Matrix Heater

Piece of cake on a 205. In a less than graceful way I did mine in about 30 mins (including re-bleeding coolant system), replacing it with a second hand one I nabbed from a 309 I also had at the time.

It's located at the back the centre console, and is removed from the drivers side. Theoretically you need to take the trim off (well you did on my Dturbo, might be different on none sporty models without the full centre console), but i just bent it back, which just gave enough room to get the heater matrix out.

If you took it to a garage I guess you'd be looking at an hours labour, so £40ish quid for fitting.

Thanks for the advice Carl, but when I told a mechanic what you said he told me that all the dashboard has to be dismantled to get to the Matrix and to do the job could take 2-4 hours? Is this just another rip-off?

Well I can tell you with absolute certainty that mine took under an hour, including removing the matrix from the 309 and re bleeding the 205, but as I said I didnt completely remove all the necessary trim, just bent it out of the way. If you did it properly I cant see it adding that much time though.

I know 405s can be a pain as I can vaguely remember helping change one quite a few years ago when I was a wee lad and it took ages.

Perhaps it'll be worth getting a second opinion?

I agree with Carl. On the 205 and 309 it can be done in situ and should tkae about an hour.

Thanks for the advice Nigel. I don't think it's the nightmare job I thought it would be, but how do I convince a garage to take the same view as Carl and yourself ? That I'm afraid will be a No-No, in Rip-off-the-Motorist-Britain

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If you cant just go somewhere else