Intake Mods

NEW?  CLICK HERE FOR DAY ONE!

---UPDATES ARE ON MONDAYS---
Click here for a 3 minute video of the entire build.
 

Above is an intake as it starts out (slightly different than mine) with all the areas marked blue for what comes off.  I forgot to take a "before" picture so I stole this picture from Steve Alexander (the guy who built my sub-frame).

Here is the intake after I did a rough cut to hack off most of the big chunks.

Another rough cut view.  Note: in the background you can see the right angle grinder with the 1/8 inch thick metal cutting disk that worked great.  I also used a 4 inch grinding disk to get closer, then finally a flap style sanding disk to finish up.  As you start to see more and more aluminum dust on the workbench I'll take a moment to mention I wore a mask, and had a fan blowing across the area to constantly supply fresh air.

Here is the finished intake.  I plan to sand it with some mini sanding disks and possibly coating it with POR-15 silver gloss.  I also am considering media blasting the entire intake and shooting it with a clear gloss.   On the right side you can see a section on the intake runner that must be ground away for clearance.  I'm so glad I didn't punch through, but Steve said the wall thickness is about 1/4 inch so I guessed on how much I could remove; I just hope it's enough.  I started to use a scraper to remove the intake gasket (seen on left) however, the aluminum is so soft it started to gouge.  So I looked around and found an Exact-O knife (seen on right) with the long, snap-off blade extended out all the way and I used it to slip under the gasket.

Another view.  There is a 1/4 inch hole (not all the way through) that I will fill flush with JB Weld. 

Here is the intake flange that had gasket material stuck on it.  Next I used one of those 3M green abrasive disks (upper left of photo) to clean up the flange.  Notice the band-aid, next pic down shows more about that.

While cutting the big pieces off, I nicked the back of my thumb with the cutting disk.  Yup, right through the glove and skin and nicked the tendon.  Good times.  Cool video here.