Here goes a step by step on material removal.

 

First off, these are the only tools used to perform this step.

 

Step one, draw a line down the inside center of each tube.

 

Step two, using a thick heavy duty cut-off wheel, make a small cut throught the tube.

 

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Step three, insert a hacksaw blade through the cut you made and cut down the center of the tubes.

 

Step four, cut down the round portions of the tube. Use the thin standard cut-off wheels for this as they cut alot faster.

 

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Go to the inside to finish up this step. Cut them a little past the 1/4 tube point.

 

Step five, hold the cut-off wheel at as much of an angle as you can and scribe a line about half way through the runner for the length of the runner.

 

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Step six, now you can lift a corner of your cut with a screwdriver and grab it with the vise grips and wiggle it back and forth and it will break off where you scribed it.

 

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Step seven, hold the cut-off wheel square with the other tube so it gets scribed at the same point as the other tube and scribe it half way through and break out the piece.

 

Step eight, take the vice grips and pinch the inside of the runner tubes together.

 

Now you have the inside 1/4 of the tubes missing and the inside drawn together.

 

From the outside they will look stock except for a weld down the center of the tubes.

 

Thats it so far. Just finished up both sets of tubes tonight but I will need to buy a TIG or set my MIG up tomorrow to weld them up. But next will be the task of making the fillers to patch the inside of the tubes with. I have an old aluminum road sign but I will try to find something better to use.

Ok, now you can let me have it. I know, I know, it won't work but
hey, it's worth a shot. I have no money invested yet. TIG's are
a bit high though.

 

i don't see why it won't work but i don't see how you are gonna really gain anything unless you cut the outside halfway like you should have only the 2 outside parts of the runners left and make it true siamesed. like a big oval unstead of the "m" shape with a rounded bottom you will get. if you weld it good and get no air leaks it should be fine.
Andrew

 

Definitely cool. That's gonna take some trick welding to not leak. It should work pretty well though. The right work on the base will go a long way too...

 

With the added air flow on the short side radius it should dramaticly increase flow far more the a set of aftermarket large tube runners ever could.

I think?

 

When this is done, the base will get ported but not siamesed.
I want to keep the base runners the same length to help keep
the air velocity up going to the heads. I will blend the entry of
the base to match the runners though.

 

Actually this is the part that scared me. The rest will be easy.

 

Putting her to bed for tonight.

See ya on the boards.

 

I think what your doing is sweet, if it turns out ok then im going to copy what you did. Being since its so much ceeper then going and buying a set. At least someone shows some interest in moding stock parts. Heres a Pat on the back for ya. Later
Bob

 

That is crazy, but cool. For the past 2 months Ive been thinking about this with a stock TPI setup and also making a sheet metal setup. I had almost same idea except I wanted to cut the outer and inner sides of the runner and just bend a piece of aluminum sheet to connect the runners. instead of just the one side and the 90 degrees of runner making the m shape.
Then I thought that it would be easier to cut the runners in half, top to bottom wise, and fab an upper. The only thing to stop me is that the excellent welder (my brother) I know has a mig, and not a tig welder.
It would be pretty cheap to fab up an intake that is very similair to the superram if you have the patience and the resources.

 

Well, he'll have to weld the seams from the inside first, then for his peice of plate to join the two together. IF he can do all of this on the inside of the runner, it'll look totally stock from the outside and would be killer sleeper. But, thats pretty fancy TIG welding on some pretty thin ****.

Good luck, you'll need it.

 

Actually, I'd weld the seams from the OUTSIDE, then grind away the seam on the inside until you got to the weld. That will open up the inside a lot more.

 

Keep the ideas flowing boys. I have not made my mind up yet but
was planning to weld everything from the outside. Do the center
first and gring the inside to the weld like Jim says then do the
plate work. I will bolt the intake all together on the bench to do
the outside of the runners to help keep things from warping.

