Powder Coated DII Intake Manifold Plenum

kennith

Well-known member
Apr 22, 2004
10,891
172
North Carolina
I suppose it's a little bit of both for most now, but whatever. Keywords, and all. We are trying to peg a later "light Buick bluish greenish sea-foam" color, and this happened. I kind of dig it:

56734

Not bad for a "let's just see what happens" two-stage finish with a new primer. It's probably a bit strong for that particular part, but might not be too bad; certainly not on valve covers if we can get the color nailed down. It's kind of neat as-is, though. I've certainly seen many worse attempts at that color, but this was our first try with what they had on hand.

You're only seeing flash because we didn't bother pulling the bolts and I just picked it up when dropping something else off before they finished it up. I'll handle the feathering around the edges while watching TV later. Regardless, this is something you probably haven't seen. :ROFLMAO:

Cheers,

Kennith
 
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ERover82

Well-known member
Nov 26, 2011
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Darien Gap
Will the machined surfaces be left coated? What do you mean "new primer"? Is the color accurately reproducible?
 

kennith

Well-known member
Apr 22, 2004
10,891
172
North Carolina
Will the machined surfaces be left coated? What do you mean "new primer"? Is the color accurately reproducible?

Oh, I told them not to worry about some of the machined surfaces, as I want to actually take it down to a racing shop nearby and check the dimensions to see if it needs to be squared up, check the port alignment and correct if required, and all that sort of thing. I want to see just how far off these things are after all those years of use.

The mating surface for the intake manifold was masked off, as well as the other stuff. What you see in the picture are the only mating surfaces that were coated over.

There are a lot of little Rover leaks I believe can be attributed to inadequate machining and potentially minor warping over time. The castings are not exactly the best in the world on the later units.

I also want to try to lap it and see just how smooth I can get those surfaces within reason. It's a test part, but it's a good part. When I'm done I may re-coat to attempt a closer match or sell it, if anyone on Earth aside from me likes it. It'll be ready for someone to enjoy when I'm done as long as I have the time.

The primer was simply something that they just got in, designed specifically for this sort of headache. None of us had used it before, as it's a new product designed to seal difficult surfaces. It worked out perfectly well, though.

As for the color, yes. At this point, we can nail that every time.

It's just really hard to tell if it's actually the appropriate Buick color, because I've never seen two painted alike. Maybe a touch more green is needed to really get it, but honestly I kind of like what we ended up with. It kind of hearkens to the Buick engines of old, while still having a bit of it's own personality. I think (carefully pollinated throughout the engine with some silver to break it up) it would look quite nice in the engine bay as-is.

Now, whether that's the best place to use that color if I break it up with silver remains to be seen, but I just need to get out there and use my imagination a bit. It may look good all the same color, or it may not. I think the heads should probably be a high temperature silver, just given the heat exposure. If anything flakes off it won't be a big deal down there, because it would just go from silver to cast aluminum.

Painting the block itself is another thing to explore. I'd like that painted, but what's going to stick, how much insulation will it add, and so on... There are lots of variables.

Cheers,

Kennith
 

kennith

Well-known member
Apr 22, 2004
10,891
172
North Carolina
Okay, there's a problem here if fifteen people haven't already made fun of me for doing that... I was expecting a few flames to play around with.

I like it, but I certainly didn't expect anyone else to like it. :ROFLMAO:

Cheers,

Kennith
 

kennith

Well-known member
Apr 22, 2004
10,891
172
North Carolina
Scented candle, spirit animal pictures, flamboyant paint.. must be be lgbt month..

Well, you'd know. LOL

That "spirit animal" looking image is the cover of the limited edition boxed copy of John Romero's new Doom episode "Sigil". I had to have it. :ROFLMAO:

It does kind of look like a wolf or something in the picture, though. It's really good, and Buckethead did the soundtrack.

Cheers,

Kennith
 

kennith

Well-known member
Apr 22, 2004
10,891
172
North Carolina
I don't like it. The furthest I usually venture from stock with engines is cadmium plating instead of nickel (on GEMS) and black for the exhaust manifolds.

And that right there is one of the biggest sucker punches to DII owners. Our engines are just a visual mess up top. It's not only cluttered, it leads to that dumb-ass water neck and thermostat in the middle of nowhere. It would be nice to play mix and match with ancillary mounts, intake, and front cover, at the very least.

I normally like black valve covers, but in this engine bay they're so buried visually that it comes off looking cheap and make the whole area dark and uninteresting. I do want to brighten those up. I've got some I did myself, but they came from another vehicle. I want to use the ones that came with it.

That's where this color could potentially come into play, I think. Silver is an obvious choice, but once that color is right it might look good hiding under there. Either would brighten things up. Another spot might be the block itself. That's something that's not exactly on open display, anyway, and it'll have to be paint, which can be matched to any powder used on the valve covers.

I don't think it's going to work well up top. The alternator and A/C compressor are so prominent and in the way it would just make any actual color look like an accident.

I want to do some plating, but again, the way it's set up might make it look like isolated bling fragments scattered about.

I'm digging those exhaust manifolds. I'll probably have to go black this time around. The higher temperature silvers just don't look like you'd really want them to. In contrast, something is either black or it is not black. It's also a color we're quite used to seeing on cast finishes. It's a shame those bolts don't stay looking so nice, because that's a great contrast.

How'd you finish the parts? It looks clean as hell.

Cheers,

Kennith
 
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