Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums Modifications Duratec Performance Terry Q again. The "restriction"

I think we could just use the lower IM and make a header style plate(out of thick plastic) that the tubes could be laminated into. Most plastics can be heated and bent to the shape we want. I could be treated just like designing an exhaust header but with plastic. I just wonder which material that we could use to start with that could take the heat, be workable, and cost nothing.
yeah right.

warmonger

I'm thinking the only type of "plastic" safe to use would be like an ABS resin mold plastic and that's not end user shape-able.

PVC style plastic gives off fumes when it gets past a certain temperature. Not a viable option.

The tubular steel design would work great, just the time involved in designing & fabricaing such a piece would be temendous. PER PIECE... Still would be worth it IMO though!

what about if you used fiber reinforced polyester resin? otherwise known as bondo.

DeamonSVT- There are all sorts of high temp resins (2 and 3 parts) that are ok for 400-500+ temps and easy(ish) to work with before it sets. Cost is $100-$150 gallon for good quality fresh mix.

How hot is this going to get (max)??

Do you know of any other co. that ever made one of plastic?

John-

jjwoz@yahoo.com

Can we make 100 on this thread? As for your ? about how hot, when the car is running, temps shouldn't exceed 250 degrees F. If they do, your oil will start to coke. Synthetics are a little better here, but exceeding 250 is not good. The problem is what are the temps when the engine is shut down and there's no oil/water cooling flow through the motor. I don't think you'd want to have your intake melt into the heads. GM has been using plastic intakes on their 3.8 motors for almost 10 years now. Anyone know what it's made out of?

I am trying to think of where plastic gets used in the airplanes at work. There are a few locations that use flexible connections between ducting and they use fiberglass impregnated with high temp. silicone and they are supposed to be able to with stand 400 deg. F.

Friend of mine is a plumber and he says that it is becomming popular to build hot water home heating systems with PVC, and then switch to copper at the radiators and near the furnace. So I would figure that it would at least be able to handle 200 deg. F, since hot water heat ususally runs water temps between 160 and 190.

I think polycarbonite (lexan) has a temp. resistance of a few hundred degrees.

I would say to just use aluminum, its fairly easy to work with, inexpensive and will withstand the temps. After all Ford used aluminum on the upper IM.

Okay... You asked for it...

Now who's going to build the mold to use the "resin" in eh?

No possible way to hand shape an intakes inner diameters & bends.

Even if you started with a waxed based model of the tube designs, you would have to be a near perfect sculpturer to render them exact enough to make just ONE resin manifold.

Do you get where I'm going with this?

I know there are products viable (heat resistant) to make it out off. Just how do you go about creating a mold.

I could even get my cousins company to make a computer designed one-off mold, but the cost is in the thousands. (I've checked! Trust me! :D) Even if I did the design modeling myself the machine time is astronomic (per unit) just to make one "resin" rendering.
To make an actual mold it's more so and then find a shop to actually cast the pieces from the mold...

Could you make your money back. Most likely if it sold enough units, but like any custom project the initial cash outlay is significant!

Which brings us back to mandrel piping tubular design with silicone connectors.

I too would prefer a "resin/plastic" manifold for it's superior resistance to heat transfer. However thin wall tubing will retain much less heat then the stock thick wall (and coated) aluminum manifold.

Why not use header tubing with a heat resistant (ceramic) coating? Is that do-able?

Yes!

What sizes and configurations is that available in. Mandrel 90's, 60's, 45's, tubing diameter, etc...

You could machine the mounting flanges. (I've seen that ability )

Lots of Purasil coupler and you could play around with it without welding.

Make me up one. I'll try it out for you...

Thats casting of plastics is to difficult and expensive and that is why I was hoping that there are tubes out there that could be bought and then heated and bent into place. I already considered steel, but that was only in case there are no plastics available.
I suppose a coated steel manifild would be fine, especially with thin walls and it would be very durable. Still it is just too much of a PITA to do right now. If one of you does it then I will definitely be interested.

warmonger