I bought an Thermal Arc 185 TSW last year and have been playing around with it off and on since. I'm learning as I go, but I figured I would post up some stuff I have been doing and get some feeback.

Any advice that can be given from the pics is appreciated.
Thanks


Turbo Manifold
This is for the stock turbo and will clear the larger EVO 9 compressor side. I ground all the welds smooth with the intention of ceramic coating it for a nice clean look. The welds weren't perfect, by any means, but the bead was about the same consistency as in the flange picture below. Everything was done with a heavy bevel and a single pass with filler. The runners were welded with argon backfill and the collectors have been port matched. I had to pump the pedal to keep from overheating the material on this project. This thick wall stuff seems to be pretty tricky to get enough heat into for good penetration but not so much that it burns the metal.
Gallery of manifold



Fleebay (Yonaka core) intecooler
3" IC piping and a 26x12x4 core
Gallery




Just for fun, here is a little shot of the car with 18x9.5 22mm offset 5Zigens and 275/35/18 Nitto NT01 rubber.

 

Aww man...I'm very disappointed in the ground away welds. No before pictures and collector pictures before everything was ground away? Gotta let it all hang out bro

 

hehe

I only had my camera phone when the welds were unground. The pictures were so terible that you couldn't tell anything anyway. I have since bought a better camera.

Maybe I'll slice up some thickwall stuff and lay down a bead next time I'm in the garage just for this thread. I'll put myself up for a beating. :D

 

how much can those stock turbos make?

Is it really worth making a whole new mani for a stock turbo?


Looks good, should be fun, but with AWD, id rather have a big turbo

 

400+WHP has been done.

My last car had a 67 on it. I actually bought a GT3582R for the car when I bought all the materials for the manifold, intercooler, and exhaust. Long story short, it took 3 months to get my money back from a crook that screwed 3 people over on this one turbo for a total of $2700.

I then decided to make something more Auto-X/road race friendly and I already had the materials...

 

that offset looks ****! nice fab work too

 

is it easy to move the car around on those caster wheel thingys

 

Nope
They are HarborGarbage and they suck. Better then trying to do it with jacks I guess, but they don't roll too well.