Turbo accessories,

By Bob Legere.

Well, thanks to our own oldopelguy's ideas,
I fabricated a custom breather tube off the side cam cover of the head.
I used a piece of radiused 1.75" tubing, and cut out a stock cam cover.
This part will eventually be chrome plated, so I polished them before welding to make the plater's job a little easier later on.

At the top of the breather, I fitted a piece of 18 ga. sheetmetal.
Onto this I still need to weld a -10AN fitting in place for the breather hose.

I then welded the top cap in place....

Finally the tube was welded to the cam cover.
I still need to grind the welds better and polish it some more, but it's taking shape now.

Yea, I know, blasphemy.
Okay, I sanded the 'OPEL' letters off, but I thought it just cleans up the look of the valve cover nicely.
I'll be powdercoating the valve cover in lieu of polishing or plating, so I decided to smooth things out.
In addition, the breather holes in the side will be filled and smoothed over to match the other side of the cover.

I also sanded off the bumps at the rear of the cover.
Of course, this broke through to the bolt holes within, but I'll just weld them up and sand it smooth again

Some of the parts ready for the chrome shop.
Also have the intake manifold and the distributor, plus some NPT>to>barb brass fittings that are getting plated.

One of the 'improvements' I'm attempting is smoothing out the valve cover.
Here's a 'patch' I made from .060" aluminum, it'll get welded to the side of the valve cover, capping the stock breather holes.

My valve cover patch in position.
Didn't get to weld it in plae tonight, I want to put some pipe plugs into the stock breather holes first,
Otherwise this area will become a 'trap' for oil.
Gotta hit the hardware store in the morning...

Some of the thermostat housing tweaks.
Relocated the OEM temp sender, added a t-fitting with the temp sender for the ECU, and heli-coiled the bolt holes too.

I made up a couple of t-fittings for the heater hoses.
I'll only be utilizing one of them, but figured I'd make a spare just in case.
Used normal 1/2" ID copper plumbing fittings, ran a bead with my new tubing beader on the ends of all the tubes.
Fits inside 5/8" ID heater hose perfectly, cost about $1.00 each to make.

The finished t-fittings, soldered together.
They're going to be chrome plated too.

My alternator of choice for this project, a GM one-wire 80 amp unit.
Powdercoated red to compliment the other red powdercoated components that will soon adorn the engine compartment.

Originally Posted by BQS4
Bob;
What is the part # of that alt?
In red, it's MGM-7127RSW, it cost $99.95 from Summit Racing.
They also have blue, black, orange, purple (Wayne are you listening?), and yellow.
The part numbers change accordingly with the color.

The alternator brackets were completed, upper and lower, for the GM alternator.
The modified upper alternator bracket.
I cut a stock Opel bracket down, and welded a curved GM alternator bracket to it.
This is necessary because of the 'clocking' of the GM alternator's upper mount, it's further away that the Opel's Bosch alternator.
I have custom brass mounts here too.
They keep the alternator from oscillating at higher rpms, which I've seen happen with the original rubber mounts.
This can cause premature belt failure.

I started with a GM universal upper alternator bracket, which was then cut down and welded to a cut-down stock Opel bracket.
I needed to use the curved bracket to keep the GM alternator from hitting the distributor.
The stock Opel lower bracket is used, but I have to grind a little bit of the bracket for clearance,
And I have my own lower bushings custom made from delrin with a 3/8" ID hole
And with the corrected offset for proper pulley alignment.

As it turns out, the lower mount did not have to be ground at all to fit this particular alternator.
This is odd, as every other GM alternator I've installed required some grinding to fit. I can only attribute this to the brand.
Still, the lower mount needs new bushings,
I have custom delrin bushings that are offset to center the pulley correctly,
And they have a 3/8" ID to fit the larger bolt required for the GM alternator.

No chance to update yesterday's progress last night,
I was at my friend's chrome shop late dropping off the parts to be plated.
While I was there, I decided to polish a bunch of aluminum parts....boy I forgot how dirty and grimy that work was!
Props to my friend Dan at Allied Metal Finishing for promising a quick turnaround and allowing me access to his buffing machines.

Closeup of the turbo compressor housing after polishing and buffing.
And here's the surge tank/expansion tank after polishing and buffing.

It was like Christmas today, I got all the parts back fom the plater.

So, what did I get done today?
Not a lot frankly, I jumped from piece to piece but didn't finish anything fully.
Another few steps closer I suppose, regardless.
I decided to make a short throw shifter for the Getrag 240.
I shifted the fulcrum point by 3/4", which will reduce the throw substantially.

In order to fit the short-throw shifter in the limited space created when a Getrag 240 is modified to fit a Manta A,
I had to move the pivot ball higher up within the shift tower.
This was acomplished by cutting the pivot ball housing, and moving it up 3/4" using some 2.5" tubing as a spacer.

It would have gone smoothly,
Except the person who originally shortened the shift tower to fit a Manta A used bondo (!) to smooth out the welds,
Plus some really funky primer and paint.
In short, it made my job of welding the shift tower spacer a real bear,
Since the weld was contaminated from the get-go by body filler in all the seams.
I should have MIG welded it it turns out, because using a TIG was a real issue.
Eventually it got done, but not before welding, grinding, rewelding.....

Finished Getrag short-throw shifter after welding and bending.
Next to a stock shifter for comparison.

Originally Posted by BQS4
Bob;
Did you thread the end of the shifter to accept that new rod?
Yup! Heated and bent the stock lower shifter further back and towards the driver some more, then added the extension.

The new Sparco shift knob came in today.
I will still have to cut down the shifter extension once fitted to the car.

Originally Posted by BQS4
Bob;
Two questions about the shifter as I'm about to do two of these at the same time, and they are both going into a Manta & Sportwagon. how much further back did you bend the shifter, in order for it to mimic the stock 4-spd? Also, how long of an extension did you use?
Thanks,
Gene
I honestly have no idea on either count.
I mimicked the stock shifter location by clamping it to the edge of a counter while seated, and reached for it.
I then bent the other shifter until it had a more natural angle to it to fit my reach. Maybe another 10 degrees?
As far as the shifter extension,
I made it extra long (about 10-12"?), it will be cut to fit when the car owner shows up and I can test fit it in the car.

Made a sheet metal cover for the open holes in the distributor housing.