My 63 Dart wagon's 225 was overheating, so I had the rad boiled out, rodded out, and tank repaired. I also did a block flush, pulled all freeze plugs, cleaned all the schmutz from the water jackets. I also have on hand a brand new 180 Stant thermostat, plus bought new hoses and belts to give this thing some badly needed maintenance. Hopefully, I won't have to deal with overheating for awhile. Also bought a new 16lb double-seal cap.
But I'm still annoyed, frustrated and depressed, because in my zeal to remove the radiator and fix the overheating problem, I created another. The brass nuts that hold the transmission cooling lines to the lower rad tank were very, very tight. On the first one I tried to remove, I managed to twist the line beyond repair, so I realized I would have to re-bend and re-flair the end to mate it correctly. Wisely, I sprayed liquid wrench on the second line, and it came loose much easier.
Spent about 3 hours this past Saturday trying to re-bend the transmission cooling line with the line still in the car. At first, this seemed like a bad idea, because I had no room to work. Tried removing the line from the transmission, but even with liquid wrench, the nut's not budging and there's very limited room back there, even from beneath. So, I continued to work on the end I can access, but my results were mediocre. That's when I realized that to really do this job right, the line has to come out, and be completely re-bent.
So all, my question is: (using the tube cutter), should I cut the line as far forward as I can and mate a new section of line with the old section which is bent correctly, or is it necessary to remove the whole thing and re-bend it?
Please give me thoughts for best practices. Thanks!
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