2004 V70 2.5T radiator replacement tips.

[Sardine]

Here is a post of a few tips that I wished I had seen before replacing the radiator in my 2004 V70 2.5T.
I largely followed the procedure in VIDA. If you do not have VIDA then there is a print out posted here viewtopic.php?t=18552 by MadeInJapan.
In this post I'll refer to this article and expand on those points that I think the article glosses over

• " ... Disconnect the charge air pipe from the charge air cooler (CAC) on the left hand side (turbocharged engines only)..." This pipe did not want to let go until I used a hot air gun and levered it out with a piece of wood.

• "... Disconnect the connector from the receiver drier and the cable from the holder..." You don't want to do this as it is impossible and there is no need.

• "... Hang up the condenser using tie straps on the right-hand side in the pipe for the receiver drier and on the left-hand side in the pipe for the condenser..." This had me scratching my head for quite sometimes. Have a look at the pictures I posted here and it will become clear how I did it.

• "...The following requires two people..." I did this all by myself but I had to use a couple of jacks, the one that comes with the car, one jack on the left and one jack on the right to pop up the radiator and the charge air cooler.

Right hand side:

Left hand side:
On the left hand side 1) pushed two pieces of steel wire onto the front and back side of the air condenser from the top and 2) tied the steel wires at the bottom and 3) pulled the two wires up from the top and tied it to the top panel.

Please note that once you remove the six screws, per VIDA instructions, the radiator and the charge air cooler are decoupled from each other and everything. These two components must still come down together, due to the air cooler hose connectors being in the way of the radiator.
On reassembly, the only difficulty I encountered was the connection of the charge air cooler hose on the left hand side. I had to put a liberal amount of rubber grease on the connector and then lever the charge air pipe back in, using the engine as a fulcrum.
Overall, it is not a really hard job even though I'm neither very strong nor very experienced.

[abscate]

It’s the details like this that make this the best DIY site!

Thanks!

[cn90]

- How many miles when the rad failed?

- What is the mode of failure, is it cracked upper outlet?

[prwood]

I'm currently in the process of replacing the radiator on my 2001 V70 2.4T, and wanted to add a few of my own tips, as well as share an issue I'm currently dealing with:

- None of the videos I watched or instructions I read mentioned this, but: The hard line between the compressor and condenser on the left hand side blocks the radiator/intercooler assembly from sliding down, and can't be removed (without evacuating the system), so I had to essentially rotate the assembly towards the right hand side of the car and slide it down until it cleared this line.

- As I removed each of the four screws that were holding the radiator/intercooler/condenser "sandwich" together, I replaced them with a zip tie through the radiator and intercooler to hold them together. This made taking them out and putting them back in as a unit easier.

- I didn't have any issues removing the charge air pipe from the charge air cooler. Maybe it's because I've removed it several times for other work (throttle, etc), but I don't ever remember having trouble with it. It certainly doesn't just pop right off, but if I completely loosen the hose clamp holding it on, slide the hose clamp off, and pull straight out with a bit of wiggling, it does come off.

- The receiver dryer has an electrical connector on top for the pressure sensor which is pretty easy to remove, and at least on my model this cable did run through a clip on the intercooler, so for me at least it was necessary to remove.

- This might depend on the model of replacement radiator you buy, but the one I got didn't include the side bushings, or the s-shaped metal bits on top to connect to the top hood panel (slam panel?). I had to transfer those from the old radiator. In both cases it was an easy transfer.

* Here is the issue I'm currently dealing with:

The bottom holes on the condenser where the bottom left and right "sandwich" screws thread in seem to be fairly corroded. The screws themselves were also corroded on the end when I removed them. I wire brushed the screws to remove corrosion and thought they looked pretty good. When I tried to put the first screw back in, I found that it was just spinning around at the point where it met with the condenser and wouldn't thread in. I pulled the screw back out and it was coated in white. I'm going to try cleaning out the threads on the condenser with a pipe cleaner to see if the screws can get a bite on it. If that doesn't work, I might either zip tie the condenser to the intercooler and radiator to hold the three layers together, or drill out the threads on the condenser and use a longer bolt plus a lock nut to hold the sandwich together.

Any thoughts on the above issue?

[SuperHerman]

For the charge air pipe - hit it with a heat gun is what VIDA states. I find this works well as the plastic softens up and slides in. Some oil helps.

As to the OP's last post, I am not picturing the problem, but putting in a longer bolt and lock nut would be a great solution. Some advice here - use stainless steel and anti-seize on the shaft. Make sure your drilling does not impact any other area - I am sure you have a good understanding of this. Finally use metric to make future work easier and make sure what ever you install can be removed without much effort - for example if space limited use a allen or torx head bolt and position bolt side where access is easiest.

[abscate]

THe P80 sandwhich screws into metal clip nuts that slide onto the radiator.

I ditched those for SS M6 bolts and lock nuts. I held the lock bolts with a Kelly clamp to start them

[cn90]

Just curious for those with failed radiator...

- What yr/mileage when it failed?

- How did it fail: is it broken plastic side tank, broken rad neck, or leaking from the O-ring (the seal between the side plastic tanks and the main radiator)?

[darylrobert]

i didnt look at VIDA as i thought it was a straight forward job. The mistake i made was fitting the radiator connections then trying to drop fit the intercooler. I ended up using a trolley jack as a platform to support the three while i bolted them in.