turboswede wrote: Maybe look at some of the ceramic coatings?
For the intake manifold, or something else?
I'm also not certain if I'm going to be able to pull off painting/coating the alt like that picture has... it definitely looks like that one was taken apart and painted/powder coated separately.
I really need to get off my lazy butt and wire up the oven I have for powder coat curing and see how well I can do at it with my HF powder coating gun...
Yeah, Performance Coatings here in Portland has some neat coatings to help reject or contain heat depending on the coating chosen.
Coating the intake could help keep the charge cooler and more dense, plus they have various colors (even chrome-like)
In reply to turboswede:
Interesting. Their website is kind of sparse though, at least from what I can see from my phone. It sounds like though they do the coating there? And I'd wonder if it would be remotely Challenge-friendly price-wise...
Didn't get a WHOLE lot done today since I needed to take care of other things, but did get a start of putting the carb back together after cleaning it. I need to bead blast a few more parts though before I can finish reassembling it, so it will hopefully get finished up tomorrow. Or rather- it WILL get finished up tomorrow, because I need to have it out of the room I've been working on it in (on a card table in my guest bedroom) by the time I get back from my Thanksgiving trip since my brother will be staying in that room and housesitting while I am gone to Portland on business.
I'm really hoping to get to do some engine painting tomorrow since it will be a very nice and warm day for November.
Ashyukun wrote: In reply to turboswede: Interesting. Their website is kind of sparse though, at least from what I can see from my phone. It sounds like though they do the coating there? And I'd wonder if it would be remotely Challenge-friendly price-wise...
Well, there are home-based versions of the coatings they use that are essentially powder coats that you can do yourself. I think Eastwood carries it, among others
Their shop is worth a visit while you're here. Complete hole in the wall, but they are just cool. My buddy had quite a bit of his engine parts coated, looks great and works well.
I had a single, long header quoted at about $200 (which included blasting inside and out and coating inside and out) Intake coating wouldn't be nearly that much since it would be just the outside, etc. Worth a call into them just to chat about coatings, etc.
In reply to turboswede:
I'll have to stop by there. I doubt that I'll have the room in my budget for it, but it should be neat to look into.
So, I didn't get quite as much done today as I'd hoped to, but things still went reasonably well. The bad was that I didn't get the carb finished up- largely because I found that I'm missing the linkage rod for the accelerator pump which I'm going to have to try and track down now.
The painting, as the new pictures show, went a bit better. The block still needs a few more coats of paint, but it's well on its way to being done. It's not going to be perfect by any stretch, but then it's being rattle-canned after all. But, it looks much better than it does before. The other parts I painted turned out really well though too- I'm thinking the orange with black accents is going to work well.
Unfortunately it's going to be nearly a month before I can do anything else on the engine & car thanks to vacations & work travel. 
Finally back home for a short while... but have been too sick to spend much time out in the garage.
Did get the 600cfm carb put back together last night, the final coat of paint on the block a few days ago when it warmed up here, and will probably be trading the last of the excess chrome stuff that came on the original engine for a 750cfm Holley carb.
Also picked up the finished cylinder heads from the shop a few hours ago....
The good: They look BEAUTIFUL, and if I bring the new springs back with the heads the shop will test them and put them on as well.
The bad: Besides the vehicles themselves, the work on the heads cost more than anything else in my budget, and was nearly twice what I'd been thinking it was going to be. It's looking increasingly unlikely that I'll have the room in the budget for the nitrous- it's cutting it really close as it is without it. 
Ashyukun wrote: In reply to Ranger50: Oh, that's useful. Quite interesting too, since I actually have a set of front springs I pulled from an S-10. Of course, I also have a set of front lowering springs that I picked up for $20, though I don't know the spring rate on them. The car actually came with a set of Monte SS rear springs on it (from what I was told), and the rear actually sits pretty close to where I'd like it to be, though we'll see when I get further along whether I stick with them or not. I have a pair of KYB Gas-A-Just shocks I picked up for the front fairly cheap, and a set of interesting shocks I pulled off of a Monte in a salvage yard that have small springs over the outside of them kind of like coil-overs (but way too small to replace the actual rear springs). One of these days I'll get a good picture of them added to the album...
