and others fighting something when they could have just as easily made it much easier instead.

 

 

This one works better, rihwoods...

 

Funny..my pita experiences with these C3's were things like the driver mirror control disappearing inside the door;electric window switch doing same on console,and my on going battle with this sucker:




I've done all six u-joints,rad,waterpump,distributer,intake, steering,you name it,but this one has got me...even tried beating slide plate off...