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mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 1:22 am
by radomirthegreat
1337ssei a while ago suggested that we take my Bonneville to some place that's easy to wash, like a car wash, and paint it there with a compressor and air gun. If we go there and stay up all night, he says, we could finish it in just a few hours. I think the setting wouldn't be right, but it's worth a shot with another project whose paint job and other tasks have not taken months...

Well, say hello to 1337ssei's exhaust manifolds! :hello2:

I arrived at his house in the Aerostar with a compressor, some hoses, sheets of wood, and a camera. The Aerostar is quite the ghetto work van when you take out the seats, throw in wood and tools, and drive with no AC. Have a look at the cargo area:
http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m242 ... CF1316.jpg
It was vanny that day.
http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m242 ... CF1319.jpg

Here are some exhaust pipes. They were ported by danthurs, and Austin (1337ssei) had them bead blasted.
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Here's the black exhaust manifold paint that we used:
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Observe Austin's latest grinding kit.
http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m242 ... CF1328.jpg
It was about $20-30, and it worked pretty well. The most aggressive burr turned blue in seconds and went dull but still cut. Most of the grinding bits either fell off or sanded themselves down against the exhaust manifold after some minutes of work. The reason for porting is interesting. Allegedly, no one has so far done it. Austin has a 3" Hogan downpipe ready for installation, and he wanted to port the OE exhaust manifold outlet to fit it better. That's the only thing we had to port & polish. We did that on his front porch! Please note that both pictures below are progress pics. I took a lot of pictures of the outlet, but very few turned out well. The finished product was very smooth... until the paint!
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The spray gun was bought exclusively for this use with the hope that it could be used again. It was only $10 at Harbor Freight, and it had just enough oomph to coat exhaust manifolds.
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We cleaned the exhaust manifolds very well before painting.
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So, you might think all that we did thus far was not necessarily ghetto? Don't worry! I cannot disappoint you! We needed to let the manifolds dry on one side while we painted the other. I suggested using sticks and whatnot to hold these up so we could hose down both sides. One of the items in the three pictures immediately below is a broken weed whacker, and in the pictures, the manifolds are standing upright.
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The ported outlet looks like this now:
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Vice grips were used to prop the crossover pipe on an upside down coat hanger that hung from the Aerostar's hatch and was balanced with the air compressor's power cord.
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We ran acetone through the spray gun to flush out the paint and clean up around ourselves. Then, something bad happened...
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À la willwren, we baked the freshly painted pipes in Austin's kitchen's oven.
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It was good, but I ended up parting with my favorite painting board. In the video in this link, I tried to capture all the stencils I left. It left at last with some EM stencils, but also included are my SSEi badges, some of the ricer case, and some parts of my newest case painting/modding project.
http://s106.photobucket.com/albums/m242 ... CF1372.flv

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - EM porting and ghetto painting. No 56

Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 3:32 am
by 1337ssei
A fun night indeed now all I need is to install these

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - EM porting and ghetto painting. No 56

Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 6:05 pm
by harofreak00
why didn't you hang all the manifolds before you started? so much easier to paint something when you don't have to keep moving it.

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - EM porting and ghetto painting. No 56

Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 6:34 pm
by radomirthegreat
I didn't want to get black paint on the inside of the Aerostar. It's actually a well kept interior except for a faint urine smell that no one can figure out.

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - EM porting and ghetto painting. No 56

Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 7:45 pm
by harofreak00
Well then don't use a gate door as your hanging location ;)

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - EM porting and ghetto painting. No 56

Posted: Sat Sep 20, 2008 11:04 pm
by Roadtech195
radomirthegreat wrote:I didn't want to get black paint on the inside of the Aerostar. It's actually a well kept interior except for a faint urine smell that no one can figure out.
I got drunk last night and pee'd in your van...sorry Rad :beerchug:

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - EM porting and ghetto painting. No 56

Posted: Sun Sep 21, 2008 10:21 am
by Wes
:laughing3:

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Fri Sep 26, 2008 12:14 am
by radomirthegreat
I'm using this meet ordeal to exempt myself from the 25 picture limit, though I tried to get very close to 25 in the first post. Let me know if this tingles your Spidey senseâ„¢.

Austin's house is all about the GMs. Note my nice SLE in the driveway.
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So, I walked into Austin's garage and found his car pretty much not in true running condition. The opening to the downpipe on the OE manifolds had rusted, and somehow one of the nuts was totally stuck. I used my awesome Radomir power to break one loose, but I somewhere on the underside of the car cut my arm in doing so. The other nut had to be cut off with a Dremel. The following pictures pretty much explain the process. We took turns crawling under the car and cutting.
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During all this madness, I also worked on the SLE. I noticed lots of 00+ Bonneville people can easily take out their grilles and paint them. Not so for the 92-99 crowd. I spent quite a while with a Dremel and a cutting wheel. The grilles were taken off! I used a plastic primer, silver paint, and a clear coat. Then, I used caulk that's white when applied and clear when it dries. That took a long time, so I have only one night picture of the finished product. Also, the SLE got a very popular performance mod, and it's awesome! More on that tomorrow.
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Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 4:39 am
by radomirthegreat
I just went over again. I assure you guys I'm working on the 94, but pictures are so hard to take when I'm afraid of the camera getting overspray on it. Yeah, still painting on the driveway. It's tons of fun. If there's a picture count issue, please PM me.

