Ugh 
I paid 500 dollars for my Rio. I have no money to spend on labor. I used a dremel tool to cut through the plastic casing, then realized i was looking at the a/c evaporator and not the heater core (the heater core is more to the left. I have no idea what i’m doing in all honesty. But i don’t want to get raped by a mechanic.
I have personally changed two heater cores, both on junk cars and I wouldn’t recommend bothering with it unless you are wedded to this particular vehicle. They are always difficult to do (reinstalling the dash is often very difficult) and if the shop needs to do a warranty repair on the new installation, you’ll be without your vehicle again for an extended period.
A 1994 American automobile unless it is is in pristine condition (especially in Michigan) is probably not going be worth more than $2-3k in resale value. Considering that it may cost you as much as $1,500 to have the heater core replaced and that your dash may never be correctly remounted afterward, it may simply be easier to replace the car.
I understand that, but you probably just did a good $500* worth of damage by blinding cutting into the wrong area.
If I were you I’d at least get some quotes before you do more damage. Heater cores are notoriously hard to replace.
*Random guess, I don’t know exactly what you did, maybe a little less if they can patch it, maybe a lot more if you have to replace the coil, but your gonna cough up some money to recharge the system.
I figured i would just Take the piece i cut, put it back, and seal it. That’s the only thing i did to it.
Wait let me see if I have this right. You don’t know fuck all about your car, but taking it to some one who does, has the proper tools so as to not damage the car and can do the job successfully is rape?
Do you have the same opinion about doctors and dentists when you are sick or have a tooth ache? If not why not?
Those two sentences of yours rate right up there with the stupidest I have ever read on this message board.
You should listen to Dirty Harry. “A man has got to know his limitations,” you have exceeded yours.
It was probably worth more 5 1/2 years ago.
The biggest problem I have seen with do it yourselfers changing the heater core is that they don’t always remove all the screws or properly release fasteners causing parts to break and end up with a loose dash that rattles.
By way of an update, the Bar’s Leak worked for a little while, but then it started leaking again. I don’t think it made it through the coming winter, but I’m not sure. Once it began leaking again, I went with plan B, which wasn’t too hard. I didn’t even need a connector, I just bent one of the hoses that went to the heater core to the connector for the other hose.
I think the car lasted about another 1.5 years from my last post, and then I went with plan C. I would have had at least one winter without a heater, and it wasn’t that big of a problem. I have a garage, and my commute is only 15 - 20 minutes, so the heat would only be on for half my commute anyway. I don’t recall fogging problems. I probably cracked my windows to prevent the humidity from building up.
Actually… probably not. Among some other issues, by the time the original thread had been posted, the top door hinge on my driver side door had broken, and I was getting in and out the passenger door.