Finishing Up All the Trial Fits on my Engine Tin and Short IDA Manifolds...

[rick m]

Spent the majority of the day finishing up modifying and making the rest of my engine tin, along with the final trial fitting of parts. You can see how short my BERG IDA manifolds ended up with me trimming 3/8 of an inch off the top of them.  Plus, hours of grinding and then polish work to make them look like a finished product.

Have a few more things to complete tomorrow, including the trial fit of the motor, rear engine bar, exhaust, side tin and seals in the engine compartment, etc.  Then everything comes apart and the tin is off to the powdercoat shop. I forgot how much work goes in to a project like this. It's been too long since last working on one of my projects.

Can't wait to get this thing done! I lost a week with a sinus infection and decided since missing the shows I wanted to attend to just spend a little more time and get things powdercoated and some little extras completed.  Will be ready for the 2011 season!

Rick M

[fredy66]

looking good men

[Cheesepanzer]

Looks great!  Nice work Rick.

Just curious..., what's your objective with the modified short manifolds?  (as opposed to your standard talls, or even an old set of shorts)  Lots of top end rpm's?  Tuck the carbs deep inside the engine compartment?  Again, just curious.

[rick m]

Primarily room for the future air cleaners.  Plus, I had short manifolds with my first IDAs in 1972.  I liked the way they worked on the street, plus they got the carbs in closer to the fan schround and more room on the sides of the engine compartment.  Just something I want to try on this motor. I have run talls too.  Here is a shot of my last street motor in my 67 cover car.  It had tall manifolds on it and I could still close the 67 Deck Lid.

Rick M

[Zach Gomulka]

Those look a million times better Rick!

[Diederick/DVK]

good job on the manifolds! they look sweet.
how about a set of K&N king kong filters to top them off 

[rick m]

I will definitely have a set of K&N's for road trips. I need to get the motor finished and in the car before I start that project. With everything in the car I can make the air cleaners to fit nicely.

Rick M

[Kaferdog]

Rick...
I was checking out your breast plate tin and I could see you did the same thing I had to do to get a "Good" fit over the exhaust...just curious...is it a "Scat" rear tin...?

[rick m]

Yes.  It was SCAT. Since none of the aftermarket tin fits like factory tin, we all find ourselves spending hours trying to get things to fit better.

RM

[Kaferdog]

Yeah...the 3 & 4 side are off just buy a hair ( A really big hair) ....1 & 2 are pretty much right on ..Overall Scat is the best I have found other than German.

[javabug]

Rick...
I was checking out your breast plate tin and I could see you did the same thing I had to do to get a "Good" fit over the exhaust...just curious...is it a "Scat" rear tin...?

What kind of work was done to yours?  I'm not sure where to start on mine.  If I had any metal skills I'd just fill up a factory one, but alas...

[rick m]

First, since I am running the BERG Cross-Bar linkage, I disassembled it, welded up two of the holes and redrilled them to get the angle piece to sit level. I cut a piece of flat stock and welded it into the notch BERG put in the angle piece to clear the coil, since I am not running one in that location.  Look over my threat on the BERG type 4 cooler mods and you will see the deflector plate I made and welded in place to ensure all the air is going through the cooler and not around it. Most the aftermarket pieces are crap in the details. I also welded up seams that were not tight where there could be air leakage from the fan to the cooler duct.  Only 16-18% of the fan air goes to the cooler, so you cannot afford to lose ANY FLOW at all.

Only other mods I made to the tin was really the addition of threaded inserts for different things I have mounted to the shroud. I am running a COMPUFIRE ignition so I run their big coil pack on my schroud. You will see it when I post pictures of the completed motor installed.  I've had good luck with these coolers after I do a little work with them. They have all the factory vanes in them, so they should work fine once you've gone through and closed up all the potential air loss areas.

I made my own dog house cooler for my last 67 I built. I had so many hours in it that I decided to just modify an aftermarket one.

Rick M

[javabug]

Thanks for the info Rick.  I was actually asking about the rear tin above the header, BUT I am running a Scat fan housing too so that info is also appreciated.  Thanks for taking the time to type it all.

I've done a little bit to my fan housing so far, but want to really go over it well before it gets powdercoated.  One thing I had to do to mine was put a nutsert in where the upper doghouse exhaust piece goes, as the nut location for that was WAY off. 

[rick m]

I had to do the same for the dog house piece that directs the air over the trans. Instead of a nutsert, I modified the tin to have a wider area for the small allen head bolt and washer to secure the piece to the fan schroud.

RM

[Kaferdog]

Rick...
I was checking out your breast plate tin and I could see you did the same thing I had to do to get a "Good" fit over the exhaust...just curious...is it a "Scat" rear tin...?

What kind of work was done to yours?  I'm not sure where to start on mine.  If I had any metal skills I'd just fill up a factory one, but alas...

The Scat rear tin seams to sit a little off over the 3 & 4 side but sit pretty good over 1 & 2 side of the motor, if you look at the pic of my tin then look at Ricks tin you can see the holes "after".... look at mine its the "before"...! you have to "enlongate" the holes of the tin so the tin can slide towards the motor.Also you may have to reshape ( grind )the tin a bit so it can conform to the head tin like in Ricks pic

[glenn]

Rick,

Do you have "Weber Windows" in the car? Short manifolds can make it really tight to get to the spark plugs.

[rick m]

Actually, since these set in so close to the fan schroud, you can get your hand on the sides of the manifolds.  I will take shots of the motor when it is in the car and post them.  I've had shorts before.  BERGS manifolds actually hug the tin better than the early SCAT, DDS, IECO and other early manifolds.

Rick M

[javabug]

The Scat rear tin seams to sit a little off over the 3 & 4 side but sit pretty good over 1 & 2 side of the motor, if you look at the pic of my tin then look at Ricks tin you can see the holes "after".... look at mine its the "before"...! you have to "enlongate" the holes of the tin so the tin can slide towards the motor.Also you may have to reshape ( grind )the tin a bit so it can conform to the head tin like in Ricks pic

Thanks Kaferdog.  I can see what you're talking about in the pics. 

[Kaferdog]

Yer Welcome Java..  You'll find outside of that it fits well !....