I have never polished anything before and i saw a guy polish his intake maifold, and the lettering on his valve cover... he said he used a soft grinding wheel and then sanded it 400 1000 2000 grit sand paper, well sounds easy enough but i was just wondering if anyone has any techniques (sp?) that would help me out... i have a few extra parts laying around and wanted to learn this, thanks, also i hear about people porting their intake manifols and tb's and i wanted to know if anyone had a write-up or and hints or techniques on how to do that, thanks alot

Polishing the exterior of the intake manifold is a very labor-intensive project. You will have to be very patient if you want to get the best results and finish. I would advise you get a flex attachment for your Dremel tool and a variety of sanding bits. Don't worry about the finer shit for now. Just get a bunch of coarse grinder/sander bits and work the thing from end to end. I've also seen people have good results taking the larger surface areas to a wire wheel on a bench grinder. It's all in the steps and attention to detail.

As for the performance porting, if you're really new to this, I would highly suggest sending your spare TB and manifold to either Exile Racing or Eddy Fierro for professional porting. There is a bit of art to it, and the power comes from improving flow. This is a combination of volume and velocity. You just hog it out in there, you will lose power. Besides, polishing the outside will keep you busy enough! Let the pros do the subtle, internal port work to save you some time.

thanks for the info, i think the porting thing will definatly wait till i have a lot more knowledge about that, but the polishing thing i would like to try, i think i might try my extra intake manifold, i have a friend who has like 30 and he said i can practice on some of them if i want. thanks again, and if anyone else wants to add any tips about it then please do, i can use all the help i can get...thanks alot

Where can I get more info on Exile Racing or Eddy Fierro, I just "hogged" mine out so I probably fucked it up and lost power. How much do they charge to do this?

I think its around $130 or so; check the exile website!

buy a porting kit from summitracing.com (about 40-50$)

and use a die grinder.....

the dremel will take forever and wont spin fast enough...

i did a full intake mani (upper/lower/TB hole) in 3 sessions of about 2 hours each...

but new gaskets and match em up... (i took a lil off the gasket)...

if you have your exhaust manifold off, you can touch up the head ports a lil as well ;-)

How do you get the IM opening to a perfect 60mm circle? I know about gasket matching and such, but the gasket I have is only about 55mm. Just wondering if there was an easier way besides to keep measuring with a little ruler until enough was removed.

Do you guys know of anywhere where you can buy like longer sanding bit for the dremel. The one they give you is so small and I want to be able to get my tb even all the way around.

Maybe home depot or lowes? I dont know really but thats where i would guess, Walmart might even have them. are you porting you TB then? is it your first time, i was thinking about doing it but not sure if i want to try, you should keep me posted about how that works for ya, pm me or somthing with how good it works for you

Well I actually already "ported and polished" tb. And I guess it went alright, but it didnt turn out the way I wanted. It really takes a lot doing it with just a small dremel sander and sanding by hand. So I checked a place called WW Granger today because they specialize in parts like the longer sanding bit like I need, but for some reason they didnt have it. If you read earlier on in the post I "hogged" mine out if you will so thats why I'm trying to find the exact tools needed to do the best job I can. I'll let you know if I can find a longer sanding bit. The hardest part that I seemed to have was sanding the surface inside even. I dont really know a good way to measure all of it to make sure its the same. If you attempt it yourself let me know if you come onto any good tips or pointers!!

Originally posted by clipse2g95
Well I actually already "ported and polished" tb. And I guess it went alright, but it didnt turn out the way I wanted. It really takes a lot doing it with just a small dremel sander and sanding by hand. So I checked a place called WW Granger today because they specialize in parts like the longer sanding bit like I need, but for some reason they didnt have it. If you read earlier on in the post I "hogged" mine out if you will so thats why I'm trying to find the exact tools needed to do the best job I can. I'll let you know if I can find a longer sanding bit. The hardest part that I seemed to have was sanding the surface inside even. I dont really know a good way to measure all of it to make sure its the same. If you attempt it yourself let me know if you come onto any good tips or pointers!!

I'm not sure what you mean by porting and polishing your TB. the only thing that you can do with a stock TB (and not change the butterfly) is take out the "hump". If you have taken out more, then you have probably F'ed that one up. Though it possibly can be fixed with a bigger butterfly, that is not your question. You can get the bits you need at a welding supply store. It's worth it to get the good carbide bits. My extendo's cost me around $40. Good luck with the porting but you may want to look into having the "experienced" help you out with that. Porting is a practiced labor. While I port and polish my own parts, I have had experience with this. If I was strip racing I would have to go through quite a few parts and get to the flow bench before I was comfortable with my final product.

And to the original poster of this thread, exterior polishing takes A LOT of time and patience but do not be worried that you will hurt performance, it does not affect it at all.
MB

Porting heads is an art, and not for the amateur. If you want to learn what works....

www.theoldone.com

Read everything, then think.

back to the intake manifold porting... would having a larger IM opening than the TB hurt performance? If the throttle body was 55mm and the intake manifold was larger, would it kill some of the velocity?

Yeah your right bulletdsm, I guess I'm not porting it, just as you stated I'm removing the hump and not replacing the butterfly or anything. Was it $40 for a set of bits or just one? I just need one to clean it up a little better?

Originally posted by clipse2g95
Yeah your right bulletdsm, I guess I'm not porting it, just as you stated I'm removing the hump and not replacing the butterfly or anything. Was it $40 for a set of bits or just one? I just need one to clean it up a little better?

$40 for just one extended bit. Match port is always best. But if your IM is bigger than your TB opening then it will not noticeably hurt. Never down size (big opening to smaller). That generates interference. And, again, be sure that you don't touch the area that the butterfly closes on. I also use a sandpaper flapper to polish with. You can get these at the welding supply store also.
MB

if you fellas need porting bits and advice call BC Gerolamy Company, 916 638 9008 or bcheads.com ...they have everything you need and they do cnc porting also if you're really looking for a quality job...chris

there's also a decent article on porting in the sept issue of import tuner, check that out...chris