S10 springs are about 410lbs, the G body are 797lbs IIRC
Actually, there are about 5 different G-body spring rates and lengths based on engine / manufacturer / body style / etc. There are about 10 different springs for the front and rear that will plop right in. These include everything from an S10 to a monza to a camaro.
I'm sure that the springs will work out- there are enough of the cars/trucks that I can pull the springs from sitting around in salvage yards nearby that if what I have doesn't work I'm sure I can find another set cheaply.
What I'd LIKE to find really cheaply would be a set of nice rear shocks... I've got a decent set of used KYBs for the front, but am so far looking at having to get new ones for the rear to the tune of $70. I'm hoping that I'll find some at the local track's swap meet in early January...
FYI, here's a link to a spring calculator so you can figure out the spring rate before buying the springs. You'll still have to pull the springs, but at least you won't have a bunch of springs to buy for no reason...
http://www.planetspring.com/pages/compression-spring-calculator-coil-calculator.php
Oh and for the rear shocks? Measure the extended and compressed length of the stock ones and poke around for some of the same basic dimensions. Fitting them to them to the car is relatively easy by altering the bolt diameters or adding bushings where necessary. I suspect you'll find some oval racing shocks that could work.
You can get KYB's brand new from Tire rack for either $20.00 a piece or $35.00 a piece. Depending on which ones you select.
This is dependent on the car having the same fitment as a monte carlo G body.
http://www.tirerack.com/suspension/Susptabl.jsp?autoMake=Chevrolet&autoModel=Monte+Carlo+SS&autoYear=1986&autoModClar=
wvumtnbkr wrote: You can get KYB's brand new from Tire rack for either $20.00 a piece or $35.00 a piece. Depending on which ones you select. This is dependent on the car having the same fitment as a monte carlo G body. http://www.tirerack.com/suspension/Susptabl.jsp?autoMake=Chevrolet&autoModel=Monte+Carlo+SS&autoYear=1986&autoModClar=
The Elky uses the exact same suspension parts as the Monte (and pretty much if not all other G-bodies) with the possible/likely exception of having different spring rates. Much as I'd like to get the nicer Gas-A-Justs, my budget will likely dictate I use the GR-2/Excel-G's. Unless I can find some at the local track swap meet this weekend, which would be nice.
I've been gone for the last two weeks and thus unable to touch anything, but right before leaving got the heads back from the shop, and will probably be dropping back by with the 'new' springs to have them tested for uniformity in spring rate and installed on the heads. The good news is that it looks like I won't have to travel for a month or so and will thus hopefully be able to make some good progress. The bad is that my time is going to be eaten up with starting to work toward getting ready to try and put my house up on the market (I need a bigger garage... 
)- but amusingly getting the Elky mobile under its own power is actually part of that since I don't want it sitting around in the driveway when the house is being shown...
Didn't get nearly as much as I'd have liked to done over the weekend, but am at least making some small progress.
Drove out to the relatively-local speedway's swap meet on Saturday and picked up a set of rear shocks that will hopefully either fit or be able to be made to fit for a lot less than picking them up new, so that's a push in the right direction for my budget.
I'd really hoped to make a lot more progress on getting the engine back together, but as I'm also trying to do things -right- it's taking a while. All I got done was disassembling and cleaning 7 of the used hydraulic roller lifters I picked up. All of them were 'stuck' and the plunger wasn't moving at all and all but one required my breaking out the propane torch to heat up the outer shell to expand it enough to get the plunger portion out. I actually tried making it halfway and finishing up 8, but the last one just would NOT budge- which makes me very glad that I pulled two full vehicle sets of the things so I've got spares. The lifters take a LOT of time to disassemble and clean, but I'd far prefer having them actually functioning properly than not and ruin a set of heads that have better than a quarter of my total budget invested in them...
