| Finally had a little bit of time to devote to getting my baby back on the road. Went ahead and mounted my tubular manifolds and the turbochargers as well. I wasn't too pleased with how the factory cooling lines for the turbochargers are routed, so I decided to modify the OEM lines to route them cleanly to the back of the engine. I also picked up a nickel plating system from Caswell and wanted to give it a whirl on these new lines. Here's quite a few pics of the work: 
Nickel plating isn't terribly difficult to do and the Caswell kit comes with most of what you need. Just have to pick up some hydrochloric acid, some wiring, few gallons of deionized water, and some form of power supply. I used a very antiquated RC-car battery charging station that has variable current output as the power requirement for plating varies with surface area of the part, and it has a built in timer as well! I nuked these puppies for 45 minutes at 1.0A and plated out appx 0.001" of nickel. These guys should be very resistant to corrosion and hold up for a good bit of time. They also have a pretty nice finish to them as well - sure beats spray-painting them! I am sure I will find more parts to plate as this build progresses. Also note the use of the double-flaring tool to create a hose bead rather than a flared compression fitting. It was an idea that I came up with after pricing out a pipe bead roller and finding that I couldn't get one for less than about $450. The double-flare on the brake line I purchased gave me the idea. All you simply do is about 1/2 of the very first step in putting a double flare on a pipe. Just use the small anvil that comes with the kit for the size pipe you are using and only compress the end of the pipe down about 1/2 of the way. This will buckle the pipe uniformly and create a "cheap-man's hose bead." The brazing torch was picked up from a local Home Depot for about $35 and a few extra oxygen tanks were purchased as the torch goes through it pretty quickly. The fuel rail will be the next step in welding in 6AN fittings to the back of the rails. The rails will also get a nickel coat as well to finish them. Looking forward to getting her on the road!
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AshsZ-II "Ultimate Street Z Buildup" Some custom fab-work>> - 
