On our 90 Civic LX I need to replace my radiator. This car has A/C & an Automatic Transmission. How hard are they to replace? I know about bleeding the system.
Where is a good place to buy radiators for the Honda. I found a Radiator on Rockauto.com for $76 shipped. But was unclear as to which radiator. In these years are the same radiators used with Standard & Automatic Transmissions.
Any help would be appreciated Thanks.

 

The automatic radiator has the transmission fluid cooler in the bottom. Such a radiator can be used in a manual car (just don't hook up the cooler lines) but not the other way around. There is no need to flush or bleed the transmission after R&R radiator and hooking up the cooler. Just check the fluid level and top up if needed.

 

Thanks for the info. It appears they make one radiator for all. It looks like pulling the radiator as a unit then switching over the fans etc then putting it back in & hooking up the hoses is the easy way. Is that correct?

 

Since you have A/C you should unmount the radiator and push it forward first and remove the fans before trying to pull the radiator out. There are no bolts holding the bottom of the fans, they just push into clips. Remove the top bolts and pull fans upward. You will need to unbolt the A/C lines and push them back carefully to make space to get the fan out. Do not disconnect A/C line connections.

 

Thanks a bunch for that info. Not having bottom fan bolt will make it easier. I was looking at it today & was wondering if the A/C lines would clear if I removed the brackets. I have to order the radiator.
This really upset me, I broke the top tank. I thought I had this car ready for travel. Then I screw up. Oh well the radiator went 21 years. not bad for these plastic radiators. At least I broke it at our place. It didn't happen half way between our summer cabin & our home which is 600 miles apart.

 

:::::::UPDATE ON RADIATOR:::::Well yesterday I replaced the radfiator in our Civic. Once you do one of these they are not bad. But I must of removed & replaced it 3 times before I figured out the easy simplest way to do it. But it is done thank God. Seems to work great. Bleeding the system took as long or longer to R&R the radiator.