We had touched upon the flex pipe earlier in this thread. I wanted to mention that I picked up this part from Performance Curve. I figured for the price it was worth checking out and there wasn't anything local to look at. It came today and it looks like a good solid piece. Mine is the 2.5" diameter one. It maintains the diameter all the way thru. The stainless flex portion is a good 1/2" thick. It does not flex much, but there is some give. I'll post pics in a seperate thread once I get the exaust built.

Bob

So it's more for misalignments and not for 90 degree bends?

quote Originally posted by RCR: Not sure if you're kidding or not but to answer your question, No, it's not for bends. The flex section allows the exaust and/or engine to move seperately, thus preventing broken welds and such.

Well they've got this stuff that looks like giant electrical conduit (in fact, I'm sure that's what it is...), and you can make arcs with it... I used a section of it on my exhaust so I can install and remove it...... Otherwise my exhaust would've been permanent

thanks for the update.

on my car i did not leave much room for a flex joint to take up the amount of movement i expect may occur under rotational loads in both directions. my fix is unlikely to work but it was cheap and i will try it first and if it is worthless then i will try something else.

well, I tried the differential compression tester and was somewhat surprised at the results. mostly because I don't know what I am doing...

since i had the cams off of the even side I just tested at the bottom of the cylinder on each of those. this was because I did not have a good method of keeping the engine from turning off of top dead center. keeping in mind that I spiked the valves on number 8 but left the rest untouched they came out like this. (input pressure at 80psi)
2) 58
4) 40
6) 40
8) 68

on the odd bank the cams were still installed so I used a position near tdc and stood on the breaker bar while it was under pressure.
1) 66
3) 56
5) 58
7) 70

hmmmm?

still the only cylinder that obviously had an oil problem was number 8. go figure... the ProVision fiberscope should be enroute as I type this so I will peek inside later this week.

in the meantime the body swap starts taking place...

[This message has been edited by cptsnoopy (edited 05-11-2012).]

You're making a regular ol' frankenstein there...

quote Originally posted by ryan.hess: Body swap??? You're making a regular ol' frankenstein there...

yup, working on that for sure...

I wanted to share a new tool for removing the roof panel from our cars. It is very simple and made the difference in many man-hours of work or worse yet a busted roof panel. I think this may only happen in a hot dry place like Phoenix but it may be the same all over after 18 years. What I am talking about is the windshield molding that is placed around the sides and top of the windshield. I realized right off that the molding needed to be removed because it seemed to be holding down on the edges of the roof panel. When I tried to remove it the molding just broke into lots and lots of small pieces because it was so dry and brittle. I was able to remove the top part the covers the edges of the windshield and the roof panel but the part that goes down into the slot between the windshield and the roof panel remained stuck in place. I then ran a knife down both sides of the molding in an attempt to remove it. It did help a little bit but I think I did more damage than good because I ended up getting a lot of small chips on the edge of the glass. The glass did not crack but I was just lucky. I gave up on trying to remove the rest of the molding and started working on the roof panel. I removed the headliner and all of the nuts and bolts that go into the roof using good info found here on PFF. I was able to raise the rear of the roof panel about 1/4" but that was all. I started working on the front of the panel. After the windshield wipers and the black plastic trim piece were removed I just had to break loose a couple of spots along the front of the windshield where too much windshield glue/sealant had adhered to the roof panel. I tried lifting the A-pillar body part and it was stuck good. I knew about the butyl rope that was holding it down so I went around it with a putty knife and felt pretty confident that I had cut it through. While I was doing that the putty knife was getting pretty gummed up with the butyl material and I found that the product "GOO GONE" worked like a champ to remove the butyl from the knife. So I had a bright idea and started wetting the putty knife with GOO GONE before stabbing it through the butyl rope. It seemed to help a bit. After cutting the butyl rope I was bummed to find that the A-pillar body part was still stuck firmly to the space frame. It appeared that the same glue/sealant used when putting the windshield in had also glued the roof panel all around the top and sides of the windshield. That is where the new "tool" came in handy. I had used a knife earlier all around the roof panel to separate the panel from the glue/sealant but it was apparent that the panel was also stuck to the glue below it and not just from the side facing the windshield. The tool was fashioned with a small cutting tab to cut under the roof panel and free the glue that it was stuck to. I had spent about 4 or 5 hours trying to free up the A-pillars when I finally made the tool. After making the tool it took about 15 minutes to run it all around the sides and top of the windshield and problem solved. The roof panel was quite easy to lift off after that and no broken or cracked A-pillars.

Here are a couple of pictures:
This is what the tool looked like next to the glass. The little tab was under the edge of the roof panel.


This is how the tool was following along under the edge of the panel.


These are the tools used to make the tool. the hose clamp was the material. the file to sharpen the edges before bending the tab.


GOO GONE, good stuff for removing the butyl residue. plan on using and ruining a lot of rags...

[This message has been edited by cptsnoopy (edited 05-11-2012).]