[TheSilverBuick]

The car made it to Las Vegas and back without a hiccup. Around 550 miles round trip. I haven't filled it up since I got home, but it got a bit over 25mpg driving down there, but that is only a one tank/leg average.

The car got a part in our wedding. The wife insisted!


I was driven up to the aisle.


Afterwards, even the car appeared to have a hangover as my brother who drove us back to the hotel left the key in the accessory position and killed the battery, so I needed to get a jump start.

[goatwgn]

Your 4 legged friend in the photoshop pictures seemed to be enjoying the ride.

[Formulabruce]

Wow, that car could tell some stories!! Great posts, thanks! and Grats!!

[TheSilverBuick]

Thanks!

Yup, I drive the car all the time, and this time I was picking up Torque from the groomer's before the in-laws showed up.

[Formulabruce]

Torque gets his own 1st Gen rear window!!

[TheSilverBuick]

Now that Drag Week and the wedding planning are over I can get back to this project. I'll get pictures later, but today I started welding in the injector bungs on the intake manifold I'm building. It feels good to be making progress on it again

On a separate thought, I want to get rid of the exhaust cross over in the exhaust manifold. I've looked at a few ideas, from filling the passage with aluminum or JB Weld like epoxy to cutting out the cross over and welding in some block off plates. And I've taken the first step towards the last option.

I have an old Buick 455 exhaust manifold that I had practiced drilling holes in cast iron and tapping holes in cast iron (for the EFI bungs and possible EGT sensors). So I beveled the edges of the hole and cut a piece off exhaust tubing out to patch it with. I then turned the oven I have in the barn to 500ºF broil and placed the exhaust manifold in there for a couple hours.


Using a laser temp gun, the manifold was around 400ºF inside and out when I removed it. I set the welder to the thickness of the block off plate and welded about a 1/2" at a time, going back and fourth. Once I was satisfied with it, I put the manifold back in the oven and turned the oven to 200ºF for about 2 hours, then turned it off and left it in there over night. The next day I pulled it out, and think it'll do just fine to hole exhaust gases back.



​

One of the cross over passages. I'll run a grinder around the edges to get them clean, then cut a piece of metal out to size to plug it. Once welded in, I'll probably pour a bit of exhaust mend epoxy or JB Weld over the patch to ensure it is sealed.

[TheSilverBuick]

Winter upgrade time. This weekend I removed the intake and exhaust manifolds and I finally bolted the new intake to the engine in the car for a test fit. There was a slight interference with some brake lines by the master cylinder, but putting a slight taper on the tube, reducing the diameter by about 1/2" in the rear, gave ample clearance. I had contemplated tapering the tube some to begin with, but this just gave a physical need to. The throttle body lands right about where I wanted it to so I'm happy with that. I'll put a 90º fitting on it downwards so I can put an air filter on it until I get an intercooler installed (with a turbo).





Then I made the big leap of cutting up the exhaust manifold and blocking the exhaust cross over. If I get a twin-scroll turbo I will try and plumb it in front and back.

Marked out where I wanted to cut. Turned out to be a larger pain in the rear than I thought it would be as I wanted to keep the two halves connected still so they'd line up on the ports from the two end bolts. The metal is also quite thick in parts of these areas.


I ground down the top of the remaining part of the heat cross over so if I go back to the stock intake manifold it would not be touching the intake at all. As I said, turned out to be a tougher cutting process than I anticipated.


I cut, heated, hammered and trimmed the patches.


Then because my welding is horrible my final shot is after I painted it =P I heated the manifold up in an oven to ~450ºF, while also leaving the metal patches on my wood stove, so every thing was quite toasty while welding. Even the welding gloves were at their thermal limits. I hammer peened the welds after welding short sections. After the welding was done I put the manifold back in the oven and incrementally lowered the temperature over a couple hours and then let the manifold cool in the oven. Crossing my fingers it all holds together! If I have a little exhaust leak here or there I'll put some "exhaust weld" epoxy on it.

[Jack Gifford]

Quite the "determined" effort!

[gtospieg]

Cool...but why not just use headers?