I just got back from Austin's house. The SLE is slowly becoming my meet attending Bonneville, and that cannot stand! The 94 must be finished! These pictures I bring you are awesome. Enjoy them. Shown here are the ported and painted exhaust manifolds finally put on with the 3" Hogan downpipe, some 1.9 roller rockers, oil restricting push rods, a ported ZZP 99+ TB, the ported Intense M90 he had bought a while ago, his new 4" air intake tube, and maybe a couple other things. You also get to see his new wheels. Guess what they are.
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Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 2:17 pm
by phatklan
why didnt u just mask off the grill instead of cutting it out?

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 2:47 pm
by WhiteArrow3800
Look'n good for the most part :wink:

And the Mustang wheels don't look half bad on there either, but I would like to see a better full picture of them on the car though. :)

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 7:14 pm
by wjcollier07
Wow, those wheels look TIGHT. :eek: I thought they were 5x114...guess that 1 mm difference doesn't matter that much? seems like that could cause some strange stud loading... Wish GM would have used 5x114 like daimlerchrysler, ford and many other companies did. I don't get it. :roll:

How many miles were on those injectors?

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 9:43 pm
by 1337ssei
ya the rims look sweet IMO especially for what I paid
The bolt pattern isn't enough to make a difference many GP guys have run these for thousands of miles with 0 problems (and its actually 114.3 so only .7 mm off)
The injectors had 152,000 on them

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Fri Oct 10, 2008 10:53 pm
by radomirthegreat
phatklan wrote:why didnt u just mask off the grill instead of cutting it out?
Masking stuff off is not as much fun, essentially. Also, I thought it would be less risky just to rip off the plastic and paint it away from the rest of the grille. It's definitely harder to do it right, but I don't mind. It's just more work.

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Thu Oct 16, 2008 12:34 am
by radomirthegreat
Guess what? More pictures! I didn't sleep for about 30 hours, and then I went over to Austin's house to do more work. Needless to say, it went well. Our friend Jon was over there as well. He shows up randomly and helps us with work from time to time. Anyway, pictured here is the result of the exhaust pipe drop, the area where the gas tank was, how bad the brake lines were, the newly painted grille on his car this time, red fuel rails, black wrinkle finish on the valve covers, and rust sanding, "converting," and priming. It was a fun day. Then, I passed out on his sofa. I'm back now, so here are the pictures! This time, I'm not going to post all the uploaded pictures. The album isn't set to private, so you can go there to look at more if you so desire.

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An explanation of valve cover wrinkle finish: It is believed that this paint helps reduce heat by increasing surface area for better heat dissipation. However, these valve covers are not the right material for this job, so the wrinkle finish is just an aesthetic thing. Given how very thick the paint coats have to be for proper wrinkling, it is hard for me to imagine that anything aside from smooth, clean metal can benefit from this. I may be wrong, and as I'm aware, few or no members have tried this with these valve covers. With no before & after comparison possible right now, we may never know. It does look awesome, though. Please ignore the awesome sign we used to lay out the covers.
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Brake lines & fuel rail! I painted the fuel rail at my house but somehow managed not to whore out the work progress. I used a 500º F gray primer, red caliper paint, and a 500º F clear coat. Except for the primer, each coat was allowed a day to cure.
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There are quite a few rust pictures, but here are just a couple or so. When he dropped the gas tank, Austin saw there was some rust forming. I managed not to find a respirator when I went under the car to assess the situation.
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The old gas tank developed a crack, so Austin has a new one. We're debating priming and painting it. Suggestions?
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Steak & Shake dinner followed the work. It was tasty.
http://i106.photobucket.com/albums/m242 ... CF1597.jpg

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Thu Oct 16, 2008 12:42 am
by bonnevillain
no need to paint the tank IMO

i always enjoy a work whoreage

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Thu Oct 16, 2008 4:08 am
by Roadtech195
WOW Rad, you have acquired some nice parts for your car. Painting the tank is not needed but if ya want to... go for it. I painted my grill on my car. I used a crap load of painters tape and news paper. I painted the grills black so they stand out some. Keep the pics coming dude!

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Thu Oct 16, 2008 7:35 am
by tripscarcare95
Your Nuts!!!

keep on posting youve always got something crazy going on

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Thu Oct 16, 2008 2:19 pm
by 1337ssei
not for his car its for my car :)

Re: mMeet with 1337 ssei - Another day, more crazy stuff. No 56K

Posted: Thu Oct 16, 2008 5:31 pm
by radomirthegreat
tripscarcare95 wrote:Your Nuts!!!
Oh, no! Not them!