NemesizX

She's alive again! Thanks ted you're a star mate... Not running perfect but running on six is good enough to travel

The postal service may be a little pricey ikon.. Lol.. There's loads of places in the USA that can dip for you mate. Have a look on YouTube for Jim urbano. He runs a place called K2 that will sort you out mate. He's a master at hydro dipping and one of the people who brought it in to the car scene.. Look him up and watch his work. He's the one that inspired me to try it myself. If you have access to a big tank or even an old bath tub, you can try this stuff yourself with a bit of practice. I'm sure you'll get sorted ikon.. Or look in to postage prices and I'll send the parts over ready dipped.. Theres always a way.

I got home from work and couldn't help myself. Had to have a look at how the whole engine bay is panning out. Anyways, I ended up doing the touch up work on the plenum and got most of the bits out and pieced them together to get a sneak preview at how things are shaping up. I have to say I'm finding it hard to stop smiling now. Gonna go to bed a happy chap today.. Here's the results of my hard work so far...

Tomorrow it'll be time to touch up the plenum and then clearcoat it. Afterwards I'll be finishing off the intercooler hard pipes then the rocker covers and also painting and dipping the power steering fluid reservoir. Then it'll be time to pack it all in to boxes ready to take to Mr dent for a makeover and mechanical spruce up.. Trying to decide if I should replace all the injectors with 555's and have the power upped a little.. Don't want to go up much as I find it plenty powerful enough really but a little extra won't cause any harm.. Maybe decats aswell but I don't want it to be too loud as it'll stress the neighbourhood coming home from work at 4 am!! Also thinking of fitting all the camber arms and tie rod upgrades to try take some of the sway out of cornering.. I'm sure she'll be a different beast once Lee has worked his magic.. Can't wait! However, must get an injector in the big hole first or she won't be going anywhere!

If you look closely Alic, the gaps where the film broke are on the other side.. The small bits of colour you see are bits of plasticine which was used to block off the gaps between the plenum manifolds. The film stops exactly where I taped it off which is along the casting line naturally present in every plenum. Once the plenum is in place, the rocker covers and everything else which fits around the plenum will fit to that line.. The breaks in the film were caused by trapped air due to the complex shape. The part must be dipped at an angle to allow the air to escape naturally but the shape of the plenum doesn't allow for this. The result you see in the photo is about as perfect as you can get, believe me I have done an awful lot of homework on this project before taking the chance of ruining the plenum.. Once the touch up has been done, you will only notice the small imperfections in the print if you are seriously looking for them.. To be frank, I'm over the moon with the results considering the top hydrographic dipper in the USA said that it could not possibly be achieved.. It wouldn't have mattered which way the plenum was dipped, the angles of the plenum would have caused an imperfection somewhere along the line.. I believe I chose the correct way and ended up with as little touch up work required as possible given the complexity of the job.. So yup, well pleased!

Well, the plenum was dipped today and I have to say that the results are pretty damn good.. A small amount of touching up is required mainly due to the complexity of the shape causing the film to break around certain parts but all in all its a great result.. So I say to the pro's that say it couldn't be done... Put that in your pipe and light it! This was taken just after being dipped and still needs lacquering which will be done tomorrow after I've finished the touching up.. Tomorrow it will be All shiny.

Yes Joely, once the process is done, there's no longer any film left. It is used to transfer the ink to the paintwork and then the film is washed away as it's pva based and dissolves in water. The ink is then sealed in to the paintwork with a few top coats of lacquer. It will take just as much heat as the paintwork of the car. It can also be polished so if the lacquer starts to mist up over time, you can Tcut it back to life and or apply another coat of lacquer.

I think the photo doesn't reallt show it so well but the red lettering is holographic and does really stand out.. I masked it off around the lettering so that the dip would cover right up to it so there's no gaps.. Dip can be a real pain to get clean lines around taped areas aswell so I'd aimed to cover right up to the lettering Evaansss. Very happy with it and I'm hoping I've ironed out all the bugs with the plenum dip. If it comes out as good as this has then I will be one happy guy! It's all going off to be fitted very soon so I have to get the plenum finished and the hard pipes. I'm starting to gather all the engine dress components together now ready to transform my engine bay in to the wonderful creation in my head... I'm sure it's not going to be disappointing when I see her again after the transformation... Very exciting times for me!

As I can't drive her and ihadthe throttle cover off, I got busy sorting the dip for the throttle cover.. I must say I'm extremely pleased with the results.

Ted you are a diamond mate, can't thank you enough... If I can help you out with anything else you need for your car mate, just let me know and it's yours gratis.. Was beginning to think the agm in July might be missing a NemesizX for a minute.. I have my fingers crossed that the five remaining injectors continue to function until I can afford to replace them all. Thanks again mate..

What I did to my Z today... Looked at it out of the window and sobbed a little... Tested the injector and found the fault, then tried to remove it and got stumped by a rounded off screw which refuses to move.. After this I suffered the humiliation of driving to work in a Ford ka which I hate more than the thought of scrapping my Z... Life feels very gloomy without that key in my pocket... I don't like it when she's sick :no:

No need to ask the result hey mate? I'm thinking the words flying colours would be part of the answer along with no advisories...