[TheSilverBuick]

Because I'd also have to build the headers, and the only 3-to-1 collector that I found has a 2.5" outlet, which is way too big for this (3-cylinders) application so I'd have to make my own collector too. When I go to put a turbo on the car the smaller outlets will be better and the manifold will hopefully hold the heat better. And then basically its going to take a lot more fabrication time and work than this did.

[GTOWAGON]

You can get 3 into one collector with a 2" outlet I used these on my headers in the 31

[TheSilverBuick]

That would be ideal. Where did you get them? I didn't see one listed like that from Summit or Jegs?

[Bzltyr1]

Originally Posted by TheSilverBuick

That would be ideal. Where did you get them? I didn't see one listed like that from Summit or Jegs?

Stahl Headers 106202070 - they are removable until you get your welder out.
$96.45 is awful high though.

[TheSilverBuick]

Oof, they are real proud of those ones. Summit is $36 for a pair of them, except they are the 2.5" collector.

[GTOWAGON]

Originally Posted by TheSilverBuick

That would be ideal. Where did you get them? I didn't see one listed like that from Summit or Jegs?

I got all the parts for my headers from cone engineering their web address is www.coneeng.com

[TheSilverBuick]

Did some more work on the intake manifold yesterday. Getting closer. I welded on a plate to the back side and the throttle body mounting flange made of 3/16" steel on the front. Not seen in the pictures are three 3/8th NPT threaded pipe/bungs welded to the bottom side of the outer shell that I can thread different sized nipples on to use as vacuum ports as needed. Tomorrow I hope to cut and drill out the fuel rail so I can make the fuel rail hold downs. After that a coating of epoxy over the welds and then paint

One thing now with the laid over fuel injectors is the fuel rail won't interfere with the OE water outlet if I decide to go back to the stock water pump system it'll work.


Cut and drilled the flange for a nice fit with the throttle body I have.


I would of liked more plenum volume, but this is what I have to work with on this version. I welded and formed a small piece of tin on the left behind the throttle body to try and keep the air flow from hitting the flat side of the first runner.

[Half-Inch Stud]

HIS comments:

1. I always wanted to do the Exhaust manifold Mod; Would solve that pesky exhaust leak my OHC-6 had, Aside from overheating the Q-JET & Air.

2. Intake Runners look nice. But (not having read this Thread entirely), I am at a loss to see why a LOG-Plenum is a good idea?

3. What kind of dog is he? we have an identical looking dog (size, shape, colorations, except the nose is brown) We just don't know what breed he is (1-color beagle? part-hound?)

4. How's that Hi-Tech Sprint running?

[TheSilverBuick]

The log plenum is just a function of being able to have a single throttle body and ~10" runner length. I believe it was originally part of a drive shaft =P What would be the alternative and maintain a single throttle body (for future turbo)?

He is a pit bull and lab mix. Maybe something else in there too.

Not running at the moment since I have the intake and exhaust off but I am eager to get it back up and running. I just got back to it today and built the fuel rail and hold downs. Next up is to make sure I don't have any more real metal work to do on it (port shaping, etc) and then start giving it coats of epoxy then paint.

Same method as last time, ran a 3/8" pilot hole into the fuel passage, followed up with the 17/32" bit but stopping a bit short of the fuel passage. Then used a dremel to bevel the opening followed by some fine grit (400?) sand paper, red scotch brite then green scotch brite. Tapped threads into the ends for the fuel fittings and then cleaned it and cleaned it.

[Half-Inch Stud]

Alternative is tuned runner lengths for the RPM range interest. Probably <\= 23" total from valve head, to plenum// throttle body.

Making it a spider manifold with a carefully considered runner taps for reasonable layout. Since you created space at the exhaust crossover, could consider separating the 3&4 runners and pairing 1&2&3 then4&5&6 for some sort of sensible layout.

The result would be great momentum preservation of the fuel/ air column between valve inhales. The OHC-6 SPRINT "wakes-up" powerfully approaching 5000 RPM (due to the 4bbl manifold runner length & CSA. I think you have a great opportunity to get an earlier wake up RPM that will keep pulling to 7500.

[Half-Inch Stud]

Dang thing posted while i was typing.

assuming 1-5-3-6-2-4 firing order, i assume 1-3-2 could make 1 plenum side while 5-6-4 make the other plenum side, leading to the throttle plate. Further agonizing over this will likely improve on this 2-minutes of consideration.