Going to start my port and polish of my intake tonight

[Comp Orange 04]

Ok now that Christmas confusion is over, back to porting. I have my new plug caps on order and I am contemplating cutting the bottom of the intake off. I have a friend who TIG welds and can put it back together for me. The only requests he made were a very straight, smooth cut and a perfectly clean intake. No oil, grease or grime present. Anyone can let me know the pro's and con's to this. I would also like to know the brand name of the epoxy we can use to glue also.

[Comp Orange 04]

Well sad news today I called PHP and talked to Paul. He said the spacers are still probably 2 weeks away.... So I decided to port a little more on the intake and I cracked it.



Just kidding I decided to cut it so I could fully realize the potential of the porting.



So I will be working on it a lot more tonight and hopefully I can have a finished product.

I also talked to the machine shop tonight and he said TIG welding it was most likely out of the question. He predicted a lot of cracks would form in the cast section. Anyone have experience with this?

So I decided to epoxy it back together, but I need the name of a good epoxy to use. I will send out PM's to Nazman and Orange later tonight.

Well back to sanding. Now with 3 times the access of your average intake! Oh I also finally tracked down some Dorman Cap Plugs....

[03AV8R]

I was a few seconds away from doing this myself. Then last Year Mike Dez Racing out of Mass. tried tuning in a recently ported, polished, extrude honed Mach1 intake & couldnt find a nickel more of power over what they already had with the spacer & exhaust & CAI etc.. They got the PHP $1200 deal & did some other "work" while they had it all apart.. After it was all said & done they couldnt make anymore power than what they had before..

Maybe the Superchips tuning software has more to it now that can take advantage etc. but last year they couldnt do anything with it using Superchips tuning & his Dyno.. these guys have seen gains from good port/polishing before & the pieces they got back from PHP looked awesome but no gains found?? They tried everything on the dyno they could think of & nottin seemed to help at the time.. The guy who owns the car is a member here on the registry. Not sure if they ever got anything out of it to this day.. It was as though the Mach1's intake just didnt need it.. Maybe Dave will update us on that deal.. Im still interested & the winter IS going by pretty slow! For $450 id like to at least try it to see how it goes on mine

[Red Mach'03]

What is PHP Phone #? Thanks in advance. I am planinng on doing mine next fall.

[Comp Orange 04]

Originally Posted by 03AV8R

I was a few seconds away from doing this myself. Then last Year Mike Dez Racing out of Mass. tried tuning in a recently ported, polished, extrude honed Mach1 intake & couldnt find a nickel more of power over what they already had with the spacer & exhaust & CAI etc.. They got the PHP $1200 deal & did some other "work" while they had it all apart.. After it was all said & done they couldnt make anymore power than what they had before..

Maybe the Superchips tuning software has more to it now that can take advantage etc. but last year they couldnt do anything with it using Superchips tuning & his Dyno.. these guys have seen gains from good port/polishing before & the pieces they got back from PHP looked awesome but no gains found?? They tried everything on the dyno they could think of & nottin seemed to help at the time.. The guy who owns the car is a member here on the registry. Not sure if they ever got anything out of it to this day.. It was as though the Mach1's intake just didnt need it.. Maybe Dave will update us on that deal.. Im still interested & the winter IS going by pretty slow! For $450 id like to at least try it to see how it goes on mine

Sane words..... I hope to see a little something out of this but if I don't it will be sorta OK. I really don't have too much $$ wrapped up so far ($25 for a butt ton of dremel pieces and $30 to cut the intake and $13 for freeze plugs). It is a winter project so I am making it one. All I know is I have removed plenty of aluminum so far so at least a little bit more air is available to the engine.

Let me tell you, cutting the bottom off is the only way to go. It allows you to go full circle into the ports and feel every imperfection. It also allows for better shaping of the 'horn'. Right now I am on 'medium' grit emery cloth and 120 grit sanding drums. I have gone as deep as I can into the ports so now I am smoothing out some of my divots and doing final shaping of the horns.

