I'm going to be doing this without emptying the radiator and just wanted some advice about removing / bleeding air from the system.

Provided there's not too much air in the system when i get the new hose on, do i simply take off the main radiator cap and run the engine until warm to get the air out of the system, or can i simply run the engine topping up the expansion tank.

Any advice would be great. Thanks. Nick.

 

Also - how full should the main reservoir (not the expansion tank) be, at the moment i think its about 1/2 full. I'm also going to be putting the lower half of the pipe onto the block first and then attaching the upperpart of the pipe filled with water to the top of the radiator.

 

I dont think you're going to get a huge amount of water loss when you do this, but its always best to try and avoid air in the system...

Just fill the expansion tank up, as the air starts to drain out you can top the expansion tank up. Squeezing the new hose should also help refill the bits that are empty.
When i had to replace all of mine i found that a bit of wd40 helps get the pipes on....