Week #147

I pulled out the small brackets that bolt down to, and are painted with, the intake. A quick survey showed I was missing a wire loom thingy that is in place on the front drivers side of the motor when painted. It took a few days hunting but I found the correct loom bracket on eBay. NOW, with the intake goodies all there I installed the intake for good and took some time to tape up all the openings... I had a feeling this motor wouldn't be painted as soon as I had thought.

Way back whenever when I bought the heads the "package deal" I got included several things like the throttle and return spring bracket, spark plug tubes, motor mount brackets and a set of HEMI pullies. Unfortunately the crank pully I had was for a power steering equiped car... this was not. I had to buy a single grove pully from an aftermarket vendor. Oh yea... I needed a water pump too. A test fit of the waterpump, crank and fan pullies showed they lined up perfect. All was well.

Just about everything is bolted to a HEMI when it's painted. This includes the exhaust manifolds, one rear heat riser tube, motor mount plates and mounts. Next was the test fitting of the exhaust manifolds and rear tube. A problem arose right off the bat with bolting on the manifold. The surface that the large special wacher is to mate to on the manifold was not big enough or flat enough. I had to take a few minutes to carefully grind down a flat area big enough for the washer to sit. With that done it was on to the heat tube. No, it didn't fit very well... but I was able to bang on it enough to get it to seat into place as the manifold is bolted down.

After mounting the oil pump I got into bolting on the motor mount brackets. From the sources I have it seems that these brackets are mounted to the block using studs and nuts... which I didn't have. Looking around the room I spotted those cheesy head bolts that I had chosen not to use. They where the perfect size and tread type! I simply cut the threaded portions off of 6 bolts, paired them up with some good looking nuts and flat washers and vola!!... stud attached brackets! Hows that for no waste. The only issue with the brackets was a clearance problem with the oil pump. I had no choice but to radius out a small area for clearance.

I left the motor like that without the ehaust manifolds installed. My plan is to paint them with cast colored high temp manifold coating before bolting them in place to be painted. I also realized I'm missing a hanger/strap thing at the rear of the block that holds the positive battery cable up off the drivers exhaust manifold. I haven't decided if I'm going to buy a repop of this strap or just make one that does the job... this spending money thing is getting real old.