Page Six

While the motor was out I decided repaint and smooth out the engine compartment. I stripped the existing paint out withthe aircraft paint stripper. I then took off all the insulation tabs and filled all the little holes with my Miller 175 welder, I then ground down the excess metal.

I sanded the bare metal and applied some etch primer myself, this gave me a nice surface to work with. I applied some body filler and block sanded the compartment to give it a nice finish and finished it off with some high-build primer.

I got some mid-grey urethane paint custom mixed up at a local paint supplier. I then finish sanded the high build primer and cleaned it off really good with some pre-clean and a tack-rag. To apply the paint I called my good friend Rob, he has the Toyota truck on my friends page.

Here is the Fan Shroud, I used a late model with a doghouse cooler. This is one of the most effecient designs, I don't have any use for the fresh air holes so I will be removing them and smoothing it to look like the rare 73 Thing shroud. I sand blasted it and ground out the rivets removing the fresh-air holes:

I cut the srea around the holes out with a cut off wheel on a die-grinder and welded in some steel plate. This was difficult to do because I had to weld in small tacks till the whole seam was filled in. I also patched the wire holder holes in the same manner. We then ground them down carefully with a flap-wheel disc, being careful not to get too much heat into it. Here is the pic of the shroud with them welded in:

Steve (the blue Mazda on my friends page) then did the body work. He etch primed and filled the low spots with fiberglass filler. He smoothed it with a body board and got it flat:

Steve spend alot of time on it, it turned out great. Here it is in fresh primer, it's still wet, hahaha.

I then sandblasted a full sey of German tin that I pieced together locally and a in Las Vegas. The cylinder tins needed to be enlarged around the intake area to allow the Scat manifolds to fit and there was some small cracks to fix. The pulley tin needed a notch to clear the full-flow fitting and one of the under cylinder tins need a notch for the cyl head temp. After that Steve-O once again got the gun out and got to work.

They all turned out great. Here I am with the completed shroud...LOL

Here is the motor minus crabs and exhaust with all the tin on. Looks good, I wanted a suble look and just a little flash to add some flare.

Some toys I got fot the car, I got a Pro-Comp 2 Ultra-Lite tach, Pro-Comp Ultra-Lite gauges, oil pressure, oil temp and cyl head temp:

I decided to mount the tach under the dash to keep the steath appeal. I first had to modify the tach by cutting the wires for a 4 cyl application. I didn't hook the second stage shift light up, but it's still there in case I need it later. Here is a pic of it all mounted up:

I later moved the shift light to the other side of the tach because it was difficult to see there.

The old MSD shift light that was mounted in the glove box was no longer needed, so I gave it to my friend Rookie. I can now mount the 3 gauges in there. I first tried a cardboard template that I cut to the shape of the opening, but I couldn't see the gauges clearly. So I got my brother to build me a fibreglass one to fit in there. They are sloped up and towards the driver molded so it looks smooth. I was going to vinyl it in a material that matches the interior, but it turned out so nice we decided to paint it a semi-gloss black. Here it is with the gauges in for a test fit before the last coat of paint and being reinstalled into the car:

Installed inside the car:

See:
Page 1 - intro page
Page 2 - engine specs.
Page 3 - engine rebuild
Page 4 - new rims
Page 5 - beam narrowing
Page 6 - misc mods
Page 7 - the green limousine
Page 8 - friends rides
Page 9 - 2003 Las Vegas Bug-O-Rama