I think the evaporator or the internal coils that cool the air can safely be removed as a part of the air conditioning system. If you want to keep the connection between the blower and the heater/rest of the hvac system, I would think you could just remove all the internals from the evaporator housing and just put the plastic box back in.

jhooten, did you get a chance to put the car on the scales yet? I have been chiseling the sound deadening off the interior for about a week now, and I really hope it is going to be worth it. I would guess about 35-50lbs of that stuff has come up so far.