 

I would do like jim says too, man I was gonna do something like that too man. just don't have the guts! good job!!

 

Looks good man! I've been thinking about something like that for awhile... CHEAP! I think I may do the outside too and weld up pieces on both sides. True siamesed runners then. I'm gonna siamese my spare intake anyways

 

keep us updated on your progress

 

I have run into a snag. A TIG is out of my price range at the
moment and a spool gun is about $700.

I have talked to a few welding shops here and they say it can't
be done. They say the materiel is too thin and that it will fall
apart from the heat or they are scared of blowing holes in the
runners.

I have a guy willing to try it but he don't seem too sure about it.

A couple of them suggested A-lum-rite or Durafix rods. They said
they have used them before on delicate stuff with good results
but couldn't remember where they got them from.

Has anyone heard of A-lum-rite or Durafix before? Or used either
of these products?

I found some info on the web and it sounds like it should work.
I called Linweld and they do not carry them, can anyone tell me
where to buy these at?

 

An update on the epoxy or JB weld idea.

The surface of aluminum, when cut or sanded, instantly oxidizes
when air hits it. This oxidization film prevents anything from
adhering to the aluminum. The only way to get something to
stick to it is to scuff it and apply the adhesive in an oxygen free
environment. Yea right

Aircraft manufacturers use and acid based primer which etches
into the aluminum and dries into an acceptable surface coating
for epoxy adhesion. Yea right again.

 

Fiberglass resin.

I was thinking of this same idea about a week before you posted, swap.

I was gonna cut out both sides of the runerns however, and simply wrap fiberglass cloth around them, and resin it up.

the Fiberglass resin should stick to the ally, it sticks to almost anything else.

ANd what, Don't you have a Nitrogen Bath at home ?

 

Resin probably won't stick. I have tried JB weld, Lock-Tite weld
and Devcon. Simply tried to stick two pieces of aluminum together
with a 1/4 inch overlap. I filed the areas clean and roughed them
up with emmery cloth then cleaned them with carburator cleaner
then smeared the weld compound on each piece then stuck
them together.

I waited two days then picked them up and snaped them apart
with my fingers. The weld compound pops off the aluminum with
not much effort.

Pissed me off.

 

welding or brazing is gonna be the only way to do it right. Welding is gonna be a pain in the a$$, because instead of laying a bead down, you'll have to make a series of alot of small stitch welds to keep the heat out of the material, and also wet the peice down with a damp rag to pull heat out. A tig or Mig(with a spool gun) should work ok, but it will be a long process. I'm not too sure about the brazing, but I've seen that as a pretty common practice, I just don't know where you get the rods. Also, make sure you bolt the runner to a fixture, to keep the whole piece from flexing and changing shape....It would be a bummer to finally get it all welded up, then not be able to bolt it all together.Hope that helps at all

 

I have welded sheet metal with a wire feed mig using the stich and cool with water method. Yeah, it does take a while. I didn't know you can weld alum. with a mig. What is a spool gun? Do you need special tips and special gas?
I might give this a try.
Thanks,
J

 

I have a 200 miller and a little 110 volt Lincoln. I was going to try
and use one or the other but it seems the aluminum wire is too
soft to feed through the hose assy. You need a fully teflon lined
tube which is major dollars and even then the wire bunches up
inside the tube if it is not kept straight.

You use Argon for the sheilding gas.

This is a spool gun, You hook the power leads, and trigger control
to your welder and the gas hose to your argon regulator.

 

I have the whole intake on the bench so I will bolt the whole thing
together to do the outside and make up some kind of a jig to do
the rest of it.

My Linweld sales guy called me late today and he found a demo
spool gun for $300, the same model# he priced me $900 for the
other day. It has never been used, just a floor display.

He says it is too much for 1/8" material, generaly used for 1/4"
or thicker. He was trying to talk me into a TIG but for that I could
buy a complete mini-ram setup. LOL

I don't know what the hell to do now. Buy a set of LTR's and say
screw it or what.

