Radiator Core Support Removal
 

Hey folks,

Backstory: Ran over a retread on the highway and it tore up my bumper, ripped the engine splash guard off, tore my center core support in half and pushed the lower radiator hose into the engine and cracked it:gotowned:

Im not an experienced mechanic but I am pretty handy with the wrench(Do brakes, change oil, etc.) I am getting ready to replace the front of the core support myself in the interest of saving money and also taking pride in working on my own car.

My question to you guys is, is it that hard to do myself? I have looked in the Factory service manual and it looks to be a pretty lengthy procedure(hood removal and other things). Is every step in the Factory Service Manual needed for me to replace the support? I don't want to take any shortcuts but hood removal seams a little overboard? if anybody has experience in replacing these please help me out!

Don't need to remove hood if you have a way to hold it up.

sweet i'll use a piece of wood or something. Thanks for the advice

I just completed this procedure myself this week. I am not a mechanic but I used the factory service manual. My damage was identical to yours. Front fascia, undertray, core support corner broken off and radiator bent. Total time spent was about 16 hours. I'm normally a "change my oil type" so this was a big project for me. I did not take the hood off. Not even necessary. I tied a rope to the ceiling and ran it thru the hood latch to keep it open. Trickiest part of it all was transferring the condensor cooling parts over to the new core support. Had to pull the power steering line apart on the upper left part of the support which made a mess. Also be careful with the SRS unit on the front of the support. I rapped mine in a towel and put tape around it so I didn't drop it. It's easy to do with all that stuff on the front of the support flinging around. Otherwise fairly easy. Also your "air guides" are probably broken. Just a cheap plastic part behind both sides of the fascia.

you shouldn't have to do anything with the power steering.

I've had the front of mine off 5 times in the last 6 months with engine removal and various things. complete front end off the car in less than an hour and i didn't open a single fluid system besides the radiator. there is no reason to mess with anything on the power steering.

What did you do with the A/C lines running through the radiator core support?

AC lines run on the engine side,

I believe that there are a couple of lines that run through the support. I will have to check now.

power steering lines run through the support on the passenger side - had to do this when I swapped core supports back last year. It's a bit time consuming but it's not hard at all...very straightforward actually. Took us about 4 hours to do start to finish, but that was going from an 03 support to an 07, so some extra time was needed to swap additional parts too

Power steering lines goes through the radiator support. There is no way you can remove the support without disconnecting these lines.

can anyone confirm for me that you don't have to remove any ac lines, i will be replacing mine within the next to weeks so i would like to know?

They go UNDER the core support. I've never opened my PS lines once in all the engine pulls i've done.

I've done FI on both 350z and g35. Maybe we have a different model in the midwest. :rolleyes:

see my pics. condensor moved off to the side easily.

I'm not sure how it ripped through composite core support yet didn't damage the a/c condensor. Didn't you say that it damaged the radiator? The radiator is behind the a/c condensor therefore it would have to be replaced as well....

no not me, my radiator is fine, but my core got a nasty crack in it, that's why I'm replacing it

ive done PS flush before. my 05 PS lines goes through the radiator support haha weird. The car in the pic is g35. maybe it's diff from 350z

my radiator support is cracked badly also. How much do you guys paid for the new/used support?

ahh, crack in core support. I misread. I thought the core support was completely broken. Maybe someone else in here said something about the radiator and misunderstood that it wasn't you.

strange, maybe they changed it in 05. The 350z I did FI on was a 2004. That being the case, you can just clamp off the soft lines then slide the cooler off the ends, remove the hoses from the core support and it should be fine that way. It's not under pressure so not much should leak out.

Mines an 04, and lines went through the core support from the factory too. Must vary car to car unfortunately

ya, that's strange. I wouldn't think it would be different.

Cheapest place i found was z1motorsports, i got mine for just about $200 shipped brand new, im sure they have used ones laying around also

I'm going to be replacing my center support on the radiator soon as well. I'm very familiar with taking off the bumper cover, fairly familiar with headlights, but I've never gone much deeper than that. I've looked at the manual on how to do this, and it seems like I should be able to do it. I'm hoping that I don't have to mess with any AC lines or deal with charging the AC back or anything like that. My dad's mechanic friend seemed to think I would. Any insight?