Expert: Brad Sears - 5/11/2010

Question
I am trying to remove the radiator from my 1940 buick super. I have removed all of the obvious bolts, hoses. This model has a "hood housing" covering the radiator. I have removed all the bolts from that as well. The radiator is loose inside and the hood housing seems loose to but will not come up out of it's mounting position. I am aware that there is a housing around the radiator which is attached by a large bolt from underneath the car. I have removed this bolt as well to no avail. I am kind of stuck because my next guess would be to remove the front grill or fenders, my common sense tells me that they couldn't have made it that difficult to take the radiator out. Any help will be greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!

Answer
Buick built a very strong car that would withstand the bullets of cops and robbers car chases but they were a royal pain to work on in the day.The factory procedure to remove the radiator is to remove the fan and the water pump. Then the bolts and hoses and you should be able to, when standing on the bumper, reach in, tilt the radiator back as far as you can and lift it out over the engine. We used to use the engine chain fall and a sling that my dad made up when doing this in our shop in the day. Yes I am old enough to have worked on these when they were used cars. I also used to take an old quilt and lay down over the front of the engine to keep the core from being damaged during the process.
Brad