Water heater valve

Hi,
Anyone have any tips on removing the heater valve on a right hand drive
'91 740 estate non aircon type? (Water valve inside car). It's covered by a
mess of plastic control parts which I assume come off the actual valve part.
The one on my '89 only has one cable to the valve arm. Also, does it have to
be turned to line the lugs up and is there a trick to doing that? I can
remember having a hell of a problem getting one out of my 240.

 

I guess this is the same as the 940, I have written a short guide on it
after experiencing torn knuckles and very full swear jar. Its funny that
all the options add up to a complete nightmare (RHD, non-air con, manual).

"
Heater Valve replacement on 1995 940 SE 2.3 Turbo (non-Air con), manual, UK
RHD

Valve cost: £49 + vat

Having suffered a valve that wouldn't shut off fully for a year since I
purchased the car I eventually decided to spend the money and replace it.
However it was nowhere as straight forward as I hoped, the Haynes Manual was
useless and didn't describe the job for non-air con / RHD etc.

You'll need a good light, something soft to neal on, and a good assortment
of pointy pliers and screwdrivers.

Removal
1. Drain cooling system
2. Remove clutch pedal and bracket (2 nuts on clutch cylinder inside car, 1
bolt at the top, 1 long through bolt for clutch hinge, drive pin and clip).
3. Unscrew jubilee clips on either side of valve (1 inside, 1 in engine
bay). catch the excess water in a small tub.
4. Remove control cables by unclipping the spring clamps. There is one
cable comming from the control knob, this is stepped at the end and this
needs to be worked carefully from the hole in the control arm, as the arm is
delicate plastic. The other goes to the air mix flap and is held by a
circular loop with a bit that sticks out and trapped under a plastic shelve
beside it, a small screw driver should help release.

5. This is the tricky bit. There is a big plastic square shapped part that
the cables where attached to and with the link arm etc, this is attached to
the valve by 3 bulky plastic clips, the valve is behind it locked into the
bulkhead by lugs on the engine side pipe. One should be able to twist the
whole thing 90 degrees to release it, but I could not do this (actually I
didn't know how it was held in) because the big square bit (we'll call this
the frame) hits metalwork that is not removable. The following in my
suggestion hopefully allowing no broken parts.
-Move the frame lever up and off the white valve level.
-Move the white valve lever until is above the hole/slot in the frame, and
try not move in subsequent operations. If you have a new valve its not such
an issue if you break it, but be carefull of the frame.
-With fingers behind the frame locate the thin lug near the bottom and push
it off gently, or just pull the bottom until it pops out.
-At this point it maybe possible to rotate the frame (90 deg clockwise) to
release the valve from the bulk head, however you could just try pulling
until the whole frame pops off (I broke the white valve lever at this
point).
-If you got the frame off then rotate the valve now and it should come out.


In my case I could now see the reason for the faulty operation, the jubilee
clip had been tightened so hard the outlet pipe (inside) was oval, warping
the casing and preventing the shutter (pathetic) type valve from sealing.
So don't over-tighten on reassembly.

At this point it is useful to fully familiarise yourself with the workings
of the valve and frame and how it clips together and the angles you need to
achieve to lock the thing into the bulk head. With the lot clipped together
it should become apparent that you can't just insert it and turn to lock in,
you have to assemble it after the valve is in the bulkhead. You should also
see that the clip on the long arm of the valve (use to attach cables in
other lives) goes into the thickest clip and must be inserted first unless
you've got vice fingers, and it is not easy to do with the valve in the
bulkhead. So either assemble the partly clipped bits together off the bulk
head, or try to push the frame on after locking the valve into the bulkhead.
Eventually you'll figure it out, understanding the operation and assembly is
the key.

After that reassembly is fairly easy, taking care with tighening the jubilee
clips and positioning the cable sheath in the cable clamps, to ensure you
can achieve fully closed.

Refill the cooling system with lots of nice additive and water mix, then
pick the crap out of your hair and apply various plasters to your arms and
fingers and you're ready to enjoy your new heater valve.

Apparently the dealer sells quite a few of these (frame and valve), probably
due breakage during dissassembly.

Hopefully your experience will go much better than mine.


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