2008 Chevrolet Equinox V6 3.4L To 9/03/07 Production Date with Air Conditioning Dual Radiator & Condenser Fan Assembly TRQ RFA83509

What's up guys? I'm Andy from 1A Auto. In this video I'm going to show you how to install this radiator fan assembly on this 2008 Chevy Equinox. If you need parts for your vehicle, click the link in the description and head over to 1AAuto.com.

We're going to take this trim piece off. We're going to use some trim tools. Just get underneath here, pry this out. This one is coming out very easily. It's been out before. Have to get underneath, pry in here, slide that out. There should be some clips that hold all these in.

We're going to take these four bolts out. I'm going to use a 10 millimeter socket and a ratchet. Now that's loose.

Underneath here we're going to use this trim tool, we actually sell this trim tool at 1AAuto.com. We want to take these three fasteners out. Slide the center out, pull that out. Do the same with the others. Then on this side, I'm going to take these two trim clips out on this side and also on the other side.

Okay, I'm going to use this trim tool to take some of these clips out. I'm going to remove some of this inner fender well. If you need to you can remove the wheel, if it makes it easier. Just going to peel this back a little bit. I don't have to remove it completely. Just get that out of the way. Now, there's a screw or a bolt right here. I'm going to use a seven millimeter socket and ratchet to take it out. Take that out. Now I'm going to use some needle-nosed pliers, on the inside here there's some clips, right here and right here. I just want to squeeze the clip so that I can release the tabs. You might be able to just grab it and pull, but it's a little bit safer to push down with needle-nose. Just like that.

Now we want to disconnect the fog light. We'll just take a straight blade screwdriver, just going to release the connector tabs, slide that and as I disconnect this side, the other side clicks back in and release that side and just pull it down like that. Then we're going to do the same with the other side. You can grab the bumper from the top and the bottom and just slide it forward. If you need a hand, grab a partner to help you.

We want to remove this piece, so we're going to take these pushpins out, right there and right there, just use the trim tool, get underneath the back side here, slide it out, just a little pushpin. Same with this side. Pull that out. Then I want this piece disconnected right here. I'm just going to use a straight blade screwdriver coming up from underneath, slide that up and there's another piece in the back that I just have to get underneath that piece as well. Slide that up like that. I can slide this out of the way, take that off.

Now we're going to grab this piece, pull it back and forth, just yank it forward. It's just clipped in right there and right there.

All right. Now we want to drain the coolant. Make sure you get a coolant bucket underneath here. There's a little drain on the radiator, the petcock. You can grab this and just twist it to the left, you should be able to pull it out a little bit. Sometimes these get frozen and they don't come out very easily. Just grab some pliers, twist it. Make sure the engine is cold when you're doing this, you don't want to open this up when it's hot. Here we go. Let that drain out. To make it go a little faster, I'm just going to pull the cap off the coolant reservoir, that'll let the air suck into the coolant system.

Now I'm going to take these two bolts out. I'm going to use a 13 millimeter socket and a ratchet. All right, I'm going to pull these brackets off, just slide up, slide that one up as well.

Now I'm going to remove this upper hose clamp on this upper radiator hose. I'm going to use this hose clamp remover tool. We actually sell this at 1AAuto.com. It's nice because you can get this started over here and then with this cable, you just squeeze, just like that and squeeze that and then slide it, get it past a little bit. Make sure it's past the lip and then you can release it. It's a lot easier to do the job. I'm going to use a large pick to release the seal on the hose, just go right around, loosen this up. Be careful not to stab the hose. All right, then I can pull it out. I should be able to wiggle the hose back and forth a little bit. Try to twist the hose, pull it off, just like that. A little clip right here, holding this wire on, I'm just going to use some needle-nosed pliers, squeeze that, slide that off.

Now I'm going to take a little pocket screwdriver, we're going to disconnect this retainer right here, just slide that out, pull that wire off. Now we'll disconnect the electrical connector on the fan. Push down on the tab and slide it out. We can do the same on the other one, push down on the tab, slide it out. Pocket screwdriver, release this connector, set that aside. Just going to pull the radiator up a little bit, slide it out. I'm going to disconnect this little cover that goes over the fitting for the transmission cooler line. Just use a straight blade screwdriver, slide that off. Now they do make a special tool to release these clips, if you don't have the special tool, you can always use a right-angle pick. Just slide under here and then slide up and then once that's up a little bit, just grab the pick, go underneath here and I should be able to grab this and that's the retainer. Before I install the hose again, I'm going to have to reinstall this into the fitting.

