Question 55/56 Ford Vent Tubes

[Hot Rod Reverend]

Here are the originals...



The question is what to do for replacement? Of course these can be cleaned up, the insulation removed, etc. But what insulation do I need to get to replace it?

Has anyone added an inline "cabin air filter" to these tubes? I remember when I drove this car every day it could be a dust bowl inside if I went down a gravel road, etc.

Another idea I had was to get rid of these old sheet metal tubes altogether and install rubber tubes in their place. I am pretty sure these are made this way because the elbows off of the firewall are rigid and the whole front end needs to be "adjusted" when installed so these are the last items install once the front end panels are secure. Am I right on that?

Anyone have photos of what they have done for these tubes?

[frank long island]

when I removed that setup for an under dash heat/a/c unit I used a 4 inch rubber cap that had a band clamp for plumbing I would guess you could use 4 inch plastic pipe and rubber couplers with a band clamp to join and give some flex as for a filter you could get an a/c filter and cut the shape you need at least it will filter out the dust the other way is heat/a/c duct that would be insulated but on the outside

[Y-Blockhead]

I use 4" Dryer vent tubing and paint it semi-flat black.

[Daves55Sedan]

I just cut pieces of 1 inch thick fiberglass insulation to fit the split tubes. Then I cut up old t-shirts and wrapped the insulation with the t-shirt pieces before gluing them to the inside of the tubes. I did not attempt to add filtration to these. Yes, there is a lot of dust that comes in. There's probably an inch of dust on my backseat because I never have any passengers and never waste time cleaning back there.

[okiedokie]

So, if the flaps have good rubber on them and they are closed, they still allow dust to enter?

[Daves55Sedan]

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Originally Posted by okiedokie

So, if the flaps have good rubber on them and they are closed, they still allow dust to enter?

If the valves are adjusted properly, they should not allow very much air to get through, provided the rubber seals are good, but a little air gets through when running at highway speeds.
Road dust will enter the cabin as long as air is passing through the ducts freely.
The original design incorporated a loosely knit cloth sheething around the inner surface of the insulation, which was thought to help catch some of the dust as well as keep the insulation from coming apart with higher volumes of air passing through.
I don't mind the dust so much, as there may be bigger fish to fry sometimes with these old cars. Know what I mean?

[Daves55Sedan]

Originally Posted by Hot Rod Reverend

Has anyone added an inline "cabin air filter" to these tubes?

HRR, have you thought about cutting out a piece of chicken-wire to a diameter a little larger than the elbows on the firewall and bending the chicken wire around the opening in the elbow. Then you could put some kind of filter material in front of the chicken wire prior to installing the split ducts. Applying a light spray of "filter-coat" would also help to catch more dust on the filter. But in order to clean or replace the filter, it would be necessary to remove the split ducts, which in my opinion is not really a big deal.