Oh I know they are tapered, its just strange because i only went 3/4 of the way up the tap, but I assume this craftsman tap is just not sized correctly -_-

 

Got the zzp phenolic spacer in today, looking at this, and thinking to myself, it might just be easier to drill and tap the head for M8 bolts rather then trying to find an alternative.

 

Probably.

Have you thought about how you will be setting up the pcv? Im thinking about just cutting the head to spacer gasket and the spacer itself to channel our central port to the lsj port.

That way I wont have to touch the head or the manifold, and only risk the spacer. Looking at the meat of the spacer, I don't see why it wouldn't work. A lot of people just let it get blocked off, but If I can manage to get it to work, I will

Im going to test on the edge of the spacer to see how cleanly it cuts. I might just end up cutting the channel half depth

 

My only concern with the spacer is the material its made out of, phenolic is like fiberglass sheets glued together, taking a dremel to it might be a bad idea.

 

Im going to try to shave off a bit of an inconspicuous side and see how clean of an edge it leaves. If it cuts cleanly I'll give it a shot. The worst thing that happens is that I need a new spacer. But I would rather trash the spacer than try to modify the mani or head haha

 

Suppose you could make a small angled cut on the back of the spacer to allow it to pass through properly. Sort of like how the EGR is on the exhaust side.

 

that's what the plan was. Just cut half depth through the spacer from the center of the 2 and 3 ports, up to the lsj port. basically a channel connecting the two.

I was going to use nail polish or something to mark the port on the head, and then press the spacer onto it to get an exact location of the port, "hollow" it out on the spacer, and then make the channel connecting the two

I think this will be todays project

 

lol post some pics of your progress, if it works out well then ill be making the same modification

 

Ordered a headgasket, and I'm thinking about ordering a braided clutch line

 

What are you doing for a boost gauge? I'm going to be running a mechanical gauge in the stock single pillar gauge location, I tapped another 1/8th NPT hole for a compression fitting where the redundant hose barb protrudes from the top of the manifold.

 

I have a mechanical gauge, but I'm not sure exactly where I am going to run the line yet.

If I end up tapping an additional port, it will be on the drivers side of the manifold for a cleaner installation. I will probably just end up capping that factory nipple

 

Are you running it off to the side to make it look better?

 

I mean it would technically look better, but once the injectors and rail are on i assume it will kind of be a pita to access if I ever need to. I still haven't decided. I need to find a local sssc and scope out the logistics of the bay

 

yea its kinda difficult to get to lol. You'll still need something though to connect to the bypass valve

 

We only need the one side hooked up to vacuum which pulls off the blower nipple. Even zzp says to keep the other side disconnected. I'm not sure, but I think the ss uses pressure from that port regulated by a solenoid to control the bypass more than just open or closed with vacuum.

For our needs, we just need the one side of the bypass hooked up. When the tb is closed and there is vacuum, the bypass is pulled open. But when the tb opens and the vacuum goes away, the bypass goes back to its resting state of closed so boost can be built.

 

What blower nipple do you have it pulling off of?

wait were you deleting your evap?

 

Yea the selenoid opens up that port when there is an engine issue which then opens the bypass keeping the boost down that we do not use.

and i just realized what blower nipple so ignore that post lol

and now i just realized that i only used the intake manifold nipple for the boost gauge so ignore everything I said in the last few hours hahahaha

 

only reason i tapped it to NPT is because the rubber fittings for the mechanical boost gauge ALWAYS go bad after a month or two. We were going through them faster then advance could get them in stock here with my brothers boosted mazda and my boosted acura both with mechanical gauges, so we wound up converting to the compression fitting kit that autometer sells. Seems that's what they are including in all their gauges now as well. I'm not concerned so much with looks like blackg5 is :p

 

So I found a very good solution to our m8/m6 manifold issue.

I saw these a long time ago, but never thought of using them like this. I'm going to buy some shoulder bolts with an m8 shoulder that is way too long, and a short m6 threaded section. depending on how **** you want to be, you can use more bolts, but technically 2 will be fine. all you need to do is slide the bolt s through the manifold, and slide the 2 gaskets and spacer onto the shoulders. If you thread the bolts into the head there will be a big gap between the parts and the head when the shoulder bottoms out against the head. then when you slide the assembly down towards the head, they will be perfectly centered when they hit the surface. You can then put your m6 bolts in the open holes and tighten them down. then remove the shoulder bolts one at a time and replace them with the proper m6 bolts.

I am going to do this with all the holes minus the 2 long ones, and just remove and replace them in the proper torque sequence. they shouldn't shift if torqued properly, plus once the lower bracket is attached, they will be even more stable.

hopefully that makes sense. these are the style bolts i'm talking about.

 

I also modified the spacer to make the oem pcv systems function. It's not the prettiest thing, but there is no reason why it wouldn't work.

I first used nail polish to mark the port location, and then filled in the area with marker


Then I just used a dremel with a whole bunch of bits to hack it to **** you can see the little J from when I got a lottle carried away haha.


I trimmed the gasket to fit...




gasket on the head to show the allignment. there is some marker on the port I havent cleaned off yet lol



Like I said, it obviously isn't "perfect"...but there is no reason why it wouldn't work

 

**** that came out better then i thought it would, and i was considering using a end mill bit and a drill press for a cleaner cut lol

 

That should actually be flawless, you sir are a genius. The sizing on the thread portion will have to be perfect to get the proper torque but it should be fine. I was looking at the selection on mcmaster, the options seem to be limitless. Some measurements with the caliper gauges and should have a perfect bolt.

 

That would be very easy to do, and it would obviously come out way cleaner. I have a drill press, but I was just rocking the "zero ***** given" attitude today.

 

I wouldnt risk it actually using those bolts for the final assembly, unless you just wanted to use some where the shoulder didnt bottom out to keep the manifold and spacer centered (but not actually bottom out against the head).
I was just thinking you could use them to get everything lined as you tightened it down. I will probably use 2 shoulder bolts that dont fully bottom out to keep it locked centered.

the risk is that it would have to be absolutely perfect, otherwise it will torque against the head and leave the manifold slightly under spec. but it it didnt bottom out and just made it barely into the spacer, there would be no issue. the only thing that wouldnt be locked center would be the spacer the head gasket, but that would never shift with everything else held centered and torques down

and now that I think of it, I can technically still go back over it and clean it up on the drill press

 

The ones listed seem to all have 11mm of thread from the shouldered portion, all depends on whether 11mm is enough to not bottom out the shoulder against the head. A sleeve in the manifold could also work as previously mentioned, but that would also have to be sized perfectly.