cholericfc

I have a great interest in this thread. I replaced my motor and basically everything mechanical last year. TWO THINGS I didn't do, that I ran out of time to do:

1.) Hide the wiring
2.) Clean-up and Re-paint that engine bay

Now, this summer I plan on using "Almost Stock"s instructions on this. I've read them and their thorough enough for me.

I'm curious? I want to fill these 'bullet holes' too. All of those little holes all over the engine bay annoy me. Can filling, grinding, painting, and all of this stuff be completed with the engine still in place??
&
Do you have to remove any interior parts, in order to hide some of these wires?

ALMOST STOCK

Yes you can weld, grind down the welds, apply and sand a body filler to fill in any small imperfections left after welding and grinding, prime and paint the engine bay with the engine still in place.
It will however take you longer and will be more difficult to weld, grind, fill, sand, prime and paint behind the Strut Tower and back of the firewall and the trans tunnel is the downfall of leaving the engine in place.

You “DO NOT” have to remove any of the interior parts to hide the wires under the pinch weld. The write-up I have on my site is for hiding the wires and vacuum line under the pinch weld.
You will however need to remove the dash if you do decide pull the wires inside and behind the dash.

This is how I filled all the holes in the engine bay if you were wondering.

Clean and degrease the entire engine bay.
Take a wire wheel on an electric drill and clean all the old paint off around near the hole you’re going to weld up.

Get yourself some 22 ga metal (20 ga metal is easier to find and will work also) to make some patch pieces just slightly smaller as the same diameter of the hole your weld up. Weld the patch piece into place. Weld and fill any hole larger than a dime in that manner (dime size and smaller hole you can weld closed by making a few passes to fill those small holes).

Grind down all the welds then use a body filler (I used all-metal not bondo) to filled in any low spots in the engine bay due to either warped fenders, welding or grinding, spot welds, or any screw holes. When using any body filler always try keeping it to a minimum thickness by following instruction on the can or label. You’ll need to fill the low and uneven spots probably 2 or 3 times before you have enough buildup to sand the body filler smooth and flat. I used a long board and 4” sanding block to make mine as smooth and flat as I possibly could.
I found that if you buy the sand paper sheets for the body filler from any Auto Supply paint store your time spent sanding will be cut in half versus getting sheets of wet-dri course sand paper from your local hardware store, but that’s just me.
At this time you’ll also need to scuff the entire engine bay with a medium scuffing pad, and then clean the engine bay of any dust by either air or tack cloth.

Next prime:
Once the primer is dry you’ll need to sand the entire engine bay with 360 grit wet-dri sandpaper. After that you’ll need to remove any primer dust from sanding by either air or a tack rag.
Next apply finishing putty such as (Evercoat Glaze Coat) to fill in any small pin holes that the body filler or primer did not fill in. Sand the finishing putty with 360 or 400 grit wet-dri sandpaper, at this time if you see and small pin holes or recessed areas that you may have missed earlier or that didn’t fill properly fill with the finishing putty one more time.
Remove any finishing putty sanding dust with air and while doing that making sure at this time that you have completely eliminated all dust and any debris that could fly up during painting process. Last and final time tack rag the whole engine bay out, and now your ready to paint.

cholericfc

So, would you like me to detail your car, in return for the advice? ... Thank you very much for the tips/advice...

ALMOST STOCK

Just trying to help if I can.

blwn93gt

Just my two cents, but if your gonna hide the wiring just go all the way and hide it behind the dash instead of under the pinch weld. I ended up doing my twice because after a few month i didnt like being able to see some of the wiring so i did it again.

Project 5.GO!

My only question... When I read the write-up on this on Almost Stock's page, and a couple other sources, I see that sometimes you are re-using the factory screw hole to mount various components on the inside of the fender as opposed to the outside. Doesn't that mean screw points sticking out into your engine bay from the fenders, or is there a way to hide these screws, or mount things without using holes?

