Yeah, I got in the car this morning and noticed my carpet was wet on my passenger side. tuned out to be antifreeze. I'm thinking heater core. I took off the panel below the glove box as well as the plastic cover to see if I could see where it was coming from. There is a crapload ov junk down there and I have a feeling this is going to be a pain in the neck. Also It leaks if I run my heater or not.

1. is this consistant with a bad core?

2. I'm a nube when it comes to alot of things but even more so with heating and air conditioning. what should I probably do for this? Can I rout some tube to bypass the core and just have no heater or what?

3. help, por favor.

 

textbook heater core. seeing as you live in Cali, bypassing it would be a viable option.

 

it could also be the heater valve they sometimes have leaks . check that before you change the heater core .

 

its easy to bypass that. see the 2 coolant lines that run along the block on the passenger side and into the fire wall, connect them together. and done. but where im from you need heat. lol.

 

x3 on the heater valve "water ****." Somewhat common prob on the 280zx's.

 

if it is the water valve you can order from the courtesy nissan in dallas or fortworth the cost is only 32.00

 

Thanks guys. I'll bypass it for now.

 

i had the samep roblem from my 280zxt its called the " water ****" my nissan dealership didint have the part so i went to a junk yard and worked for about 2 hours to get me the peacei needed... it cost me 5 bucks.. used..

 

I had the same problem and ended up by-passing it with a valve.
Mine would stop leaking if I kept it on the Heat position. The valve allows me to let coolant flow if I need heat and to stop it for colder air.

 

Does anyone know if the regular ~37$ heater valve (water ****) will fit my car if it has a/c? Do I have to spring ~150$ for the one with automatic teperature control? My a/c is old and uncharged anyway, I've ment to rip it out, just havn't gotten around to it so if I can save 100 bucks or so that would be awsome.

 

The heater valve doesn't have anything to do w/ the actual a/c.... it has to do w/ the heater.

And yes it matters... if you have the manual control vents, you get the manual controlled heater valve. If you have the auto climate control, you need the auto heater control valve. Why? Because one is controlled by a cable, the other by vaccum.

If you are really strapped for $$$... search out a good one from the junk yards.