I have a 2001 Dodge Ram 2500 I have a brown substance coming out of the floor vent not to mention when I turn the heat on I smell antifreeze and my window steams / obviously I need a heater core. My next question is how difficult of task I have done heater core before on an S10 as far as brands should I stick with Mopar or go with something else

Might be for city folks that never see a dirt road or go offroad. 

 

When you live out here and there is more dirt roads than pavement then the HVAC gcase get pretty bad. I stopped taking photos after then article was made. Everyone I still open out here even the 3rd Gen I last done was pack for dirt and dust. Still best to clean it up, than short cutting. 

9 hours ago, IBMobile said:

Genos cabin filters like @Tractorman posted and call it good

 

How about the drain holes on each side of the cowl that lets dirt and dust back in? How about the mice crawling in there. Remember a member (Rhode Island) fighting mice and rodents off and plugging the cowl drain with stainless steel pot scrubbers.

 

What I mean exactly... I don't own a pavement princess, I own a WORK truck!

 

Edited May 5, 20204 yr by Mopar1973Man

1 hour ago, Mopar1973Man said:

Might be for city folks that never see a dirt road or go offroad.

This is true.  People have to evaluate the condition of their HVAC box and ability to perform the task then take action accordingly.   For some trucks, the driveway queens,  just pulling the heat core is all that is needed.  Trucks that are in forest or farm conditions all the time will most likely need a complete remove, clean, and refit.   

 

1 hour ago, Mopar1973Man said:

Remember a member (Rhode Island) fighting mice and rodents off and plugging the cowl drain with stainless steel pot scrubbers.

Yes, I remember @flagmanruss.  He lived out in the woods of Coventry, RI,   

2 hours ago, Mopar1973Man said:

Might be for city folks that never see a dirt road or go offroad. 

 

Actually I think its more about how you treat your vehicles than what kind of terrain your vehicle sees.  I have a 20 year old truck that looks beautiful with an interior that smells clean.  I still use it for driving to work, hauling trailers for whatever projects I'm doing, taking the family vacations, and getting wood for heating my house.

When cutting wood, the dogs and I go up the hill in the morning and come down early evening with upwards of 10+ cords per load.  And yeah its a lot of work by myself so any help is always welcome.

 

I actually wash my truck from time to time, vacuum it out, and try to stay up on all the regular maintenance.  I dont treat it badly in hoping that it will last for as long as I want to keep it.

 

That said, I know of people who treat their vehicles like they hate it.  Always dirty, smells like the backside of some animal, fast food wrappers on the floorboard, drives horrible, and rarely sees maintenance unless something broke preventing it from more daily abuse.  Generally they complain about the POS they have and blame issues on poor quality.

 

I can assure you that my evap is clean even though the truck sees plenty of dirt and fresh air.  I cant say why the evap you pictured looks like a flock of birds nested in the HVAC box but I'm gonna suspect that the owner is not very vehicle friendly...

 

Not all us country folks are bumpkins.

 

   Mopar1973man, I'm not trying to undercut what you advise and do here. If anything, I'm just asking and showed that hey, maybe you don't have to tear your whole box out this time around, maybe it can go another 5, 10, or 15 years more before its time to a full tear down. Then again, I could tear my whole box apart, clean the inside, maybe do the heater treater, inspect the evap and clean it put it all back, and a month later, my evap starts leaking. But by just taking the blower out, using your phone to inspect the fins on your evap can at least give you the idea of how dirty it is, and go from there.

   And as for a work truck, I may not use it to pull a trailer or for farming,(couple times for getting hay for some friends) but I have darn sure worked her hard. Been a couple times carrying stone to the job with well over 4000 pounds sitting in her, countless times carrying over a ton with masonry mud and rock to go with. I may not live out in the country, but I'd sure like to some day. I'm where the work is, and you'd be disgusted at the price of houses here in North Idaho, weather in the city or trying to own property outside of it. At this point, its a pipe dream for my wife and I, unless we move out into the middle of nowhere that is.

    Like @KATOOM said of his truck, i do my best to take care of mine I'm one of those guys who despite having a fading paint job and some with some scratches to go with, it pains me when I come across a new dent or mark. it might be old, but she's still mine and bought with my hard earned money. My boss is one of those guys who drives his hard and doesn't maintain it. Sometimes it can get real nasty lookin, both inside and out. Its hard for me to not clean it up when I'm driving his truck for some jobs lol.

   Anyway, I appreciate the advice from everyone. Heater is on my to do list for next week, currently taking the powersteering and vacuum out now.

  She's getting there....

   

3 hours ago, IBMobile said:

Trucks that are in forest or farm conditions all the time will most likely need a complete remove, clean, and refit.

Yup. Very true... Every time I've tried avoid the HVAC pull down I end up pulling the HVAC because the dust issues, bound up doors from debris. Plugged evaporator more than once... I've done plenty of HVAC cases in Dodge both 2nd (early and late) and 3rd gen bodies. Even the last 3rd Gen was pack so good I had to power wash the evaporator. 

 

2 hours ago, KATOOM said:

Not all us country folks are bumpkins.

(Chucklin') You are one of the rare few. I work on trucks that are seriously nasty at times, some are horridly gross... Dodge's, Ford's and even Chevy's... There are way more country bumpkins that good natured folks that maintain there trucks. I just got done helping a guy that is simply beating a Ford to death and in poor condition. Again to get this mans house I had 8 mile drive up a dirt road. 

 

1 hour ago, Alexio Auditore said:

Mopar1973man, I'm not trying to undercut what you advise and do here.