Now I'm going to grab that transmission cooler hose and just wiggle it back and forth. It should pop out. I'm just going to use a pry bar. You want to be careful when you're doing this. I'm just going to pry it out while I wiggle it a little bit, 'cause there is plastic right here, so I don't want to break it. Sometimes you can spray some rust penetrant on there. There we go. Pull that off. You might want to, if this is pretty badly corroded, you might want to clean this up with a wire brush. Be careful around this area, 'cause that's the sealing surface, but just on the back side. Then on the bottom side, we're going to do the same with the lower line.

Make sure you put a drain bucket or some kind of a towel or something to soak up the transmission fluid that comes out. There we go. Slide that out. All right. We want to disconnect these transmission cooler lines from this little bracket that is attached to the fan shroud. Just take this pry bar, we're just going to pry it out. These are pretty rusty. If you were going to do this job and your lines look this bad, you're going to want to replace those lines. They are leaking a little bit over in that area. Slide it out. Just like that. That's disconnected. I'm just going to close this drain right here. All right, that's good enough.

Now I'm going to take this hose clamp tool and just slide it on the lower radiator hose clamp right there, squeeze it. You're going to want to put the drain bucket underneath here, 'cause it might leak some coolant out. Just move that there and I'll take my large pick and just loosen up this hose, it just breaks the seal on the hose. I can twist it back and forth and we'll drain it into the bucket. Not much came out, so that's good.

I want to remove these bolts. There's one right here, another one right here. You want to make sure you do not remove these nuts right here. That's for the AC; the refrigerant is in the system right now and if you took those off, it's going to blow all over the place and be bad. I'm going to use a 13 millimeter socket and a ratchet, take this bolt out. This bolts pretty rusty so I'm just going to use some rust penetrant, let it soak for a little bit. Do the same for the other one. All right.

I'm going to take this condenser, lift it up a little bit. With this condenser out, you want to be careful. If you look down here, there's a piece of the frame right there, you don't want that to stab the condenser. It would be ideal if we could remove the condenser, but we don't have an AC machine and if you're doing this at home, you probably don't have one either. Just stick a piece of cardboard there to prevent that from getting stabbed. That's pretty good. We can push that down a little bit. We just want to rotate this forward a little bit and there is two bolts we want to take out on the fan shroud, there's one right here and then one on the other side over here.

We're going to use a 13 millimeter socket, take these bolts out. Now we're going to grab the fan shroud, just lift it up, slide it back. I just want to separate it from the radiator. We should be able to grab the radiator and just gently slide this out. There we go. There's the radiator. We can grab the fan and just slide it out.

All right. We want to slide these fans back in, just going to try to sit them right there. Once we get the radiator in, we can lock them into place. If you're going to reuse the radiator and you need to put these clips back in before you install the tranny cooler lines. What you want to do is take this clip, slide it in this way like this and then just walk it around just like that. I'm actually going to take these off and we're going to slide these into the frame, 'cause they're probably going to fall off anyway. Same with that one, slide that one right there.

Now, we want to keep in mind when we're installing the radiator that the drain was on that side, the upper radiator hose is going to clamp onto here, lower one down there. Now we'll just slide the radiator into position, being careful, you don't want to stab it with the condenser. Try to keep it out of the way. Now you just got to angle it just right. There it goes. Then I'm going to try and slide this fan shroud into position. There's some little legs that get locked in down below there. Get that in right there, same with this side. I'm going to bolt up the fan assembly. Just take that bolt and then this bolt and get that started. All right, when you get those bolts in, we're going to tighten those down with a 13 millimeter socket and a ratchet.

All right. At this point, you want to make sure your transmission coolant lines are on the back side here, right here and right here. I'm not going to install them yet, but just make sure they're there, otherwise it's going to be harder to get them in, in case they fell out. These rubber grommets fell out, so we're going to reinstall these, just lift up on the radiator. Actually before I install those, just going to slide this condenser into position. Set those aside, just going to slide into these slots down below. All right. That's good. Like that. Now I'll take these two bolts, get that one started there and the other one started over here. Then I'll take a 13 millimeter socket and a ratchet and we'll tighten these down. Just snug, not too tight.

