1979 10th anniversary Olds 403 ac hoses
 

Check your hoses if you buy replacements!

I sold my TATA to a local buyer, and a few months later I found a couple cans of R12 so I got together with him to charge the a/c. After a little fudging with the can tap (those things are nowhere near as easy to use as a can of R134a!), we got a couple cans in and it started cooling - until the hose blew out where it had been rubbing on the passenger side fender brace. :(

He bought a replacement hose from classic industries and installed it last week, so I drove up over the weekend with my vacuum pump and gauges. First thing we noticed was no more high side port on the muffler coming off the compressor. OK, we'll charge through the low side only. The system seemed to take forever to suck a can in, and it wasn't cooling at all; if anything, it seemed like hot air coming out the vents.

After getting 3 cans in and still no cooling, we laid the old hose out next to the new one and noticed that the routing is opposite - we were sending hot gas to the evaporator! He's going to get with the vendor to find out what happened and if they have the correct hose manifold, and we'll try it again.

I was looking at the used one thinking, that looks correct. Pretty obvious there's a problem even trying to install the next one. Hopefully a correct replacement has been sent.

http://thepartguy.com/images/PartsFo...ressorHose.jpg

Factory put a foam on that brace. I’ve seen people put them on the battery side lol

If you have the OE hard pipes/fittings then I would suggest getting new hoses crimped onto them. You may be able to get that done locally at a hydraulic shop or send them to a company like Original Air.

Thanks for the info, guys. The guy who bought the T/A has been sourcing the parts, so I'll pass this thread along. I've just been visiting to bring tools and see his progress on the car. :)

Warren, I have had some hoses made locally before; I just can't believe a repro hose for something as common as a '79 T/A wouldn't be available in a correct configuration. Hopefully it was just a shipping snafu from the vendor.

There are a lot of reproduction parts that are not correct. The reproduction accumulator isn't correct either. Sometimes the reproductions are close but not quite right. Check this out:

http://www.transamcountry.com/commun...?topic=84363.0

There was a Tech Bulletin from 11-78 for extra protection on 400 cars to have a sleeve of heater hose on the radiator brace to prevent cutting into the foam sleeve of the AC hose.

Interesting; this one was a 403, but I'll let him know that wouldn't be a bad idea.

That was in response to previous comment about foam.