Fuel Rail cleaned up and painted!

This is the fuel rail that the injectors attach to. It seems to be copper that was painted with a gloss black paint. Here it is after some light cleaning and sanding.. The wire on the upper right was used to hang it while painting.

Here it is freshly painted with 2 coats of black semi-gloss POR-15. POR is supposed to be resistant to gas and high temperatures so I will leave it as the final coat of paint. Below the rail are the freshly painted fuel injector hold down rings.

Fuel injector rings

Here are the fuel injector hold down rings before:

To clean them up: Simple Green, POR-15 Metal Prep, 2 coats Napa Self-Etching Primer (7220), then Rust-Oleum Bright Coat Metallic Finish. Not perfect (I could have sanded  them more), but I think they look good, and original. These might be parts to get zinc plated in the future.

Cleaning and testing the Auxiliary Air Valve

Cleaning and testing the AAV or Auxiliary Air Valve



OK, here it is, the Auxiliary air valve before cleaning...

1970 Volvo AAV

I used detergent to clean it, then rinsed in water followed by alcohol. It still needed some shine, so some buffing and polishing followed. The inside was sprayed out with WD40 to make sure it didn't rust, and to ensure that the piston could move freely.

It was tested by placing it in the fridge to see if it opened, and then  the bulb was placed in boiling water to see if it closed. All checked out OK! Ready to go!

Bosch 0 280 140 013 AAV

Battery Hold Down Bar

Finished the battery hold-down bar...

Here it on the front of the battery when I got the car.

Here it is after cleaning in Simple Green and POR Metal-Ready rust converter. The bolts and wing nuts looked ok, but the bar needed more work...

4 Coats of gray POR-15 with sanding in-between...

I was going to paint it silver, but because the POR is so tuff, and this part will get lots of abuse, I think I'll just leave it "as is" Anyway, this is one of the easiest parts to remove, so it would be easy to fix later if needed..

Cleaning some bolts... not sure what to do... Keep them, get new ones?

Before

After degreasing in Simple Green and a soak in POR-15  Metal-Ready.

The brighter ones were lightly hit with a brass wire wheel on the bench grinder. Not sure sure if I should replace all the bolts, paint them, get them plated or just go with the wire wheel. Cleaning them was fairly quickly, so I'm not worried about the time. I just don't want them to rust 2 seconds after they go back on the car... I think some of the original coating is left so they might be ok....?? Any ideas??

Cleaning the thermostat housing

Before:

After:


It actually looks better than the photo suggests.... The top part will be covered with a hose. I used a wire brush and some Mother's Metal Polish on it. The part is cast aluminum and would polish up better if I had smoothed out the imperfections from the casting.... But, ultimately It looks better and its ready to go!

Cooling system parts cleaning

More parts cleaning...

Water pump pulley spacer before cleaning.

After degreasing in Simple Green, a soak in some POR Metal-Ready, 220 grit paper, 400 grit paper and finally the buffing wheel. I think it looks good, although there is still some pitting.... Each of the polishing steps was done quickly, in all about 15 minutes.... Not sure if its worth the time to get perfect...

This angle highlights the imperfections, in the photo below it looks a little better.

The first parts to be cleaned up...

Ok, so the car sat for a few years in my garage after I found out the engine needed to be rebuilt. I have to admit, that really took the wind out of my sails. I did not really have the money just to have it done, I didn't really have much of a clue as to how to even go about it. Nothing has changed, but I am going to work on it anyway. I realized that even if I could snap my fingers and a new engine showed up, all the other parts still need to be cleaned up and fixed. I have most the parts taken out of the engine compartment in labeled bags, so there is no problem with lost parts etc. The first parts I picked were the battery hold down and fan pulley, all with major oxidation issues....

Here is the pulley, I brushed it off and let it soak in POR metal-ready, then I tried metal polish... that didn't do much so I used the buffer on my bench grinder. I think it looks good, there was more rust on the inside and in the groove, but for the most part the original coating is still present. I used some car wax on it hoping that the wax will provide some protection. I guess the question is, given that much of the coating is still present, will this part stay ok without being painted?

Note the pitting in the groove, its not too rough, but I wonder if it will kill the belt?

The battery hold down was way rustier. This is going to need paint. Some of the pitting is fairly deep and I doubt it would be worth sanding totally smooth...? At least paint would provide some rust protection. I assume that these parts were zinc coated? I'm guessing Eastwood "Clear Zinc" might be the best??

This is why its been 4 years since I've worked on it...

If you look where the red arrow is you can see sunflower seeds... Yes, the mice had been living there and peeing into the engine... which caused it seize...

The car had been sitting for about 20 years (before I got it), I knew it would need lots of work, but I was hoping not to have to remove the engine and all that. So the whole thing has been sitting for awhile... now I'm getting ready to start working on it again, hence this blog...

What the car looked like when it got here..

Still learning how to post things, these are photos of what the car looked like when it got here... Sorry, they are not in a logical order...

So here it is a 1970 Volvo P1800!

Inside the trunk

Notice the mouse nest in the corner...

Animal turds...

Pseudo post.. learning how this works..

Waiting for the car to arrive..