Went junk hunting at the scrap metal place today. Dug in one of those big bags and found some perfect stainless plate, it still has it's protective plastic covering on. Had them cut me a piece of 100mm stainless pipe from a long piece that was there and also found that cone. The 100mm pipe and plate I'll use to make a surge tank with. You don't often find cones so when I find them I take it even if I don't need it, it's wall is about 2mm so it's fine for a transition for an exhaust. I also happened on a bunch of filler wire that was stuck in there, on closer inspection it turn's out to be 316L, so I took that as well.





Got a tip from Rotor that I should use stainless filler rod for the welding then it comes out nicer, so I immediately had to try it. Though he did say he uses 304, I'll get some of that for the manifolds and use this 316 for pure stainless. It comes out very nice I think, much, much better than the steel filler wire anyway... I just need some practice still to get it perfect.



I didn't try to TIG stainless the other day, so I just cut this piece and joined it back together to test and see if stainless is as easy. I'd say the stainless is almost easier to do. I did find that I could turn the amps down a bit and still get the penetration but without the cauliflower on the inside.



Ok on to some car stuff. I made a new bolt for the brake pedal that does the adjustment. Initially I thought I'd cut a piece of the Golf clutch pushrod and weld it onto the original bolt, but I don't like welding in that area. So I got a capscrew with the same thread, and found that the pushrod would go into the hex on the end. Then I just used the TIG to add another nut on the end of it to make the hole slightly deeper to ensure the push rod has no chance of ever falling out and then cut a piece of the pushrod to suit.



Here's the lot fitted. The rod goes about 50mm into the master's sleeve and about 10mm into the bolt head, so it's not coming out there.



And the master finally fitted with the adapter plate sprayed in black.



I just took some pictures of the clutch setup for posterity, since a bunch of people have asked me how my setup works. It just mounts on top of the pedal box with a bracket made up of some flatbar and angle iron. How do I fill it? When the dash is instaleld, you can see the top of the bottle through the window vent, I just take the top of and suck some fluid into a transparent pipe and let it run in there. Theoretically it shouldn't ever leaked, it never has, and you shouln't need to add fluid ever, I never have, so I thought it was ok to be in there.



The original hook on the end of the pedal is just cut off and replaced with a piece of flatbar, which is just drilled and the pedal is done. Even with the double diaphragm pressure plate it was never hard to push the clutch. I'll take some pictures of how the pipe runs from the clutch master down when that is installed.



Ok an finally I took the dust plate of the motor to have it scanned for ScoobySTi. I thought it would cover the bellhousing completely, since the 16V one was just half and the bottom half was completely open with that. Unfortunately it seems the dust plate is still not exactly like the bell, but it does cover much more of it. So what I'll do is to have it scanned, but add about 10mm around the bottom edge so it completely covers the bellhousing. Provision was made in the bellhousing to drill and tap holes to bolt the cover down, so then I'll do that too. So I'll also have them cut me one which I'll be cutting and adding the hump into, have and idea around that.