Stainless Steeling

Today was the day for me to go and get steel so that I could fabricate the rollcage mounts. I went to my dad's ranch to get some steel stock. While I was snooping around, I happened on about 15' of 3" outer diameter 16 ga. stainless steel pipe. I am so excited about this pipe! It is going to truly make an amazing exhaust system. I also got very intense angle iron, square tubing, and plate, all in 1/4" wall thickness. I plan on making some side steps/rock sliders with some of my finds. I hope to at least have all the fabrication plans finalized by next weekend so i can do the cuts.

Friday I also picked up some chrome valve covers from Don's Hot Rod Shop. I'll do some mock-up photos of them later. I may not install them until the engine has been run since the paint job needs to cure before I can spill stuff on it.

Today I went to Don's Hot Rod Shop to pick up another can of GM blue engine enamel and I also picked up a can of the VHT orange header paint from checker. Today I also ordered the mufflers (flowmaster 40 series), new collectors, and a pipe expander.

I am still waiting on the dipstick and motor mounts to arrive.

Some of the steel I got from my dad, it will make the jeep freakishly strong:

Fortunately I had some straps to secure the stainless steel pipe.

Did I mention that I probably looked funny driving down the road? I was told I have a unicorn truck. Don't worry it is a manly unicorn.

The headers are starting to come along, the high temp header paint has very poor coverage.

Yep, its still blue.

The red bar below is going to be cut appropriately to become some kind of rock slider thing, we'll see what I come up with.

I love this pipe!

Paint Yourself Silly

Last night I cleaned and stripped the headers, motor mounts, throttle bracket, and water pump pulley. I then proceeded to paint them all flat black, but ran out of black paint (I was using high temp paint which has very low coverage).

I went to checker and ended up getting a very bright orange for the headers and a orange-red for the other parts. I have only applied the first coats of paint. Tonight I will finish the rest of them.

Also you can see a picture of my improvised paint booth, the first of many.

Greasy Photo Tour

I reorganized my garage as it was getting difficult to move around.

Consider this your photo tour of the current garage setup.

I included more photos of the jeep outside also.