Derek

Hi tbs Nice work! I have the nextengine scanner as well and I'm blown away at the quality I'm getting with my scans. I'm using it mostly on ornamental railing parts that are more organic in nature than engine parts. I may need to upgrade my computer though as it seems to take a while to do things like fuse and such. I upgraded to the pro version of the software so I can output iges surfaces to rhino and that was a big improvment. What are you running for a computer? Derek

Thanks for the compliments on the pics but it's really a case of the camera taking great shots. I bought a Nikon D50 DSLR when they first came out and and was just blown away by the quality of the shots compared to my more expensive (when I bought it) Olympus 3030. Up until now I've only used it to document my work. I tweaked the color saturation settings in the camera for these shots in order to give them a more vivid color. Yea it was great meeting you too Jeff. It's really great to see younger guys taking an interest in the early S30 cars. Yea the manifold does look sick I just wish it looked done!! I did leave the show re-energized (how could you not?) and hope to have the first casting done in the next few weeks. I can't remember the screen name of the guy who owns the dark blue Z but he is a Hybrid member. Maybe Jeff's memory is better than mine. Derek

Well I made the trek over to Daytona and I must say it was well worth the trip. There was some great looking cars there. The weather was a little moist to say the least. And I got to meet a few hybrid members as well. So all and all it was a great day. Here's 2 links to the pics I shot. I'm no photographer but the shots turned out ok. Derek http://www.flickr.com/gp/14460162@N07/or1o2e http://www.flickr.com/gp/14461168@N07/64598w

My guess is they got tacked really well during assembly and never got the final pass. They just broke too perfectly to have been full welded. Derek

Here's a link to The lnfo I received from them http://forums.hybridz.org/showthread.php?t=125998 It's at the end De

Sounds great. I'm coming over on Tuesday for the car show. I need some inspiration and drooling over those cars should help. I'm bringing the patterns with me so If you want to check them out let me know. PM me and I'll give you my cell #. Derek

Will deliver to convention or will ship I'm listing this for a friend of mine. Triple Mikuni 44 carbs Intake manifold Velocity stacks K&N air filters Chrome fuel fittings for daisy chain arrangement as well as single inlet fittings Owners manual Carbs have been in storage for 10 years but are currently on a running car. ( he's removing them this weekend) $1300.00 firm Derek

No problem. Any of those friends in Ocala know anything about Meggasquirt Derek

Nothing good to update. My business picked up considerably which is a good thing for my finances but a bad thing for my extra curricular activities! I'm in the middle of a very large project that should leave me with enough time and money to finish the patterns and castings. Then comes the scary part. The EFI stuff. This is definitely not a dead project but it's going to take a lot longer (they always do) than I thought. See the trick to pulling off big projects is to under estimate your time by about 90 percent, otherwise these things would seem impossible. Thanks for the interest Derek

Anyone have any idea what the start times are for the events? I'm mostly interested in the car show. I looked here http://flza.com/agenda.htm but there are no times listed. Thanks Derek

Well at the rate I'm going on my patterns I'm sure you'll have me beat as well. Great work!!! Derek

Thanks Paul your timing is perfect. I was hosting my pictures on my earthlink account and I'm changing providers. I followed your instructions and it worked like a charm. Great work Derek

Well I managed to get a little more work done on the patterns. Unfortunately work keeps getting in the way. I hate when that happens. This is the top side of the front manifold. I switched from corian as the pattern material to urethane tooling board. It carves a lot faster than the corian and it's a lot easier to work with. This is a shot of the roughing cut with a 1/2†cutter. Here's a shot of the finished piece after about 12 hours of machining. The square blocks on top of the throttle shaft bosses are so I can locate the center of the boss for machining. After I have the manifold casting clamped in the mill I'll map out the location of each block with an edge finder and then use that data to program in the machine ops. At this point I'm going to finish up the core box for the front manifold and go ahead and cast and machine it. This way If I have to make some changes I'll only have to modify one pattern. Derek

I use bees wax for saw blades, spray cooking oil (Pam) for sanding disks and Tap magic for aluminum on burrs. The wax on burrs has a tendency to load up the tool. Derek

