Hot Rods Source of hot coolant for heater

Trying to keep things as unobtrusive as possible when running heater hoses, can any of you think of a reason why the pressure side cannot be tapped off of the 1/2"npt plug on the passenger side head of a sbc. If it's doable it wouldn't stick out like a sore thumb as badly as taking it off the intake manifold.

 

yes. I am sure it would work. You still need to turn a return line. Don't see any advantage.

 

I'm not an expert, but...........
It might restrict the coolant flow from one bank compared to the other. Don'no??
The cooling of the block and heads is one system engineered to work a certain way and the heater is another system engineered to take heated water from a certain place at a certain temp. Though they share the heated coolant, they seem to be parallel systems and never series systems. Changing all that around may affect some sort of balance that you don't want. Like I said, I don't really know. But there must be a reason cars have always come from the factory plumbed the way they do.

 

The return line would run to the water pump as normal, I'm just trying to keep things low in the engine compartment. I know it's the price of running a heater but I'd really like to not have the hose up on the intake manifold

 

It shouldn't bother anything. Not much different than coming off of the back of the intake manifold.

 

Local builder has had some fittings made up to use the new style ac hose as heater. 3/8 hose much smaller and does the job. Hose is very flexible. Vintage air sells the a/c hose as an option.

 

thanks for the info on the a/c hose, does your bud sell the fittings?

 

Might cook the hose with the heat from the exhaust manifold or header...plumb it carefully.

 

I know a guy that did this. He ran hard line to the back of the engine or maybe clear thru the firewall, I don't remember for sure. You really had to look to see it.

Gary

 

Tap the intake at the back of the head.

 

looks like they used a angled fitting in the intake. i know it is not what you asked but if for some reason tapping the head doesn't work this looks kinda clean.

 

tb33, that is a clean install on that engine. Since this website is dedicated to traditional hot rodding I won't tell you what is mounted in that exact spot on my engine (it makes the interior nice and cool) so I couldn't place it in there. If I tap into the plug just to the left of the one in this engine I would have to loop it over the valve cover which I'm tring to avoid. But I appreciate the suggestion.

 

I'm not sure I would want to run hard line through the firewall, the torquing of the engine might lead to failure of a ridgid line.

 

You could also use the plug just above the pan rail. It's pretty small though so it would definitely restrict the flow to the heater core, but that may not be a problem for you....here in Canada we need all the heater core flow possible. (-29 Celsius this morn)

 

I use the setup like tb33anda3rd showed but use the other hole to the left. It sits tightly under the AC compressor at an angle-have done 8-9 40's that way. Hose comes forward and down. Can send you a picture if you like.

 

41woodie, I did my 39 Chev coupe with sbc exactly as you are asking about, worked and looked good..

 

Plumbed it that way on a number of cars, never had a problem.