I'm frustrated trying to find a suitable hose to connect to my stock coolant recovery tank; the fitting on the tank end is 3/8 and on the radiator nipple its 1/4 inch. I'm sure the original GM hoses were thin wall and easily compressed to allow a 3/8 hose to be clamped "down" to fit the 1/4 fitting but today's heater hose offerings are too thick and do not compress easily with a small screw clamp...they tend to leak at that end of the hose! What type of hose or clamp works good here? Your thoughts, ideas and experiences would be appreciated.... John
The OEM hoses were thick walled and ribbed. The one from the radiator to the bottom outlet of the tank is about 13" long and looks like this: Before I was able to find some, I just used fuel line hose.
If you have any salvage yards local to yiu that has old stuff, it's worth a trip to see if any hoses are still around. I think Buick used them on the very early 70's big cars as well.
Thanks Brett; good info! I'll look into the local yards and see what I can find; in the mean time I'll stick with the 3/8 fuel line hose and get a squeeze clamp as indicated.
It took some effort to get the 3/8 hose pushed on to the recovery tank barb; I'm not sure I could get a 5/16 line on that end but Napa had some in stock to try when I was in there.