ALMOST STOCK

I’ll ask you to read my write-up once more and if you would tell me where I have made any suggestion or stated that I reused any of the factory screw hole in my write-up? The only screws I reused were the lager screws than originally held the solenoid in place on the inside fender, but that is not mentioned in my write-up
Without going through the whole write-up this should cover what I’m saying.

Step One: The Basics
To remove your plastic outer wheel well liners there are just a few screws in the outer fender lip and 1 or 2 that hold the plastic liner in place under the bottom attaching it to the floor panel? There are also a couple of plastic plugs that need to be removed and that’s about it. Then take your hand and hit the plastic liner in an upward motion which should help release the liner, then just pull it out of your way. Some people have removed there fenders for easier access, in my case I didn’t. It’s just that I didn’t want to deal with re aligning of my fenders later is the reason I removed the plastic liner which would have to be removed any way if you remove your fenders. This way I was able to see and access the hole on the back of the Strut Towers to get the connectors and wire through. It also made it easier for me to tie wrap the harness up and out of the way, along with being able to put the solenoid as high as possible on the inside fender, keeping it as high and dry as possible.

Step Two: Wire Time
All the wires and the harness will fit through the back of the strut tower. You don’t have to remove any wire from any of the connectors. All you need to do is unplug (pull apart) the connector or deal with individual wires that were individual to start with.

First mark both ends of any connector that you’re separating, it will make it easier when you start to put thing back together, a camera is also a big help when it comes time remembering how thing went. Most people seem to forget what wires went where when it comes to the solenoid/ starter relay wires just mark each wire and its location and it will make life easier later.
Next separate the two ends on the different connectors then run the largest connector through the Strut Tower first then followed by the next largest and so on. All the connectors will fit through the hole without having to enlarge the hole in the back of the Strut Tower. It may seem that not all the connectors and wires will fit in to the hole when you first try but with a little finesse everything will go through. It does help if you have someone help you feed the connector and wires through the hole while you pull them through but it’s not necessary.

Now that you have all the wires and connector in the inner fender check where you want to put your solenoid/ starter relay (I found that the farther you go forward with the solenoid/ starter relay and related wires the easier it when you do the other harness such as the headlight harness) making sure all the wires will re attach to the solenoid install the solenoid and then just tie wrap the rest of the harness as high as possible. You will be able to see place on the upper fenders where you can run the tie wraps. Another reason for keeping the harness as high as possible is so when you so when you reinstall the plastic wheel liner they fit like they use to. You can also run your hood release cable through the back of the Strut Tower if you like. If you weld the holes up on the inner fenders, I’d suggest not running your MAF wire harness through the hole in the Strut Tower. You won’t have enough wire to hook it back up without cutting and splicing.

Since you said that you have read other write-ups possibly someone else has said that they reused the old factory screw holes but it was not me?

I can understand your thinking “IF” someone said that they reused the old screw holes,
you'd either the head of the screw or the threaded point of the screw would show in the engine bay and that would defeat the whole propose of a clean engine bay.

However there is a place where the outer fenders bolt to the inner engine bay liner that is doubled walled and the only place you could put a screw facing toward the engine bay without it showing and that is where I have my solenoid attached.

Project 5.GO!

Yup, I just rechecked your write-up, and it turns out I'm a retard.
I confused yours with another write-up, obviously from someone not quite as competent.

So, did you just use holes that were in the fender wells but that don't show in the engine bay with zip ties to secure the wires and harnesses?

ALMOST STOCK

Yes that is exactly what I did.

Once you remove the wheel and remove the splash shield and look at the top of the fender you'll see all sorts of places that you can use zip ties or screws if you need to to hold something in place, and none of it shows in the engine bay.

Project 5.GO!

Thanks for clearing that up for me. I think I'm going to start that project pretty soon here. Are there any potential stumbling blocks that someone with little experience could encounter and thereby screw something up? It sounds pretty cut and dry, but then it's not like I haven't screwed anything up before. I'd just as soon get a "Hey, and be careful about x, or you'll end up screwing up Y" LOL