Nuts, Bolts and rocker cover Cleanup.

[Archtects]

I Try to keep my engine bay relatively clean and tidy. After finally getting 5 mins to my self I changed my spark plugs to find the rocker was a bit of a mess. Very grotty. I also found one of the bolts holding the Inlet on was broken. Have a feeling someone did it up to tight.

I need to change ht leads and am thinking about changing gasket at some point as well. Anyone tried ptfe one? Found one but it worth doing?

Does anyone know what the size is for the bolts for the Inlet? The bolts on the air box look a bit rusty to id like to change them as long as they don't cost £28 or something daft. I'd Imagine a few bolts from screw fix would do. I know about the slam thingy bots. I have some of them already.

Painting the rocker cover? I've seen a few painted, is that removed? Or just painted with a brush. I can't see removing it being easy, And how do you paint the engine mount cover bit, not sure what it's actually called. Left of the rocker. I'm sorry it's alot of questions.

Thanks in advance people.

 

[Jamess182]

I changed my spark covers and painted my rockers & inlet just the other day. I sprayed the inlet mani, but paint the rocker in situ mate, just with a brush. You can't remove it as it pins the cams in place. I used high temp brake paint. Not the neatest job in the world but looks far better than before.

I also managed to snap the head off one the inlet bolts as well, funnily enough. Seems they're made out of paper mache! They're just a standard 10mm bolt but need a bit of length to them, I had a s**t load of them knocking around after breaking my old 106 GTi.

Heard from a friend that the ptfe gaskets work really well in keeping the engine cooler, maybe wrong about this?

Good luck, let us know how you get on.

 

[Budgie]

Heard from a friend that the ptfe gaskets work really well in keeping the engine cooler, maybe wrong about this?

Yeah, very wrong. They won't improve cooling at all.

Nothing wrong with the standard inlet mani gaskets. They either leak or they don't.

 

[Archtects]

@James172C dude your engine looks well nice. I don't have a fuel line cover atm. Did you take of all of the manifold off including the underside bit that fits to the block?

How did you paint the bit next to the rocker? On the left. Engine mount bit was that just paintbrush to.

I've got hightemp silver spray paint. But people I know used standard rattle can in the manifold. I'm still not decided on what color I want. I'm torn between standard silver and a darker grey for manifold. I might go with a grey Inlet + side engine bit and then silver rocker.
Cheers when I finally get round to it I'll share some images.

 

[Jamess182]

Yeah, very wrong. They won't improve cooling at all.

Nothing wrong with the standard inlet mani gaskets. They either leak or they don't.

Fair play.

@James172C dude your engine looks well nice. I don't have a fuel line cover atm. Did you take of all of the manifold off including the underside bit that fits to the block?

How did you paint the bit next to the rocker? On the left. Engine mount bit was that just paintbrush to.

I've got hightemp silver spray paint. But people I know used standard rattle can in the manifold. I'm still not decided on what color I want. I'm torn between standard silver and a darker grey for manifold. I might go with a grey Inlet + side engine bit and then silver rocker.
Cheers when I finally get round to it I'll share some images.

Manifold is just one piece mate. 3 bolts at the front, 2 at the back iirc.
I cheated and just painted the engine mount in situ with a brush- again not the neatest job just got to take your time.
People say normal paint is fine, but I went with VHT just to be on safe side. And I can pick it up just as cheap anyway!
Also , a word of warning, don't trap the HT leads under the inlet mani when re-fitting, it will likely cause a misfire. I did this and couldn't work out wtf I'd done wrong. You have to learn one way.

 

[Archtects]

@James172C that's the top half there is a bottom half that does come off. Normal where people connect throttle boddies or ITBS. But I'm assuming you just painted the top Inlet in that case. I'm tempted to just leave the fuel guard off tbh. But I'm debating. I can always buy the bolts. Just another thing to clean up. And paint.

Well cheers I'll get some new 10 mm bolts when I can. Still need some bolts for air box though. They are those cursed hexhead ones. That are very rusty. I might just take them out give a measure and see if I can get anything close

 

[Jamess182]

Ah yeah, I'm with you now. Nah, I didn't both painting the lower half. I like the fuel rail cover but can't imagine it making a huge difference to the look if it was removed.