A buddy of mine has a TIG so I may just let him try it and if he
screws it up I'll get the LTR's.

 

On the other hand, you can do a lot more later on down the road with a new TIG machine, than you can with a superram, eh?

Tools=investment with delayed gratification
Parts=instant gratification with limited future returns

When I mentioned that I had a similar idea, it was of cutting both sides and fabbing the aluminum side pieces like someone else mentioned.

Also, when someone else mentioned fiberglass, obviously the fiberglass won't stick to the aluminum, but if it's completely encasing the aluminum tubing so that the tubing is only acting as a "skeleton", then sticking doesn't matter. It's own rigidity should make it keep it's shape with the runner skeleton helping keeping things where they should be, as well as a solid flange to bolt up to and support the plenum. Carbon fiber would be an even better choice (think of the LS1 intakes: some type of plastic composite).

 

Not that i don't believe you about the instant oxidation, BUT, this was a flawed experiment that doesn't convince me of anything yet. You see, carb cleaner always leaves an oily residue. I never use it to clean anything that i need to stick something to for that very reason. Brake cleaner is a much more suitable solvent for parts that need to be truly clean.

 

Yes, only use good laquer thinner(automotive not Wal-Mart) or brake clean. Always keep in mind the clorinated kind is flammable. I prefer laquer thinner.
J

 

Actually I used Brake Kleen. I can redoo it with with good thinner.
I have some PPG laquer thinner here. I will try to redoo it tonight
if I have time after I yank a 99 Caravan tranny out.

Damn Chryslers anyway.

 

I'm just giving you a hard time cuz i'm going to be patching that intake i went through on pretty soon and i was still planning on using epoxy putty or similar. Thus i'm trying to block out negatives on that plan, lol.
Seriously though, give it a try again w/ a 'clean' solvent to be sure and let us know. Maybe i will be getting this thing welded after all...

 

Technically, you could simply fill a fishtank or osmeting w/ argon and do it inside of that...

Argon is heavier than both nitrogen or oxygen, So you should be able to displace all the O2 long enough to sand it down real fast and get the epoxy on

 

I like the fish tank idea, that's funny. But I will do it over with
solvent this weekend and report on it Tuesday after it has set
for a couple of days, I hope it works.

I am half tempted to cut the runners out of the headers and have
a machine shop duplicate the headers from 1/4" steel then have
some 1-3/4 tubing mandrel bent to the same radius as the
runners then cut them in half longways to get the sides then
make the inside and outside flats, jig it all up and weld it all
together. Wouldn't that be a hoot?

Does anybody make a fully siamesed runner set thats like one
big oval?

I hate to give up but when shops that make money welding
things together for a living tell me no way, what the he** do
you do?

 

On a good note though, I bought another used base for $35
today. If anything else, this stuff is worth about 50 cents a pound
when I retire. I am going to make a self centering cutting bore to
run through the base ports, what size should I cut them to?
I am thinking of 1.65". Does anybody have calculations for hole
size to cfm flow?

 

swap, since you have the mig, you can rent a bottle of the gas mix thats special to doing alum welding, I dont remember what the mixture is but when I bought my welder and the argon bottle for it, the guy was telling me about being able to get the alum bottle and a spool of wire for it, works a lot like welding steel with the argon gas, but like you said its all stitch welding and cooling. its not hard to warp stuff with these things, trust me I know from experience!

 

I don't think i'm following you here. Do you mean to say that you want to overbore a stock base? 2 problems w/ that plan. 1, the base runners are only round for the first part of the trip, then it opens into a rectangle to interface the head. 2, there is very little available material to even try to open it up. IMO you won't be able to rmeove any significant amount of material to make it worthwhile. Remember you have to leave a decent amount of material so that the intake doesn't crack over time w/ heat cycling. Thin brittle metal doens't tolerate that very well.