I'm adding factory air conditioning to my Torino and wanted to clean the air ducts out before I installed them into my dash. My donor was a '68 Fairlane but this should be good on a '69. I know they are different than the '68 Galaxies vents. I though the vents would come out as a unit. I was wrong. Laying before me was 15 pieces of a puzzle I didn't want to do. After a couple of hours(yes hours) of scratching my head then beating it on the wall I figured out how they must have been assemble at the factory. –this is not for the faint of heart-
How to disassemble and reassemble 1968 Fairlane A/C registers.
Tools:
Flat tip screw driver
Small piece of cardboard
Razor or knife
Bucket of soapy water
Shop rags
Tooth brush
-more tools will be needed if the vents are in the car. some are:
Sockets
Screw drivers for retaining nuts on the ignition, wiper switch, headlight.
Allen wrench
The first thing to do is remove the pieces of the vents off of the lower dash. If everything is installed in the car then the ignition, wiper switch, headlight switch, and radio knobs need to come out. I don't have pictures of that because I had the lower dash out and it wasn't in the scope of this article. The radio itself should be fine to leave in, I didn’t have that to deal with. Remove the ends off of the control levers using an Allen wrench( you may not need to do this but it should be easier without them).
The glove box liner may need to come out too. Now remove the nuts off of the shutoff 'pulls' under the vents.
Then remove the ducting to the vents and remove the nuts off of the vent pieces. Each piece will pull forward and the piece left of the column overlaps and needs to come out first. Once they're out you'll see the dots on top and bottom of the vents. These are tabs holding in the veins.
With a flat head screw diver, gently pry the top plastic piece (from the back) until the clips are out enough to push out a little. Now pry the bottom piece out until you can push all of the pieces forward and out of the vent.
Now you have 15 dirty pieces in front of you. Don't panic. This is not as hard as it looks. Separate the pieces into two piles.
Dunk and clean all the loose pieces with dish soap and water and clean up the ducting for the vent. The horizontal veins and the vertical veins like in the picture. They include the short link and short sides. The vertical veins include the long link and the long sides.
Take a small piece of cardboard about 3” by 1.5” and cut slots in it the distance of the holes in the long link piece.
Put the short veins in the slots of the cardboard and then align the pins with the link and the bottom side. This part uses a little patients.
Place the top side onto the top of the veins. While applying pressure with your fingers align the pins with the holes until they together. Move the veins side to side to test for movement.
Carefully insert the set into the vent until the tabs click back in place. Point the veins straight for the next part.
Now you can take the horizontal veins and put them into a side piece with link. I found I didn’t need an alignment tool(cardboard) for this. Put the other side on it and check the vein movement. Carefully place the side pieces into the slots of the top and bottom of the plastic that is in the vent.
I found that is where you can misalign things and have to back up if you miss the slots. Once you start the insertion you need to make sure the lever is centered to engage the vertical vein behind it. Press the sides in with your thumbs whilst watching for misalignment until it clicks on both sides.
Check the movement of the veins and your done with this vent, only three more to go.
Here is the before and after.
Today
