Shiney engine?

[B.Martin]

Right, some of you know i\'ve finally got my FC. Also some of you will know that i love neat looking, shiney engine bays! We can now presume that my engine has never seen polish in its 22 years of existence and has become stained etc on the metal - please see image below:-



Now i went at it with some autosol, just to see what kind of result that would get and it was minimal as i expected not even worth posting a picture of the result. Now with my last car i used some glass paper to get the crap off it and take it back to metal, then polished it. I forget for the life of me which numbers of the paper i used!

Basically i want my engine bay to look like this:-
(picture stolen from geenidee, hope he doesn\'t mind)



What i\'m asking for is the best advice as to how to get my engine plenum? To look like his, because frankly it looks awesome! Also bare in mind i don\'t want to be taking the engine out etc, i might if i\'m feeling brave remove the intercooler as in theory i shouldn\'t be able to break anything!

Hope you can help me.

Ben

[GeenIdee]

i do mind.
 
 
 
.. lol,
 
Just posted up in my topic, i cleaned it with a brush and things and put a few layers of motip engine paint on it.
 
But i was changing a lot last winter so i had it all out so it was an easy job.
 

 

[m1tch]

Intercooler is held on with 2 jubaliee clips and 2 bolts not that hard to remove, also will give you a chance to check under it with regards to any split hoses in the vac spider

[Prof]

Intercooler is held on with 2 jubaliee clips and 2 bolts not that hard to remove, also will give you a chance to check under it with regards to any split hoses in the vac spider

Your\'s is - I think Ben has 4 bolts to undo.
 
I used a HyperClean to get the oily crap off first, then a Dremmel with a brass brush, then some 180 and 400 grit paper - decided not to polish but painted the upper inlet manifold with Halfords High temp paint (grey/silver finish).
 
I also did mine with the engine out.
 
Once the Intercooler is off, 5 bolts hold the upper inlet manifold on the engine - along with a bunch of vac pipes, and some water pipes (BAC valve and Throttle body) - these could be taken off without removing the engine - but there\'s a lot of pipes to remember to put back - plus a few eletrical connectors - TPS, and Inlet Air Temp sensor - can\'t remember what else.

[B.Martin]

Yeah maybe I\'ll just try and polish what can be seen wen the tmic I\'d removed, cheers for the advice on which grit\'s to use. Thanks all

[Grant Monkhouse]

Get yourself a mains/230v drill, a wire brush piece of eBay, this will remove all the crap first. Then buy some sanding/polishing bits to go in the drill. the drill will be better than a crappy dremel IMO. higher rpm.

I would take the IC off to make it easier to move the drill around in the engine bay.

Or go on the good old ebay and buy a polished UIM and swap it over?

[Ada7]

I\'ve done a thread on polishing somewhere on here if you do a search. Will say that it would be a lot easier to take bits off to do them rather than whilst on the engine. Saves you breaking your back to

Adam

[B.Martin]

Yeah maybe i should consider my options again, problem is i don\'t want to buying drills, dremels or other power tools as frankly i don\'t know how long i\'ll be staying in Cyprus and chances are i could be throwing cash down the drain. Really appreciate all the advice however and will look into removing the IC and having a look to make sure i can\'t break anything before i get to work on making things shiney, perhaps i\'ll fit my hoses and BOV first see how i get on with that before i attempt the intercooler removal :Giggle

Cheersw guys