Recent content by promethean-in-fl

Don't have a bench grinder, but I do have a rotary buffer. An expander wheel is a rubber wheel? You are suggesting it would be possible to recreate the original texture on the smoothed casting line area to match the rest of the part, making it unnecessary to work on the whole part to get a...

Thanks for the thorough suggestions. How does an expander wheel compare to the process you laid out? I'm not going past 300 or 400 if that. I didn't mind the current texture. It's the parts that look like they were done blindfolded with a trowel that are causing me to work on it. So far I've...

I'm replacing the original cast iron exhaust risers on my boat engine and would like to improve the appearance of the new risers by eliminating this crude line down the centerline of the top of the risers. My originals were manufactured 26 years ago much cleaner; they have a very narrow, uniform...

Did they use a right hand or left hand drill bit?

Having a nut welded on was going to be my next move, but it turned out to be unnecessary.

To be clear, I first heated the surrounding manifold with a Wagner HT1000 heat gun set to high. I later heated it to a higher temperature with a Bernzomatic propane torch. In both cases, I monitored the temperature of the surrounding manifold with a Raytek MT-6 Infrared Thermometer that I...

Or flaws in my information. I went back and checked that broken bolt head. It has no radial markings on the head. It's a Grade 2 bolt from Midwest Fastener that I temporarily substituted for the stock bolt while I was putting together a temporary test assembly and didn't want to clean up the...

How much PB Blaster and beeswax is left on the female threads after chasing them and blasting them with carb cleaner and compressed air? Are you referring to the anti-seize suggestion?

I did that on the first manifold and forgot to in my haste assembling this second manifold for testing. Probably contributed to the difficulty in removing the broken bolt. Just finished chasing the threads on this second manifold. Bolts run in and out by finger now.

I decided to take one more pass at it myself. I double nutted the exposed threads. Using a propane torch, I heated the surrounding manifold to about 250 deg F measured with my IR temperature gun. I braced the manifold against the ground and broke the bolt loose with a closed end wrench...

If the cast iron manifold around the bolt should be heated, does anyone know to about what temperature? This exhaust manifold is 26 years old and has the boat manufacturer name cast into it. You can't buy them new anymore. Only without the name. So I want to keep the manifold.

Well, mechanically inclined enough to be in the engine section on a manufacturer-specific forum for direct drive boats which has everyone in it from people deciding which oil to use in an oil change to people who have rebuilt the engines. I asked the first couple of them who suggested a machine...

I suspect this Grade 5 3/8"-16 new steel bolt bottomed out in this blind hole in this old cast iron marine exhaust manifold and was torqued until the bolt head sheared off. I've read quite a bit on here about bolt extraction techniques. Based on that, I'm inclined to go the route of welding on...

What about cleaning out NPT threads? On my cast iron exhaust manifold, a nylon elbow threads into a 3/4 NPT hole in the manifold. I don't know anybody who has gotten one to unscrew. Like others I've spoken to with this marine exhaust manifold, I cut off the elbow, used a hack saw blade to...

I bought Lang 2581 - 26-PC. THREAD RESTORER TAP AND DIE SET, which is SAE only. So far, I've used it on the head bolt threads on one side of the engine block. Seems to be working great.