Fresh air and Blower intake hose replacement on BJ8

[Leo_Speichinger]

I am having to replace the fresh air and blower motor hoses and am not able to get the fresh air hose back on the flange by the firewall much less get the clamp back on. Is there an easir way to accomplish the task without haveing to remove the fender? Have battled it for several hours and I dont see a solution other than removing the fender to acess it.... Any one "been there done that" and have a solution? There just isnt any room to get ahnds up in there where they need to be...

Looking to end the frustration.

 

[Leo_Speichinger]

I forgot to add the FRESH air is the one I really am having problems with... The blower side was a real drag but not impossible... The fresh air is a whole nother matter

 

[steveg]

I made a slightly tapered extension from household aluminum flashing which clamps onto the stub. It's about 6" long. The fresh air hose is forced onto the taper.
Not shown is a pop rivet under the hose which keeps the OD of the front end at less than the ID of the hose.
This doesn't look stock, but then you can't really see it.

 

[John_Progess]

Leo, The problem is that the hose is catching on the body extension and you obviously cannot see or feel all around the extension. I have done this by enlarging the end of the hose just slightly and making sure that the end of the hose is perfectly round. Easier said than done. Keep trying as this is probably easier than taking the fender off. I believe you have to remove the door to get the fender off. Then you have to deal with the fender beading when reassembling the fender.

 

[vette]

Leo, it is a bear but possible. I forgot to do mine before I put the fender on and had to do what you are doing. "Been ther done that" . I massaged the end of the air ducting to increase its dia a little. Be careful that the ducting doesn't start to unravel. I got it's opening large enough that it slipped on with one hand. If I remember right, I had the hose clamp slid up on the flange against the fire wall first. Dave.

 

[British_Recovery]

This has worked for me. Go to www.spectreperformance.com and look in the air intake section - ducting. Part # 9751 and part# 97511. Not original, but easy to install. Accordion style so it is small to fit in, but then expands. Two kits can be threaded together to replace the whole cool air duct, with some left over for the heater blower side. Boots slide right over the original metal openings.
Bob

 

[bob hughes]

Steve

I had thought of something like that, did you produce the connection whilst the car was in bits or did you fab it up with everything in place around it? Thinking about it I suppose you could roll the section that fits over the end of the duct at the bulkhead knowing the dimension and then produce the taper. I have seen one made up with a reducer that brings the duct size down to around 3" easier to install as the duct was a concertina plastic, I have also seen a concertina plastic duct at 4" on a Healey but not sure where it can be obtained from.



Bob

 

[John Turney]

A hint: If you have the duct off, get some 3" aluminum dryer duct, cover it with some 1/8"or 1/4" self-stick foam insulation and slide it into the fresh air duct. Then you will get cool air from that duct instead of heated air. I got both the dryer duct and insulation at my local hardware store (Ace).

 

[Rob Glasgow]

John, I like the idea of insulating the fresh air duct. When I live in the Central Valley of California, the temp would be 95 to 105 in the summer. The air coming thru the fresh air duct seemed to be 140. I should have tried your solution before I moved the coast where the temp is always 64 to 72 degrees.

 

[Patrick67BJ8]

I am having to replace the fresh air and blower motor hoses and am not able to get the fresh air hose back on the flange by the firewall much less get the clamp back on. Is there an easir way to accomplish the task without haveing to remove the fender? Have battled it for several hours and I dont see a solution other than removing the fender to acess it.... Any one "been there done that" and have a solution? There just isnt any room to get ahnds up in there where they need to be...

Looking to end the frustration.

I have better luck using pliers and flattening the end of the duct hose and then wrapping it with masking tape so it doesn't unravel. The original clamps are very hard to get around the end of the ducts...period. Use dryer hose clamps(the kind with screw to tighten and not the ones you spread then slip over the hose). If you are successful doing this you are very fortunate! If you can't then you'll understand why many years ago Healey owners used to install the white thin vinyl dryer hose which let more heat in than cool air(but we didn't know this)...and it was also a lot cheaper too.

 

[Ashley Hinton MG parts]

Hi the duct 4 ins dia fits on the intake on the blower unit and the 3 1/4 ins duct fits on the out let side of the blower unit, I make the heater blower unit and the heater unit, and the cold air intake valve the fits at the front of car I also make the knob for the air intake valve, and the heater water valve, heater cables, and the heater motor
so if you need more help how it fits just let me know my face book page lot of photos to look at ttps://www.facebook.com/pages/Ashley-Hinton/245648178847505?fref=ts
Regards Ashley Hinton

 

[donaldvf]

I have been putting my 1963 BJ7 back together after a frame up restoration. The body shop had full body on and mostly together before I came to the fresh air blower hose. I have owned this car for almost 50 years and have never been able to get an original hose on the blower. I did remind the body man to put the drivers side fresh air hose on but alas, I forgot about the blower. I tried a few things and after finding this thread was mostly disappointed. I finally put the hose on a 4 inch sleeve I had for a spare blower, clamped it down and bent and deformed it into a reasonable angle. I unclamped it and took it to my vise. I clamped an aluminum baseball bat in the vise and used a rubber mallet to pound the intake hose end thin, thus slightly expanding the end, essentially swagging the end to enlarge it. Then the trick which allowed me to put this together in less than ten minutes. I unscrewed the blower motor and while holding it in the fender recess, slid the hose on and clamped the crap out of it with my original 54 year old clamp. When I was confident the hose would not come loose, I pushed the motor close to its bolt-in position and started the two lower screws. After pulling the blower into position with the two lower bolts, I pushed/pulled the motor into position so I could start the two upper screws. It was easier to attach the hose if the motor was loose and able to adjust to the hose position. Forcing the motor into its proper place was a lot easier than the other way around. Hopefully this is the last tricky maneuver I need to pull off. The grillle is in, the carb linkage is attached and the rest should fall together.

 

[RAC68]

I must agree that one of the most aggravating tasks is replacing the duct tubes on a completed Healey. Bending over the fenders and trying to get appropriate leverage and hold during the install is even more frustrating as I get older and loose flexibility and strength. A few years ago, when installing my bilge blower for an article I was writing, I removed the front fender and the task was a cinch.

Yes, removing the fender seemed to be a greater risk then working only under the bonnet. However, removing the fender and door (after marking the location of the hinges) took a casual 1 1/2 hours and reinstalling it was not much more. Assisted by better leveraging position, the installation of the Duct was quite a bit easier with the fender off and I was able to easily do a number of other things as well with the easier access. Although I did not do my heater duct, I could see the same, if not more, benefit derived when removing the right fender when doing anything having to do with the blower or duct. Although this is how I addressed the issue and leave others to make take their own approach, it did work well for me an sometimes doing more turns out to getting something done faster and will less overall effort.

Ray(64BJ8P1)