The warm weather over the weekend made it a bit easier to work out in the garage on the engine over the weekend, though unfortunately it has now cooled off considerably.
The warmer weather did allow me to get the rest of the lifters cleaned, and with that out of the way I now have the new Z04 cam installed along with the lifters, dogbones, and spider. I would have gotten the timing chain installed, but the woodruff keys on the main crank were damaged a bit when I removed them and I still need to get replacements. Moving slowly, but at least actually moving...
Another surprisingly warm weekend- but not a whole lot of real progress on the engine itself. I took advantage of the weather to paint the cylinder heads, so once I put the new valve springs and rocker arms on them they'll be ready to go on the engine. Oil pan is repainted too, so at this point it's largely just a matter of getting out the new gaskets and putting everything back together.
More importantly as far as being able to continue working while the weather is colder (as it turned sharply so late yesterday), I did a lot of cleaning and reorganizing in the garage so it's now actually possible to work in there without looking like I'm doing interpretive dance when I try and get around the piles of parts/crap. I can also now use my workbench again, and don't have to clear too much out of the way to be able to use the blast cabinet (which it's looking like I'm going to need to be doing before I can repaint the valve covers).
Between family emergencies, weather, and moving 85% or so of my house's contents to storage, I've not had much of any time to do anything on the Elky... but needs to be mobile before I can put the house up for sale, so I will be increasingly devoting time to getting it running.
Last night I finally buckled down and got the 'new' valve springs and rocker arms on the cylinder heads. The polylocks still need to be torqued properly, but that's something that can't be really done properly until the heads are on the engine anyway. I updated the Photobucket pictures with a few of the newly assembled heads.
It's supposed to be warmer than usual this afternoon, so I'm hoping to get the valve covers wire-brushed and painted, and possibly get the heads put onto the engine and the timing chain installed. What I really need is a warm, non-rainy day soon to be able to repaint the parts of the engine bay that can only really be accessed when the engine is removed...
Gotta love making almost no progress over better than a month's time... but it's taken a back seat to preparing the house for sale.
Did make some progress this weekend between working on the house- but nothing really exciting...
The engine bay- or at least what can't be earily accessed once the engine goes back in- is now mostly cleaned up and repainted in preparation for hopefully getting the engine and transmission back into the car soon. So is the front frame panel. The heads are back at the shop to be machined for screw-in rocker studs... not looking forward to the budget hit, but it sounds like it's a necessity for running the higher pressure valve springs I'm using on the Vortec heads.
I've gotta admit, I sadly have my concerns that I'll be able to have it really ready for the Challenge this year... I lot is going to depend on how long I'm unable to do any real work on it while I'm between houses. Hopefully everything will come together to have it ready and racing though...
Nice eager to see your final outcome with this. One of my Cutlasses may still end up as a challenge car but the current project has far to many new parts going in. But then I have almost all the parts to start a second car once this one gets done.
Finally, something resembling real progress. With the nice weather over the weekend and eastsidemav able to make it down to help with it, the engine and transmission are now back into the car. Granted, it's only got junk heads on it because the real ones are still at the shop, but it's closer to being done than it has ever been.
The bad news is that I've pretty much decided that it's unreasonable to try and get the car running and mobile under its own power before I need to have it out of the garage when the house goes up for sale shortly- so I'm essentially just going to have to mostly put it back together so it can be towed and then dig back into it once my current house has sold and I've got a new one (with a bigger/better garage for working in...).
Definitely don't like having nearly a month between updates, but I should be making very good progress for the next week or so. Unfortunately once the car is largely back together and can be safely moved and is buttoned up enough to take being out in the elements for (hopefully only) a few months, there won't be many updates for a while again.
