Engine bay clean up

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TheSquareGuy

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Alright, month or two this lil 350 is gonna be sitting in the corner of a garage with a few of its brothers... Its future, **** if I'd know? Who cares a 500 HP 454 is taking its place! Well I want the trucks new friend to have a nice heart warming place to stay... A/c unit is going away, I've got windows. All the emissions ****, gone, Ect.

What I'm asking here is any tips to clean up the engine bay such as various customizations, im a fairly good metal worker so the sky is the limit here I just don't have the imagination to make it happen

Paints what should I do, yellow motor, black motor, orange motor. Idk... How about surrounding surfaces black? Chrome? Yellow? I want it to look clean not tacky.

When you pop the hood on this truck it just dissapoints sure the motor actually makes good power but you pop the hood and it just screams worn out. I want to fix this, obviously I've got the opportunity, let's make it happen
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Rusty Nail

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I have been partial to "pretty" wheelwells. It's a lot of surface area...Removing things, relocating stuff, filling the holes, and running any wires inside the fenders. CLEAN CLEAN BLING BLING.

The firewall is kind of different, imo, but shouldn't it be body color?... It's there for business, it has things to do, but not the wheelwells.
I don't think there should be too much / many colors under a hood and your firewall is black. Is the core support black also? I would clean the wheel wells, fill the holes and make them black to match.
Cleaning underhood also includes the core support, to me. Pull the grille and see what you can see!
The wires on top of the core support? Gotta go.
I'm into hiding wires.
MORE PICS!
good luck.

It looks pretty good, really. Somebody painted a lot of that at one time but it's still so..."busy". And dirty.
The wires/hoses on the wheel well can be run inside of the fenders.
The wires on top of the core support can be put underneath it.
 
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Green79Scottsdale

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Personally I would go with a low gloss black for the engine bay. I don't like being blinded by gloss black paint and/or chrome under a hood. Black engine block, aluminum intake (real or iron painted), and some matching valve covers and air cleaner. Valve covers and air cleaner should be whatever you like the looks of best, whether that be chrome or painted. I would almost say paint some stock pieces yellow to match the truck and see how you like it. Or more aluminum color would be nice.
 

CSFJ

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I agree with a combination of both of the guys above. I think the firewall and fenders being body color, and the core support and inner wheel wells being black would give you a nice clean factory fresh look. Orange chevy engines bore me however, unless you're going for a restoration look. I would definitely use some yellow and aluminum colors on the block. Maybe some black too.
 

1987 GMC Jimmy

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Check out this guy's build thread. The first thing I thought about was his engine bay clean up when you asked your question. He used low gloss engine enamel and plastidip, I believe. The second page is really all that talks about it, I think.

http://www.gmsquarebody.com/forum/showthread.php?t=14951&page=2
 

spenser21

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Alright, month or two this lil 350 is gonna be sitting in the corner of a garage with a few of its brothers... Its future, **** if I'd know? Who cares a 500 HP 454 is taking its place! Well I want the trucks new friend to have a nice heart warming place to stay... A/c unit is going away, I've got windows. All the emissions ****, gone, Ect.


so on a side note... I just read you have a couple small blocks sitting around? you wouldn't be interested in getting rid of one would you?
 

Camar068

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I hate black any where there could be an oil leak, if there's a leak, I want no doubt in my mind where it's coming from quick. I'm not a fan of orange blocks either, don't get me wrong they are nice....but so many people have done it.

You could make a metal plate to hide some of that stuff on the firewall. Not that I'm a ford guy, but I found a few false firewall pics on the net.
 

theblindchicken

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You could go with that hemi cuda blurple. Or that newly popular burnt orange.

I like the time period colors. If it would've been gold, make it gold. Black? Make it black. Blue? Make it blue.


Or you can go the color matched route too. Some of those look real clean in a tip top engine bay.
 

TheSquareGuy

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You could go with that hemi cuda blurple. Or that newly popular burnt orange.

I like the time period colors. If it would've been gold, make it gold. Black? Make it black. Blue? Make it blue.


Or you can go the color matched route too. Some of those look real clean in a tip top engine bay.
I figured I'd color match the block and heads, everything else would be chrome or black

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75Monza

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Are those rubber hoses diving over the pass side of the motor the tranny cooler lines? If so, replace with factory metal lines, less busy up top that way. Also, if your chucking the a/c, gut the condenser and stuff out, but keep everything inside the truck. Shave off the face of the firewall cover and cover with block plate to retain the function of factory vents inside, my truck was done that way and doesn't look half bad, I haven't even got to cleaning the engine compartment up yet, only bothered to pull out massive *** of poor wiring for everything from lights to fan controller done wrong. You can also pull apart the wire harness to the motor and change how that runs across the motor to distributor, alt, carb and sensors.
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