I was driving the 1984 Cavalier home from my friend's house and I was accelerating from a stop. I probably shifted at 4K (not really sure, no tach) and I smelled coolant.
Then the windshield started steaming up and I tried the defroster and it just made it worse.
It's 6 miles from where the heater core blew up to my house and the car made it without overheating.
I checked under the hood, everything looked OK, then shined a flashlight under the car and saw coolant dripping from behind the engine. (It's been raining all day, but that amount of drippage was not from water splashed up under the car...)
I found one on Ebay for $25 shipped. That's about the only source, the heater core for 1984 Cavalier with AC is obsolete but the one for the car without AC is still available. Go figure that one out.
Also found a heater core bypass hose on Ebay so I can at least get this thing drivable again before replacing the heater core. Which doesn't appear to involve removing the dashboard on this car, thankfully.
I've never blown up a heater core before. I feel so accomplished.
At least it happened close to home. Get all the parts on this car that are going to break, to break close to home.
EDIT: The coolant was last changed on this car, prior to my doing it a few months ago, likely sometime before 1998 and definitely before 2010 when it was parked and sat for 10 years.
Then the windshield started steaming up and I tried the defroster and it just made it worse.
It's 6 miles from where the heater core blew up to my house and the car made it without overheating.
I checked under the hood, everything looked OK, then shined a flashlight under the car and saw coolant dripping from behind the engine. (It's been raining all day, but that amount of drippage was not from water splashed up under the car...)
I found one on Ebay for $25 shipped. That's about the only source, the heater core for 1984 Cavalier with AC is obsolete but the one for the car without AC is still available. Go figure that one out.
Also found a heater core bypass hose on Ebay so I can at least get this thing drivable again before replacing the heater core. Which doesn't appear to involve removing the dashboard on this car, thankfully.
I've never blown up a heater core before. I feel so accomplished.
At least it happened close to home. Get all the parts on this car that are going to break, to break close to home.
EDIT: The coolant was last changed on this car, prior to my doing it a few months ago, likely sometime before 1998 and definitely before 2010 when it was parked and sat for 10 years.