Now if these fell out on you when you were installing the radiator, like they did for me, you can install them now. Just lift up and reinstall these. Get that in position. Make sure those cooler lines stay back there, like that. Just like that. While I'm down here, I'll reinstall this hose, slide that in position. Take the hose clamp tool, if those hose clamp is stretched a little bit or it seems a bit weak, it's a good idea to replace it. You can use a worm clamp and just get that into position, let it go. Feels pretty tight, we're pretty good. If that was worse, if it was rusted pretty bad, then we'd want to replace it.

All right. We're going to line the lower coolant hose up, lower transmission cooler line up. Let's see. This one's going to go down there, we can click it into here first, get it into the fitting and push it into the fitting. You want to make sure it clicks in. To see this fitting, see the line in the fitting, you can see right here that little clip is over the line right there. Then I'm going to go over here and that one's over the line right there. Now I'm going to go over here and you can see it over the line right there. That's how you know that the line is securely in that fitting and then you just put that plastic cover over to keep that clip from popping out.

Just slide this over and lock it over, make sure it's good. Looks good. All right. This top line we want to clip this into the fan shroud right there and there's another clip right here. Make sure this retainer comes up here. Clip that in there and then line it up with the fitting and then you're just going to forcefully push this on, lock it in and put this cover over here, just like the lower one. All right, it's very important that you don't skip this step, you want to make sure you plug the fans in, because I've done it before, where you get the job done, go to drive it away, everything works great and then the vehicle is just going to overheat and that's not good, so plug that fan in, get this connector lined up, lock that in place and plug the other fan in. I've gotta open this connector again, just like that. Lock that in place and lock the wire down. Oops. Just like that.

All right. At this point, it'd be easier to get the hose on, so slide this into position. From over here you can move the radiator out a little bit before we put the mounts on, get that on. Now I'm going to use this hose clamp tool, just get this in position. Move this hose clamp and if this one's rusty, it's the same deal, you're going to want to replace it. This one's not too bad. Loosen that up. I'm going to wiggle, make sure it's nice and tight. Looks good.

Okay, at this point, all that stuff's hooked up, so we're going to put the mounts on, just slide that right there, take one of these bolts, get that one started, do the same with this one. Okay. Now we're going to tighten these bolts up, both of them, with a 13 millimeter socket and a ratchet.

Next we wanna install this piece, get this lined up with the hole right there. Make sure that's locked in. It's good. Take this piece, I'll just slide this underneath here. Lock this in like that. It's going to sit right there. Take these little pushpins right there and right here. Okay. Now I'll just take this bumper. If you need an assistant, grab some help and just get this lined up, just like that. On the side you're going to want to push those clips in, same with the other side. Make sure you line these clips up, right here and right there. Line those up, push them in.

All right, don't forget to connect the fog lights. You're going to do that on both sides, lock them in place. Now I'll take this screw and get this lined up, get this started. Take my seven millimeter socket and ratchet and tighten this down. You want to make sure this bumper's lined up with the fender. Take this inner fender liner and get this lined up. Take the pushpins, put those back in. Then we'll do the same with the other side.
All right. Now we want to push these push clips up over here on this side and we'll do the same with the other side. Then we want to put the pushpins in here, these three. We're going to put these bolts back in, up top, there's four of them. Take a 10 millimeter socket and a ratchet and tighten them down. Now we're going to take this trim piece, if any of these clips came off, if you still have them you're going to want to put those clips back on. Get those lined up and in position. Lock it in place.

All right. At this point, we want to fill up the coolant. We have this special funnel that hooks on to the reservoir and I'm going to use the appropriate coolant, it's a 50/50 mix. We're going to fill this up. After this is all filled, we're going to start the engine, we're going to run the car for about 10 minutes, make sure the heat is on to make sure that the engine doesn't overheat. Keep checking the temperature gauge, after that we're going to shut it down, let it cool down. Before you shut it down , you can always check the upper radiator hose, make sure that's hot, make sure the thermostat opened up, so that the coolant is flowing through. After we let it cool, we can re-top-up the coolant and then you should be good. Take it for a road test and just keep checking the coolant level, you should be good to go.

Thanks for watching. If you want the parts to do it yourself, check out 1AAuto.com, the place for DIY auto repair.