I'm not familiar with that method to enlarge the pattern. But there's a lot about pattern making I'm not familiar with!!! All of my plates and core boxes are indexed so I can get them back in the machine quickly. I then re carve only the area's that need work. If its a large fix like when I totally screw up (yea it happens) It's usually quicker to start over with fresh material. I have 2 CNC machines and I don't mind running them 24 hours straight so I tend to let the machines do the work if I can. Plus they do a much better job than I could. I'd starve as a pattern maker If I had to do it by hand. Derek

I think I'll stop working on my manifold and start making a pattern for a valve cover!!! Derek

http://www.smooth-on.com/ Is what I use. Derek

Thanks Yea shrink can be a real problem. Sand casting metal is still a black art. There are many areas that can affect the size of the part. I usually use 3/16†per foot for shrinkage. Old school “saw and sand†pattern makers use shrink rules that are oversize rulers. I simply scale my model in 3D space and I'm good to go. Hitting all six ports on the first try with a single manifold would be tough. On something like that I would put in extra money to adjust the core box after we poured a few. This is why I'm casting mine in two separate pieces. I also made the final diameter where the port meets the head a little smaller. I'm going to machine a jig plate out of steel that will match the ports and bolt pattern of the head. I'll clamp that to the manifold and use it to drill the mounting holes and match the ports. If I cast anymore manifolds to sell I'll adjust the core boxes accordingly. Most patterns need a little adjustment after the first pour. I do a lot of replacement parts for old cigar making machinery. The plans I get are from the 40's. I'll make the pattern exactly like the print and the final part will always be off a little. I think there were a lot of changes made on machines back then that were never reflected on the plans. Probably a case of the machinist walking over to the pattern maker and saying “ move this boss over .050†and never telling engineering! Derek

I've been abusing a Syncrowave 250 that I bought used about 15 years ago and it's never missed a beat. Derek

Hi Sven I would normally charge around $5000.00 minimum for a set of tooling of this complexity. Probably more considering I'm doing all of the concept and design work as well. But everything is relative in that I'll have a ton of time in this before I'm finished. I'm lucky in that I have enough free time on the machines that I can sneak it in a little at a time. Fortunately the first set of castings are free because I'm friends with the foundry. After that I'm not sure what they're going to charge. Before I started doing patterns I assumed I needed to pour my own metal because none of the foundries would want to mess with me. Then I came to find that there are quite a few small foundries that are more than happy to pour small runs. Especially if you pay cash! The only thing is they can be leery of working with novice pattern makers. If he gives you a price on a piece and they have to ram it up 3 or 4 times just to get a good mold they're not going to be very happy. Most small foundries are hurting right now so you won't have much trouble finding one that will work with you. Derek

Thanks I used a 1/4†ball mill for the finish pass. I used Rhino to design the part and Visual Mill for the cam programing. Derek

That's great Tony The most important thing to look at is “are they pouring scrap or ingotâ€. If there's piles of old wheels and pots and pans around then use caution. The two main foundries I work with use nothing but virgin ingot. This plays a big part in end quality and machineability. Nothing worse than putting a few hours into finishing a casting only to hit a piece of crap. Derek

Here is the pattern after the finish passes. Your looking at about 7 hours of machining time just for the finish machining. You CNC types out there might be interested to know there's over 300,000 lines of code! I still need to fill and sand a couple spots but I'm really pleased with the way it turned out. I'll rework my cutting strategies for the top sides so I have a better finish. Here's a shot of the bosses. The large one is for the throttle shaft bearing. The smaller ones on either side of it are for the idle air bleed fittings and the outer ones are for a heat shield. I put drill points on the smaller ones because I don't plan on doing a bottom setup on the machining so I'll use a hand drill on those. Derek PS You may notice the Corian colors don't match the first picture. Well I had a bit of a problem with a cutter and it was just easier to start all over.

Your looking at the bottom of the front manifold. This is the final roughing cut ready for the finish passes. The pattern is mounted to a sacrificial bottom plate. I'm using corian scraps (free) for the pattern material. Derek

I would second what het976 says. Although I haven't installed my stuff yet I did a ton of research and came up with the same conclusions. Rick was a great guy to deal with ant the price was great. Derek