heater/ac unit rebuild. HEAT works! need cable help

[1971ford]

rebuild of the heater/ac unit my dad found at the junkyard starts on page 2!



ill try to make this as organized as possible. here i go...

i went to the junk yard today and had my dad look at heater stuff(since im not allowed in and dont have anything but the heatercore pretty much) and he found 3 heater units without the covers. i have some questions though.

1)will any of these heater units that are pictured, work in my truck?
2)if so, how do you remove a unit from the cab? where are the bolts? so my dad can grab it if it will work
3)why do i have a different air duct thing than the ones pictured?

the units found in the junkyard:




my air duct thingy




also, i plan on using this heater cover thingy. so will anyof the junkyard units work in my truck and fit/work behind this?




this is what i pulled out of my truck a while ago.

4) are the units that are in the junkyard trucks different from what i pulled from my truck? is it a whole different unit?



any help is appreciated!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[HOWDY69]

My 69 is similar to the junk yard photos.

Your air inlet looks different than mine.

The heater cover thingy is , I believe, an add on air conditioner.

[flyboy2610]

The heater assemblies in the first three picture are complete units. That is how the heaters in these trucks look. I'm not sure what you mean by a heater cover, except, as mentioned above, you may be referring to an add on AC unit. The air vent you have is one I haven't seen before. the only thing I can think of is maybe it's for a factory AC unit? (Just guessing here.) Dose your heater control panel in the dash say anything about AC?
As far as removal goes, the unit is held on by three nuts in the engine compartment. Remove the heater hoses and remove the three nuts. Inside the cab, remove the bolts holding the air vent unit to the cab side. Lower the unit and unhook the cables going to the air and blend doors on top of the unit. Unhook the defroster hose and electrical wires and remove the unit from the cab.

[1971ford]

yeah, when i say heater cover thingy im talking about this


thank you for the removal instructions.

is that core that i have a part of the first three pictured units?


and when i grab it, and hook it up, ( assuming that it works ) will it work without the thing pictured 2 sentances above or any other cover thing?
or do i just have to hook the wires and hoses up and bolt it on and heat will be coming through

[flyboy2610]

The unit pictured in the photo of your last post is an AC unit.
Before we go any further, I need you to answer one questio: Does the dash control unit in your truck, just below the radio, say AC on it anywhere, like the control unit in the photo does?

[fordman]

yes those junkyard heaters will fit . any of them will fit. your old factory air is not like those ehater units. they are different. but they are a heat only box. no air conditioning. your old one was heat and air conditioning. its that simple.

[1971ford]

flyboy: oops, i forgot you asked that question. the controls do say AC. sorry about that.

fordman: so all the units in the junkyard trucks are heat only, and the old one i had was ac and heat. and i dont care about ac although it would be nice, so i think ill just grab one of the junkyard units. i will keep looking for a heater/ac set up though. but just heat will work for now because i just need the defroster for winter.
does anyone know if i will have to drill new holes for mounting one of the junkyard ones or do they use the same wholes as the heat/ac i used to have?

will the junkyard heater systems hook up to my stock ac/heater controls and hoses????

last but not least.. is there anyt parts my dad should look for on the units that are importantt or taken off often and to decide which one he should pull?
thanks guys, i really appreciate it!

[HOWDY69]

I have mine apart right now if you want to look at it.
I am in Carmichael. If you are interested I will e-mail you my address and Phone number.

[1971ford]

thanks for the offer but i would have to get one of my parents to drive me over there. ill just hook the heater setup up and if it doesnt work i can start taking it apart and cleaning it up. thanks for the offer though!

[1971ford]

im going to the junkyard in a couple hours...
i kinda want the answers to these questions before i go though...........

does anyone know if i will have to drill new holes for mounting one of the junkyard ones or do they use the same wholes as the heat/ac i used to have?

will the junkyard heater systems hook up to my stock ac/heater controls and coolant hoses????

last but not least.. is there anyt parts my dad should look for on the units that are importantt or taken off often and to decide which one he should pull?
thanks guys, i really appreciate it!

[seattle67]

Hi Ryan,
Well, I'm looking at your post this morning through blood shot eyes and the dull pain of a headache. (I had a little too much fun last night )

I cant help you much because I have never pulled the heater unit out of my bump. I have pulled ones out of many other vehicles though and on all of them, even ones with the AC option, the holes were factory drilled for the standard (heat only) unit. I would imagine the holes you need to install the heat only set up will be there.

As for the controls, there again I am guessing as I have a 67 with heat only, different from your slide controls. But maybe the safe thing to do is have your Dad pull out the controls from whatever truck you get the heater from. That way you're covered. Save your old controls though in case you put AC back in someday.

As far as what your Dad should look for, thats hard to say without being there to look over your Dads shoulder to see what he is seeing, but I guess his best bet would be to look for one that looks complete with nothing missing.

I am curious, and maybe you answered this and I just didn't see it, what was wrong with your old heat/AC unit. Those are pretty desirable and maybe you would be better off just repairing it?

Sorry if I didn't help much, my brain is pretty much mush this morning, I just hated to see your questions going unanswered this morning.

Good luck Ryan

[1971ford]

guess what! i went to the junk yard and my dad saw this on his way to the heater that i was going to have him pull! so he grabbed it of course. it was only 40.00 for the whole thing! im so happy. the only problem is that NONE of the wires coming off of the ac/heater unit match the wires of my truck. same thing with the am radio i also grabbed today. i added a pic of the wires mess coming from the unit my dad just grabbed. that was a great day at the junkyard!

just took it out of the truck:


cleaned up just a little bit.


and the wires that dont match my truck's at all.


thanks anyways for all the help guys! now you can help me get this thing hooked up!

[dbarker]

that unit is factory heat/ac unit that you evidently once had.

good luck with it, you may have to do some tinkering to get it up and running. wires not matching isnt a problem. you just need to figure out what wires do what. and the wire them up yourself.

Make sure to add inline fuses to any power wires you run for it for extra protection.

My guess is none of the wires match because the PO took the stuff out and probably cut the old wires out.

ON a side note, hopefully since your dash control already said AC on it, your glove box insert is smaller than a normal one so that the unit you just go will fit up into the dash. If your PO has replaced that insert with the "bigger" one from a non ac truck you will run into small issues of the unit not fitting.

Im sure youve noticed, but there is a "Glove box" in that ac unit to make up for the lost space in the dash box.

[Ranchero50]

Yep, those big monsters are a pain. If you can't find the wiring in your truck you may have to send your dad back in after the cab wiring all the way out to the compressor to get it to work.. I don't know if Keith has the wiring diagrams for those on the site or not.

Jamie

[1971ford]

dbarker: well there is no glove box in the dash now but im ordering one. having that glovebox built into the unit is really nice! now i can take all the paper work out of the ash tray!

ranchero50: i dont have my dad chase the wires for me, he is too tall to fit under the dash . thats my job. i have him test wires though. he just tought me how to splice and i did my first splicing job. i spliced the new door jamb switch/ plug into the old wiring. not a biggy but it was a first.

i spent 5.5 hourse taking apart/cleaning/fixing/replacing parts/putting back together the heater ac unit i just got. i am currently loading up lots of pictures of the rebuild on the unit.
stay tuned! just a couple minutes. maybe 10