Can anyone tell me if I can fit a series two injector in the rail if the other five are series one type? Will it make a difference or is it a big no no? The injectors I have, have a brown plug socket with two flat pins.. Are these S1 or have they been changed before do you think? Thanks in advance for advice..

Thanks for the offer Stephen, unfortunately I didn't see the message til just now! Unless it's a long fag you were having, I doubt that offer is still there lol.. I've done all the tests now and the injector in number one is open circuit. No readings through the meter and just to be sure I checked it with three different meters and getting nothinvfrom the injector. Power to it and the pulse both showing the correct readings. That only points to the injector. I'm wondering if this injector has been slowly failing and that's why I've had the problems I've had with the running. It's not been smooth since a few months after I got the car so maybe that's been my problem all along and it's finally just given up.. Might be time to look at replacing them all? At least it's not a major job anyway which I'm relieved about.. Driving this ford ka really makes you appreciate the Z so much more... Throttle....... Wait a little bit..... Wait a little bit more..... Ah! We're moving.... I think..... Lol

I've checked the wiring Stephen, all fine, the coilpack has been changed and that's fine, there's not much else it could be apart from injector failure is there..

Well today was a great day but unfortunately it's ended with a sting In the tail for me. Car was perfect when I parked up after getting home from the meet but when I went out to go to the local tesco tonight, it's only running on five cylinders. Hooked up to conzult and it confirmed that cylinder 1 was faulty. Checked the wires to the coilpack and they were fine, no plug connector corrosion so I changed the number one coil pack but it hasn't made any difference. Suspecting it's an injector now so that's me off the road for the foreseeable future as I can't afford to get it fixed. Gutted :blush:

It's my hydro dip ikon. Lol..

Had a great day at the Japanese mitsuri in Langford today with Joelyp, Chrisbasildon, IanL, tomomontana, art, veilside, bedzeeman and one other whom I have forgotten your name already! Great day out and a great drive to and from with bedzeeman in a convoy.. Fantastic day even if it did rain! And the museum! The massive steam engine pump was absolutely awe inspiring. What an amazing achievement of engineering! Thanks to Joelyp for organising the day and inviting me..

Yes I know danoo. I didnt even clean that plenum before I dipped it so it's very dark cos the plenum was filthy.. The plenum I posted that is coated in gold is the one that is going to be dipped in this film. It will look stunning against the brightness of the gold coating. I have to wait now until the silicone rubber arrives as one of the reasons I dipped the old plenum first was to test the process and find out what effect the shape was going to have on the way the dip laid on to the plenum. As the dip does not turn completely liquid in the process, it actually has a very thin layer of pva that remains beneath the print, so as you push the part through the film, the water pressure presses the pattern against the surface and acts like a mould and a water barrier to prevent the actual design being washed away during the dipping process. Due to the shape and size of the plenum manifold, the depth of the gaps between each branch is far greater than the width between them. In order to understand the process or explain it in a way easier to understand, if you took a piece of cling film and layed it on the water surface, then pushed a part through it, the water pressure will press the film against the part and take the form of the part pressing through it. If the gap that the film is trying to fill is of a larger surface area than that of the film, it will stretch until it tears and any part of the ink that becomes waterlogged will not adhere to the surface. Due to the results of the test dip, I have backfilled the gaps between the manifold branches to seal them off and forming four pools if you like. I plan to fill those pools with liquid silicone until the surface area that remains is close to being equal in order to keep the surface tension on the film low enough to prevent it from breaking and get full coverage of the visible parts of the manifold. I might do a thread on the process if people are interested to show how I'm overcoming the problems associated with the "impossible dip"..

Well here's a pic but i didn't bother to rinse the pva last night so it's a little messy.. Shows how dirty it was when I dipped it too lol

It's amazing how that place has been rebuilt after the floods. I saw Boscastle before and after the carnage and the rebuild is amazing.. Beautiful place...

Done a test run with the spare plenum I have just to see what the problems may be with dipping it so I can overcome them before they cause me grief! It went pretty well and the results have given me exactly what I needed to be able to prepare the plenum for dipping. I think this is going to look stunning against the gold plenum.. Looks fairly fantastic on the alloy tbh and I didn't even clean it prior to dipping!!

Mr dent..

Yes when it goes in to be done, I'll be having a lot of things done including the belt and pump. They were both changed in March 2014 and it's only done 4000 miles since then. But the belt will definitely be done. I've got front and rear crankshaft seals being done along with all the plenum deletes and Egr etc.. Power steering res, plenum, valve covers, coil pack brackets throttle bodies are all being swapped for the parts I'm prepping at the moment.. Just got to get the funds up to pay the man first!

Finished the slam panel cover at last. Not completely pleased with it as it has some imperfections in the dipping but at least it's in place for tomorrow.. It's gonna look great once the rest of the bay is finished.. What dya think guys and gals?