Thatmerickson
New member
Hey everybody, this is my first post here, so I apologize if anything is odd. Anyways, I decided that I was going to take on the task of winterizing my 2006 LR3 (180K on the ODO). After numerous hours of research on this forum, a few other, and several calls to shops who denied much information I was worried. What I had learned primarily was not a whole lot, essentially the basics of how some rigs had heater installed at the factory but had no cord ect. I was able to locate the area where the plug should go and the part number for the heater off of some other page (I do not remember who to give this credit to so I am sorry). After not finding solid information on how to go about this I decided to do somewhat of a documentation of my journey and share it with you guys here.
Starting off for those who are not aware, the location of the plug is on the driver’s side (LH drive) of the motor on the bottom. It is extremely difficult to locate until you know exactly where it is. You can indeed see it without removing and skid plates, however, the first time looking for it, you would be much better to go ahead and pull them off to look for it. Speaking of looking for, it is a large plug about the size of a half dollar with an Allen/hex head fitting which is a 17mm (good luck finding a socket for one of these if you don’t have one).
Once located I needed to figure out how to get the plug out. I tried several methods but what I ended up doing was putting the ole girl on stands, then pulling the tire off and the inner fender. This allowed for a little more “breathing room”. I pulled off one section of heat shield from exactly in front of the plug (super conveniently placed) this made it easier to see what was happening. I used a 20” extension along with a 6” and two 3” extensions with a “U-joint” socket adapter on the end with my 17mm Allen head socket. I had to very carefully get this contraption up to the plug from underneath the car (see attachments). When I say the plug was tight, I mean it was insanely tight! I used a cheater and got it broke loose.
Once the plug was out, I was able to install the new block heater in its place. This is did by looking through the little window where I removed the heat shield. Then tightened it down in the same fashion as removing the plug. FYI the heater I was using accepted a 1 1/16” socket. I then simply attached the power cord and ran it along the frame towards the front of the rig taking special care to keep out of the way of moving parts. I plugged it into a heavy-duty splitter cord which I ran out the front grill to be plugged in. All that was left at this point was to fill the coolant system back up and take on the dreaded bleeding process.
Starting off for those who are not aware, the location of the plug is on the driver’s side (LH drive) of the motor on the bottom. It is extremely difficult to locate until you know exactly where it is. You can indeed see it without removing and skid plates, however, the first time looking for it, you would be much better to go ahead and pull them off to look for it. Speaking of looking for, it is a large plug about the size of a half dollar with an Allen/hex head fitting which is a 17mm (good luck finding a socket for one of these if you don’t have one).
Once located I needed to figure out how to get the plug out. I tried several methods but what I ended up doing was putting the ole girl on stands, then pulling the tire off and the inner fender. This allowed for a little more “breathing room”. I pulled off one section of heat shield from exactly in front of the plug (super conveniently placed) this made it easier to see what was happening. I used a 20” extension along with a 6” and two 3” extensions with a “U-joint” socket adapter on the end with my 17mm Allen head socket. I had to very carefully get this contraption up to the plug from underneath the car (see attachments). When I say the plug was tight, I mean it was insanely tight! I used a cheater and got it broke loose.
Once the plug was out, I was able to install the new block heater in its place. This is did by looking through the little window where I removed the heat shield. Then tightened it down in the same fashion as removing the plug. FYI the heater I was using accepted a 1 1/16” socket. I then simply attached the power cord and ran it along the frame towards the front of the rig taking special care to keep out of the way of moving parts. I plugged it into a heavy-duty splitter cord which I ran out the front grill to be plugged in. All that was left at this point was to fill the coolant system back up and take on the dreaded bleeding process.