Well its been a fair few months now since I replaced the rubber seals for genuine ford parts and I have to say its worked!!! the car no longer smells of coolant and there's no leaks and I didn't have to take the dash apart (though I did have to break the heater matrix housing). One word of advice before anybody else does this, buy some heat shielding material (Aluminised Heat Shield Glass Fibre Cloth) as once you break the housing and theres a hole, it's gonna kick out some heat in to the drivers footwell, especially on long journeys.

Great news least it's all sorted now

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Cheers mate and thanks for the vote of confidence :) I've ordered the genuine o rings now £2.59 + vat EACH!! For a little bit of rubber which probably costs them 5p to produce. I nearly fell off me chair when the guy told me the price. Anyway, I've managed to blank off the heater matrix, so the car is useable, just won't have any heat in the cabin, and in this cold snap it's gonna be missed. So I'll pick up the o rings tomorrow and have another try at the weekend, I just hope this dry period holds out until then.

With regards to my hands mick, well it looks like I've been self harming. Little scratches and nicks all over the back of my hands, I just see them as battle scars :)

I've got the same problem. Where can I purchase the genuine Ford 'o' ring, I've tried ford but there claiming they don't stock it. They can only sell me a new heater matrix.

I've bought an assorted box of o rings from Halfords, lubed up a 17x2.5 O ring and inserted it into the female grove on the pipe but now I can't join the pipes back together. Either the o ring is the wrong thickness or I'm doing summit wrong. What size o ring do I need.

I've got the same problem. Where can I purchase the genuine Ford 'o' ring, I've tried ford but there claiming they don't stock it. They can only sell me a new heater matrix.

I've bought an assorted box of o rings from Halfords, lubed up a 17x2.5 O ring and inserted it into the female grove on the pipe but now I can't join the pipes back together. Either the o ring is the wrong thickness or I'm doing summit wrong. What size o ring do I need.

Hi mate, I called up my local ford stealership and they gave me the number for the parts desk. Sounds to me like they can't be bothered to do a search for you or they're trying to flog you a whole heater matrix. I'll see if I can dig out the part number. Do you have a 1.6 petrol, I'm sure the heater matrix will be the same, I see you have the same year model.

I would not recommend aftermarket o rings. I tried a few and kept getting leaks. It's quite strange, as the plastic clips on the joins didn't go around the pipes when I used the after market o rings, but clipped on perfectly when I used the Ford O rings. The only ones that worked were the genuine Ford ones (I hate to say). They do take ALOT of persuasion to get on properly mainly due to the cramped working area, but I found a little silicone gel works wonders, and make sure the o ring is seated properly.

I'm at work at the moment, so when I get home tonight I'll get that PN for you.

I've got the same problem. Where can I purchase the genuine Ford 'o' ring, I've tried ford but there claiming they don't stock it. They can only sell me a new heater matrix.

I've bought an assorted box of o rings from Halfords, lubed up a 17x2.5 O ring and inserted it into the female grove on the pipe but now I can't join the pipes back together. Either the o ring is the wrong thickness or I'm doing summit wrong. What size o ring do I need.

right, found the picture that I took just after I bought these (for any future reference, so I'm glad I took it now). Not exactly sure which number it is as there are three, I'm presuming its the 1342708, but heres the photo anyway. give me a shout if you'd like me to email you the picture.

I would not recommend aftermarket o rings. I tried a few and kept getting leaks. It's quite strange, as the plastic clips on the joins didn't go around the pipes when I used the after market o rings, but clipped on perfectly when I used the Ford O rings. The only ones that worked were the genuine Ford ones (I hate to say). They do take ALOT of persuasion to get on properly mainly due to the cramped working area, but I found a little silicone gel works wonders, and make sure the o ring is seated properly.

Quite often after-market O-rings are more generic sizes and the diameter of the material falls in line with this. So different diameters are only available in 1 thickness etc. So you get little o-rings with thin rubber then the larger diameters are also thicker material. My brother has several kits of replacement o-rings both metric and imperial but the few times I've tried to match something up for the car none of them are the right size.

Hello. I had the same problem with the heater core and the o rings and I fixed on my own. But I did something wrong while I was putting back the plastic cover of the heater matrix or all the other facia and there is a lot of heat inside the facia. I don't know if there is something like a ventilation to remove the unneeded heat from the heater matrix or the plastic cover of the heater matrix seals the heat inside. Also I think that there is something like a hole at the right of the plastic cover where the pipes go to the ngine compartment.

Do you have any idea what might be wrong? I am afraid of the airbags and cables might damaged from the heat.

Hi all,

I had the infamous joint leak, I sourced the O-Rings from Ford and got them fitted (with a bit of butchery to the plastics to get the heater matrix out).  However I can't seem to apply enough pressure to compress the o-rings enough to get the black clips back on.  Does anyone who has done this job before have any bright ideas, rather than me paying £££ to a garage to remove the dash and do the job 'properly'?