No problem. Just there is ranchers, farm trucks, work trucks that don't stay on pavement. Here soon I'll be out in the forest cutting firewood for the house for winter time. I'll have plenty of back road travels. I just did a trip up the Big River (Salmon River) ran up to see how low the snow line was to see time line for firewood. 

 

Now all these people I teach them if your going off road or dusty conditions please select MAX A/C setting this closes the door to the outside and keeps the dust out of the evaporator. Basically in a nutshell the evaporator will sweat and the dust collects in the moisture and the blowing air eventually dries the dust into a cake. Debris wise it can be drawn in, fell in the cowl, animals bring it in, etc.

 

I just had a guy down at the other shop ask about a noise in his fan. Pulled the blower out to find a dead mouse in the cage. Just because you take care of your vehicle doesn't mean it going to be perfect inside the case either. Like this gent he's got a wonderful Ford luxury car and there was dead mouse in the case.

 

Like my last trip to Boise there was seed pods blowing off the trees everywhere. They where small enough to make is through my entire HVAC case and blow out the vents. It does happen... 

 

 

5 hours ago, Mopar1973Man said:

Now all these people I teach them if your going off road or dusty conditions please select MAX A/C setting this closes the door to the outside and keeps the dust out of the evaporator.

I miss some old cars that simplyhad a button for rec and a/c on/off

6 hours ago, Mopar1973Man said:

Now all these people I teach them if your going off road or dusty conditions please select MAX A/C setting this closes the door to the outside and keeps the dust out of the evaporator.

 

Make sure you let them know that there's basically no screen inlet on the MAX A/C setting where it draws down by the passenger feet.  So when the fan is on high it will suck up hair, dirt, leaves, paper, napkins, wrappers, etc...off the floorboard.

 And the stench of your buddy's feet.

Just another viewpoint. My truck is mostly a pavement queen. I haul some materials in it and the 5th wheel. The rest of the time it lives on the job and is my office alot. It gets in the mud alot and idles alot. So l would say it breathes a lot of dirt and dust while idling. Cant say on max mine has ever sucked a sandwich wrapper up but maybe most anything else. 

 After the evaporator started leaking and the dash was cracking it was a no brainer for me to pull it all. Also after reading @Mopar1973Man's article on pulling the dash, l just dove in. It is not a bad job at all. But you should make time to do it. Dont jump in Saturday expecting to drive away on Sunday unless you are willing dive in with both feet untill its done. I spent 4 days on mine with as many beer breaks as I wanted. It is not a bad job to do at all. 

 I also believe the end results were worth the effort.

Betcha cant guess what I get to do this weekend... 

Let's see,  a three day weekend, so It's either Las Vegas or replacing a heater core.

Dont know why but I am leaning toward heater core. 

Edited December 30, 20204 yr by dripley

maybe I should skip the heater core and just go to Vegas  

2 minutes ago, hdpwipmonkey said:

maybe I should skip the heater core and just go to Vegas  

That would more fun, especially if you dont have somewhere warm to fix the heater. Beer is cheaper at home, wait a minute. anint beer free at the casino?? 

1 minute ago, dripley said:

That would more fun, especially if you dont have somewhere warm to fix the heater. Beer is cheaper at home, wait a minute. anint beer free at the casino?? 

I do have a garage to work in but my truck is longer than the garage so I cant close the door.  This limits the length of jobs that I can do in there (I know this is probably going to send @Mopar1973Man over the edge) so that's why I am going to do the shortcut method of replacing just the heater core... 

3 minutes ago, hdpwipmonkey said:

do the shortcut method of replacing just the heater core... 

A short garage is a cold garage. Kind of like my gravel dirve way. But I do have a summer garage, still gravel but dry.

Seems to be my garage today... I get to lay in the snow and pull a steering box off a 3rd Gen truck for Ryan @Blue-Top Steering.

 

I don't want to commit my shop to a vehicle that I gotta wait for parts to be ship in for rebuild and then ship back for install. Mine just getting my steering box sent back to Ryan and fix under warranty it still took one month for turn around time. So, off to work I go with about 6 inches of snow on the ground. 

 

 

 

@Mopar1973Man is that on your Cummins? I thought you just went round and round with that steering box? 

4 hours ago, Doubletrouble said:

@Mopar1973Man is that on your Cummins? I thought you just went round and round with that steering box? 

 

So... 

 

What happened I bought a Blue Top (Quick Ratio) Steering box. So fast forward to about year later the output shaft seal started to leak. I ask Ryan to send me a seal kit for it. Took the pitman arm off and pull the output shaft out. Once I got the shaft out I notice a small ding in the shaft right at the seal line. During this time I was still running @MoparMomto dialysis. I figured if the leak came back up again I would call Ryan. The problem returns again... I called Ryan and explain what was going on. He warranty the pump for me. Needless to say it took 2 week for a large flat rate box to ship from Idaho to North Dakota. Then Ryan only took a few moments to fix the pump and get it back in the mail. Then problem is again taking another 2 weeks for his flat box to come back 1 month of waiting for mail. 

 

So yes mine was a PITA. As for the one I'm currently working on is a 2005 Dodge with 35 inch tires and wiped out the steering box. Not to mention this same truck needs a set of injectors. 

 

Edited December 31, 20204 yr by Mopar1973Man

 Ahh ok, I misunderstood. I thought you were back at working on your steering box yet again. That's why I asked. 

 On a side note, after reading about all the various issues resulting from oversized tires it really bolsters my feeling against lift my truck and running large tires. I'm all for that, I've had a few lifted myself but this one.....no, I'm going for longevity.