Time to eat then get back at it. Thanks for all the comments so far. I hope this may be of some use to people.

[MA-MACH1]

awesome thread - looking forward to the finished up pics - two thumbs up

[Mach1Marauder]

Originally Posted by 03AV8R

I was a few seconds away from doing this myself. Then last Year Mike Dez Racing out of Mass. tried tuning in a recently ported, polished, extrude honed Mach1 intake & couldnt find a nickel more of power over what they already had with the spacer & exhaust & CAI etc.. They got the PHP $1200 deal & did some other "work" while they had it all apart.. After it was all said & done they couldnt make anymore power than what they had before..

Maybe the Superchips tuning software has more to it now that can take advantage etc. but last year they couldnt do anything with it using Superchips tuning & his Dyno.. these guys have seen gains from good port/polishing before & the pieces they got back from PHP looked awesome but no gains found?? They tried everything on the dyno they could think of & nottin seemed to help at the time.. The guy who owns the car is a member here on the registry. Not sure if they ever got anything out of it to this day.. It was as though the Mach1's intake just didnt need it.. Maybe Dave will update us on that deal.. Im still interested & the winter IS going by pretty slow! For $450 id like to at least try it to see how it goes on mine

I'll bet the best gains would be seen from this mod after cams and head work!

[ITLRUN]

Not matter what you do inside the manifold, if you dont shorten the runner length you will not drasticly raise peak HP RPM... IMO, thats the major killer of the potential power. However, I am definately interested to see what gains are realized by all his hard work. Its definately looking good.

[Comp Orange 04]

Hmm lets see if this posts...



and



well now they work... didn't work last night.....

Anyway, I have started working on the horn flare and blending it in down the bore of the runners. You can see where I still have to smooth out and remove some more metal. I am on a medium grit emory cloth and 120 grit drums. I have to widen the holes further into the center support yet and get the flare to the edge of the horn. This is taking some time but it is looking better. The pictures capture EVERY imperfection Trust me they are definately bigger then when I started and they are a hell of a lot smoother. More pics later tonight.

[Comp Orange 04]

Well I think I am pretty much done !! I am going to hit it with the 120 grit flap wheel and call it quits. Before I started I could barely get 2 fingers side by side down the runners. Now they fit with room to spare. The last couple days I was trying to figure out a method to do some slight work inside the radius bend but to no avail. Of course I could go buy a extrude hone machine......

Here are some pics.









Now to duct tape the intake back together and pray for my PHP spacer to be delivered....

[Mach1Marauder]

Originally Posted by Comp Orange 04

Well I think I am pretty much done !! I am going to hit it with the 120 grit flap wheel and call it quits. Before I started I could barely get 2 fingers side by side down the runners. Now they fit with room to spare. The last couple days I was trying to figure out a method to do some slight work inside the radius bend but to no avail. Of course I could go buy a extrude hone machine......

Here are some pics.









Now to duct tape the intake back together, a few hours on a flow bench and pray for my PHP spacer to be delivered....

Fixed for ya man!
It would be interesting to find out what flow improvement was made.

[BONESTOCK]

Wow! Great post!

[machths]

Originally Posted by 03AV8R

I was a few seconds away from doing this myself. Then last Year Mike Dez Racing out of Mass. tried tuning in a recently ported, polished, extrude honed Mach1 intake & couldnt find a nickel more of power over what they already had with the spacer & exhaust & CAI etc.. They got the PHP $1200 deal & did some other "work" while they had it all apart.. After it was all said & done they couldnt make anymore power than what they had before..

That's weird, but according to PHP's description of their intake job you SHOULD get 18-25 HP, but even more importantly, and beneficial (in my opinion) is the ability to hit your powerband 500 RPM's sooner. Are the dyno results showing this? That's my question.

