I am taking out my engine in my 75 Stingray to get it replaced. Does anyone have any ideas on how to clean up the engine compartment? I would like to add alot of chrome to the engine but the firewall and fenders are just plain ugly and covered with switches, fasteners, etc. How can I hide that stuff to make it lookneat and clean?:

 

Split conduit over all the wires... Try to tuck the bundle up and out of sight.

I've been thinking about running the wires through the fenders, heat shrinking the whole bundle and making a conduit. Would not run to the front of the car in the engine compartment!

 

When you speak about running the wiring bundle thru the fenders, do you mean exposing the bundle to the side of the fender where the tire and wheel are?

If so, consider the conduit that you will use. It needs to protect that wiring from all the rocks, sand, and such that are thrown up by the tires. These projectiles will damage the wiring if you don't protect it with a heavy conduit.

Just a thought.

Bob

 

I hid the vacuum lines for the headlight doors under the P/B booster. Took out the washer fluid bottle & lines. I ran the wiring on the right side of the firewall back through a hole I drilled in it, into the cowl and over to the inside of the right fender. I put up pics over in general on the show us your C3 thread, last page. Filled and painted the firewall. It went on & on......

 

Scrub brush and Simple green. Hot water. Flat black is our friend.

 

that was one of the simplest and best things i did. really looks a lot better with out all those vacuum lines running over the booster. i had that plastic wire loom for a while but didn't like it. i ended up wrapping the wires nice and tight with electrical tape and i think it looks good.

 

Great ideas. Thanks everybody.

 

I got in there with a oil change bucket filled about an inch full with oderless (very important) mineral spirits and various brushes and rags. Kept working in sections going over it and over it untill one day the mineral spirits remained clear. I would say 20 hours or better. Then I used al eastwoods products for painting and it looks as good today as the day it was complete nearly 2 years ago. I also put the car on jack stands, covered the floor with rosin paper and did the entire undeneath.This was one of the dirtiest, most agonizing. tiring jobs ive done on the car so far. It was also the most rewarding.

 

Plan the routing of your wiring and hoses before hooking anything up. Spend lots of time rerouting things to get a cleaned up look. Nothing makes wiring look better than heat shrink with the exception of not seeing the wiring.

 

my car came with airconditioning but i removed it all together, then i used the aircon box to hide my msdegnintion box&coil there was also room for the vacuumcontrol unit that connects to the Wiperdoor vacuumcanister and the relays to the blower fan.

i wired all my firewall cables and vacuum hoses inside the firewall instead of in the engine compartment, i removed my mechanical fuelpump and wired my fuel line backwards through the airconbox.

i removed the heatersystem and the 2 hoses and went with a electrical heater that hooks up to the origional switches in the car.

i removed the external relay to the alternator (68) and put on a internal controlled alternator.

i cut my cable wiring to the front just after the horn relay and extended the wiring through chromes steeltubing that are mounted in the outer fender room, that way i could hide the horn relay and cables behind the vacuumtank.

i removed the swith that extrudes though the firewall and contorls when the wiper door are open to let the wipers move, i closed the hole alltogther and mounted a microswitch in the wiperarm area thhis works great.

the wiring to the wiper motor is coming out just behind it so no wires are wisible.
i removed the mechanical sprinklerpump fromthe wiper motor and had a frontplate lasercut and chromed for it.

Ignition cables are running through polished aluminum wire holders

all brackets supports bolts/nuts etc have been chromed and the vacuumhoses/pcvsystem that goes to the engine are made in chromed tubing.

i use a serpentine system for looks.

i painted the engine block silver to match all the other polished aluminum and chrome pieces on it

the hood has been sanded down and painted in the cars color with a airbrushed chevy logo on the inside

i closed all unnessesary holes and removed all the origional wiring support etc, all glasfiber is sanded several times (app 8), and then painted halfgloss black.

ill posts some pics later

 

before cleaning up you'd need to re-design the engine bay, first of all making space to let the chrome shine properly, to make space you'd need to get rid of what is not needed, that of course depends of the use you do of the car, in my case i got rid of the whole heater sistem and covered up the hole of the firewall with a sheet of aluminum...a hydroboost booster also cleans up the left side of the bay (and uprate the braking perf) and you could add a chrome master cil to match.
a tubular A-arm will uprate the looking too, and will give you a return in peformance as well and dont forget jet coated or chrome headers...on my car i went much more further getting rid of the windshield cleaner plus all the ancillaries and motor, A/C, wheels fender i cut the whole thing and replaced with aluminium sheets...

but the main thing, on my personal opinion, is to make space under the hood, otherwise you can clean and clean but it will never shine...

 

All I can say is - you are amazing!

 

Great idea.

 

You can take a look at the thread that I have going now.
http://forums.corvetteforum.com/show....php?t=1582845

My advice, be patient and don't cut corners. The disassembly and cleaning seems endless. I will be building the new motor this week and starting the front end assembly as well. I will hide what I can and make things that can't be hidden neat.
Good luck and have fun with it.