Yesterday The Dude, a TIG-wielding friend and I met for a workshop night of pizza, beer, hammers and welding.
I had just got back from 10 days working in South Africa, which was nice. Coming home straight into this workshop, I may as well have been in the Arctic Circle.
Whilst I was away, a package had arrived from Gray in San Ramon, CA. Gray is the friend that let me park car in his garage back when I bought it from Fresno in November 2012. He is a detail-obsessed maniac from the hot rod old-school, born in Florida back when it was beyond weird. He is one of my favourite people ever.
With the engine nearing completion, Dude and I realised we would soon be in need of some plug wires. Anyone can buy plug wires from Pelican or whatever, for thirty quid or so. Not everyone has a friend who can assemble custom wire sets from a stockpile of NOS Fyrebraid sleeving. But I do, and I love having bits of car made by friends, so I asked him if he could build me a set.
Gray's quest into the psychological wilderness of spark plug wire assembly was as exhaustive as ever. A thousand emails later, I chose a length of Fyrebraid that he had rescued from a warehouse in New Orleans that had been flooded during Hurricane Katrina. The braid should have been white, but was dulled from its time under water. I thought this was kind of cool and interesting - spark plug wire braid that had been involved in one of the biggest news events of the early 21st Century.
Dude, on the other hand, told me I was an idiot and that the braid was in fact stained with faeces and dead people.
I brought the newly-arrived wires along to the workshop, where Dude refused outright to touch them without wearing a set of thick vinyl gloves. Here he is trial-fitting them to the engine:
Once the tinware is powder-coated and reassembled, they'll be cut to length and clipped in place.
The main aim of the evening was to fit the exhaust. My friend Hayden of Wevo had kindly given me some beautiful CNC'd exhaust stubs, which The Dude wanted mated to a 4-into-1 aftermarket stainless Beetle manifold.
Heater on.
My friend Jels (
http://www.83engineering.co.uk/) did the cutting and TIGing...
... and it was beautiful (here's old vs new).
Getting the new, larger-bore exhaust to fit involved some fettling to the tinware. Having straightened it out beautifully, he then employed the help of Jels's gilfriend to bash it with a mallet.
After many hours of work, none of which were mine, the manifold was tacked in place and looking rather nice. Next job, which won't be mine; routing the J-tubes to the rear cylinders, and get it all properly welded-up.
