Froze my radiator on my 96 Buick Road-master land yacht and cracked the plastic header. while removing the radiator I damaged a transmission coolant line. The damn thing runs way the heck up and under. To get the other end off I’ll either have to dismantle half the car or have miracle tools and dexterity. Can I cut the tube andadd some sort of union fitting to splice a good section of tube with fitting to replace the damaged end?
You can do that, or you could cut off the damaged end, flare it, and just put a piece of rubber line over the flared end. Clamp it, get a barbed threaded fitting to go in to the port on the radiator, and connect the other end of the rubber hose to that. I did that on a car of mine once and it worked well.
Just use rubber line rated for transmission fluid use. Regular fuel hose can be used for a short time, but was not designed for long-term use for that pressure and temperature. The transmission fluid hose is easily available and used extensively when adding external transmission fluid coolers.
Thanks. Unfortunately the line was damaged badly (twisted off) right behind the fitting so I’ll need to buy a length of tube with the flare and fitting and make a clean cut to the damaged line. Then is it just a matter of a length of tube and a couple of worm gear hose clamps or do I need to do something else to the ends of the straight tube first?
If you are going to all the work of replacing the piece with a metal tube, I would just use the brass connector for it-either compression or flare it. If you use rubber hose, I would caution to use two clamps on each end instead of one. It is not under high pressure but they can slip off at the most inopportune time and you lose all your fluid. You can’t have much room to work on that under there though, do you?
I have a bit of room to work with the radiator out. I figured out I don’t need a tube in the middle and a metal line on both ends if I just find a barb to female fitting for the radiator end of the hose. I found the hose, now I just need to find the fittings. The local Auto Zone wasn’t very well equipped. Thanks for the help.