Vintage Air evap dimensions needed

[chevynut]

Hey Paul, good to see you have one, even if it is the one with the under-dash vents . Have you mounted it in the car yet? I think you can get me at least one of the dimensions I need with the unit out of the car. Your pics do help quite a bit. Your defroster vents look a bit different than the drawings of the Gen IV that I posted above but I think they're kind of irrelevant to my issue since they're pretty high on the box. Those left end main vents can easily be changed out too.

I'm surprised that yours is 5" longer than the 4-vent one. It looks like the ends of the 4-vent unit would be right about at the center of the car which is good for me. Like you said, I have some flexibility in moving the box around to make it fit since I have nothing I have to mount it to. Mostly I am interested in where the bottom rear (toward the bottom of the dash) of the 4-vent plenum is located. Once I verify it will clear my radio, I'll get it ordered. I found a place where I can get the entire SureFit '56 evaporator kit for $730 shipped.

As far as the hoses, I had all my hoses made up for my older cable unit. All I needed to do is tighten them and then attach them to the bulkhead fittings after the unit was bolted in place. Now I have to re-do the damn things.

[chevynut]

One thing I just noticed....are there more floor vents on the back of the unit near the firewall? The installation instructions say "dash/floor door" for one of the servo motors. So I assume that means you can direct air to the dash/center vents or the floor vents behind the unit. That's something I never saw before but your pics show two openings there. That means my console will still have to accommodate them.

BTW, did you notice your unit is 10 years old?

[NickP]

Nick, yes it appears that all of the vehicle-specific kits use the "gen IV Magnum" case and all they do is change the vent connections and mounting brackets. If you have the one with 4 vents like shown in the drawing above, that would work. I'll give you a call rather than to try to do it online.

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[chevynut]

Thanks for the great pics Nick. It looks like the overall height of the unit is about 10.5" and the bottom of the outlet plenum is about 8 1/4" from the top. The front mounting screw looks like it's about 6.5" from the top of the unit. That mounting screw is just below where the bottom of the dash is according to the installation instructions, so it looks like the bottom of the dash is at about where the main box seam is. That looks like about where it is in the pic I posted above too. So that means the bottom of the plenum must be about 2 1/4" below the bottom of the dash when installed.



Also I assume you have your unit sitting on the table with the mounting bracket in place. If I'm interpreting your pic correctly, it looks like the plenum is 8 3/4" above the mounting plane (firewall). I'll have to measure the distance from the firewall to the bottom of the dash and see where it lands.

[chevynut]

Well, after talking to Paul and getting nick's measurements I did some checking on my Nomad. It's going to be a little close, but I think it's going to work. I also think I have some flexibility on placement of the unit and may be able to raise it a little. I'm going to order the new Gen IV unit and go for it.

[NickP]

One thing I just noticed....are there more floor vents on the back of the unit near the firewall? The installation instructions say "dash/floor door" for one of the servo motors. So I assume that means you can direct air to the dash/center vents or the floor vents behind the unit. That's something I never saw before but your pics show two openings there. That means my console will still have to accommodate them.BTW, did you notice your unit is 10 years old?

Pictured here are the floor outlets (2):

[chevynut]

Thanks Nick, I have to figure out how to get those floor outlets out of the console too. They don't look too well thought out....the one on the right points right into the case.

I got the system ordered today. $730 shipped to my door for the Gen IV 56 Chevy Surefit evaporator kit. If anyone wants to get a good deal on VA, let me know and I'll hook you up with the guy I bought from.

[chevynut]

Well I got the VA unit today...it was just built late last week and only took a week to get from the time I ordered it. Looks like everything is there, even stuff I won't use.

After putting on the brackets I found a slight problem. The case stuck out past the brackets.



So I took the brackets back off and bent them in my brake so they would clear. I'm not using the stock holes in the firewall so it doesn't matter where I put them.

Once I got the brackets tweaked to work, I put the unit up under the dash and right away I could tell it was going to work. After marking and measuring a dozen times I finally drilled two holes through the firewall and mounted the evaporator using bolts.



I put it up as high as I could to make sure I had clearances below, and that it didn't show under my valence. I think it's just a tad higher than it would have been if I'd used the stock holes. It also fits almost perfectly to my firewall setback which is 2.5".



In the first picture below you can see how high the 4 vents are and they clear the radio really well. And in the next one you can see that it looks like my console was cut out just for this unit, but I didn't do anything to it....



Then I installed the valence, and you can't even see the unit even from the pretty low angle I took this picture from...



So I'm really happy with the installation so far. I still have to weld the studs to the inside of the firewall, and I'll probably use some "elevator bolts" with the big head, or something like that. I'll plug weld them through from the front of the firewall. Then I'll cut off the other stud I had for the cable unit. Then I have to re-do all the interior lines.

One thing I noticed is that the heater vents in back aren't close to being centered over the tranny hump.

[Rick_L]

Good to see that's all going to work out. A bit disappointed in the shallow bracket, probably no big deal for you, but it might be to some.

How are you going to get heat to the driver side?

[chevynut]

Rick, I'm not too worried about heat as the car probably will never be driven in the cold. That said, I thought the Gen IV could also direct heat out of the 4 end vents which will be in my valence. I didn't even know about the heater vents until I looked at the pics Nick and Paul posted. Even so, I think I'll just leave some room at the point where my console and firewall meet for the hot air to come out. As far as I can tell I placed the unit only about 1/2-3/4" further toward the passenger side as intended. My bulkhead is far enough away that I don't think that will be a problem...I hope.

By the way, what was this hole originally for? Apparently all cars have it since VA doesn't say anything about drilling one, and mine is stock.