[machths]

Originally Posted by machths

That's weird, but according to PHP's description of their intake job you SHOULD get 18-25 HP, but even more importantly, and beneficial (in my opinion) is the ability to hit your powerband 500 RPM's sooner. Are the dyno results showing this? That's my question.

Also...what is it about that intake job that lowers your powerband? Are other company's intake jobs providing the same results? Would we see the these results by doing it ourselves? Maybe it's time to give PHP a call.

[rcodemach1]

I haven't seen the dyno curves, but my guess is that the powerband is actually widened. So it might come in 500 rpm lower but it doesn't give up Anything on the top. The only way the powerband as a whole could be lowered is if the runners were being lengthened. Some have said that's what the spacer does, but i don't buy that. The spacer might very slightly lengthen the air path (3/8"), but only in the upper plenum and the 6 connecting passages down to the lower plenum. The runners from the lower plenum to the heads are the ones that control the powerband due to their design (length and area).

[machths]

Originally Posted by rcodemach1

I haven't seen the dyno curves, but my guess is that the powerband is actually widened. So it might come in 500 rpm lower but it doesn't give up Anything on the top. The only way the powerband as a whole could be lowered is if the runners were being lengthened. Some have said that's what the spacer does, but i don't buy that. The spacer might very slightly lengthen the air path (3/8"), but only in the upper plenum and the 6 connecting passages down to the lower plenum. The runners from the lower plenum to the heads are the ones that control the powerband due to their design (length and area).

Because we all know that if the intake spacer was increasing our powerband, that thing would be at least $300, not $80.

[Comp Orange 04]

OK time to put this project to bed. I am done porting it. I know there is a little more metal to be removed but I am running up against a new work deadline so I must call it quits. I have a guy at work who is going to TIG weld it for me. He has welded on cast before but wants to check how much sand is in it first before trying. He does not want to risk messing it up. If he says it's a no go then I will epoxy it back together. Here are a couple parting shots hopefully the next ones will be re-assembly. Of course to finish the job I need to explode my PHP spacer form their vendors hands.... sigh....

[ITLRUN]

Did you do any work to your lid?

[Comp Orange 04]

Originally Posted by ITLRUN

Did you do any work to your lid?

Not yet, that will be tomorrows project. I think all I am going to do is smooth it out and fair in the split for the throttle body. I really dont think we can gain anything NA by spending a lot of time on the lid. Until someone tells me otherwise I am going to keep the swirl dams in place. Have you had a chance to dyno Rcodegirl's Stiegemeier lid yet?

[Nazman]

...

[ITLRUN]

Originally Posted by Comp Orange 04

Have you had a chance to dyno Rcodegirl's Stiegemeier lid yet?

He ported the t-body and sent the rest back untouched. He seemed to think it wouldnt be worth the time (read $$$) for the minimal gains in power.

I did a little bit of work to my lid. Probally a little overkill, but I was bored. I can tell you there was a bit of welding done and some reshaping.

[Comp Orange 04]

Well the intake is at the welders. I'll get it back Thursday, hopefully in one piece. I wound up taking it to a weld shop that specializes in aluminum weld projects. The welder seemed to think it would not be a problem to TIG weld it (good casting). After that I will blow it out and wash it out real good one more time then re-install it this weekend and await my PHP spacer. Of course pics will follow so I can finish his thread for good.

Hey maybe we can ask this to be a sticky for a month or so for those curious of how to do it?

Itlrun, can you post a pic of your lid showing what you did to it? When you say 'welding and reshaping' just begs for pics.

[ITLRUN]

This is ruff, it still needs some work..... its getting there.

[Comp Orange 04]

Wow you cleaned it up a bunch... I wasn't thinking of going that far....

On a side note, PHP spacer is STILL 2-3 weeks away. It's been on order since November and I am now starting to get frustrated with it.

[ITLRUN]

Notice any of the areas that are filled in?