With the heads back and the new springs on them that will take the lift from the Hot Cam installed, I was finally able to get down to getting them properly installed. I did a quick test of the new springs though to make sure that they didn't bind up, and they worked just fine.
Unfortunately I didn't have as much time as I would have liked, and having to run to the parts store for a few things didn't help- but I was able to get the more difficult of the heads (due to the airbox being in the way) installed and the new head bolts torqued down.
This did involve an interesting incident. With the headers just unbolted and right next to the heads and the airbox in the way, I needed to use a combination of 3/8" extensions on my torque wrench to get access to the row of bolts below the exhaust ports. This didn't cause any problems during the initial 25 ft-lb and subsequent 45-ft-lb torquing- but the full 65 ft-lb final tightening was a different story. The first two bolts (going in the proper sequence) seemed to tighten up properly, but I just could NOT get the third (the first of the ones below the exhaust ports) to 'click'. I was getting really worried that there was something wrong with the torque wrench and it was going to damage the bolts- and got REALLY freaked out when it felt like the bolt had yielded and was starting to snap in half... until I pulled the socket off of it and took a look at the extensions...
Apparenlty the torsional strength of a cheap 3/8" extension is somewhere just south of 65 ft-lbs of torque. After getting the socket off the thing, I dug out the similar-length extender from my impact set and was able to torque down the rest of the bolts with no issues (I was using a 1" extension too, but it was a Craftsman one and didn't have any problems).
I've largely decided that I'm not going to put the pushrods, rockers, and polylocks on the heads when I have the car sitting out- I don't see any real need for it so I'll just keep them with the rest of the parts that won't be going back in/on the car just yet.
Had a pretty productive Saturday in the garage- didn't get as much done as I would have liked, but that's nothing new.
-Harmonic balancer installed on the crankshaft. Probaly won't install the pulley just yet though since the accessories won't be going on it when it's stored
-Heads installed and torqued down to spec. Headers bolted on, valve covers, and intake installed.
-Steering column with new Jeep intermediate shaft installed.
-Fenders bolted back up; not totally tightened down since the front frame isn't bolted down yet either pending replacing the nuts on the body mount.
Things that need to be done before I call it 'done' enough to move it to the storate lot:
-Finish putting the front end back together (radiator core support, front fascia & grille. Bumper may stay off initially depending on how I decide to move it since the tow bar may be mounted to the bumper attach points
-Finish securing steering wheel.
-Replace door locks (should be 'find where I put the replacement door locks and install them', really...)
-Install back half of exhaust
-Plug end of exhaust pipes, all water pipe connections, fuel line, distributor hole, and airbox openings
-Check that brakes will handle stopping the car rolling down the driveway to the street
-Air up tires
It's kind of ridiculous that it's been 8 months since I last posted anything about this... but then, to a decent extent I've not been able to get that much actually DONE on it since then either. It's mostly been fairl small steps forward (and better than half of my time has been spent finding what box I put the parts I need for the next step in...).
Made more progress than usual over the weekend though despite still being a bit under the weather. The oil system is buttoned up and the rocker polylocks should be set right, so I was ready to try pre-oiling everything. Unfortunately, I encountered two problems: First, the pre-oil tool I'd gotten doesn't have the bushing to allow the pressurization of the valvetrain-side of the engine. So, I need a better one with that bushing... will stop at the local performance shop that I know will have it later this week before I make it out to the workshop next, probably over the weekend. Second- I need a bigger drill... mine started smoking when trying to turn the pump at a decent speed, so apparently the 2A corded drill just isn't going to cut the mustard for this. Bouncing between thinking I should just buy a cheap bigger one from Harbor Freight, or rent a big one from Home Depot.
FYI de-gear(or cut the teeth off the gear) and take the rotor and top guts off an old distributor and you have a free priming tool, if you have one laying around.
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