Paul built a heat shield to protect his steering assembly. I believe it’s his last project of the winter. Paul’s putting ‘Knardly Rolls’ to rest until Fall. It’s now time for him and the Goddess to drop the top on the Miata and explore the melting tundra.
He writes, Here’s the heat shield I made to protect the steering assembly from the heat given off by the left exhaust manifold and exhaust tubing. As you might have noticed there’s very little clearance between the heat shield and the steering shaft. A penny will not fit between the heat shield and the steering shaft. The heat shield is .020” stainless and the attach bracket which clamps to the exhaust pipe is .050” stainless.
The decreasing diameter holes drilled thru the attach bracket will allow cooling air to pass behind the heat shield which will help keep the steering linkage from getting too hot. I hope. The brown coating on the brake light switch ground wire attach bolt is a gasket shellac that should prevent water from seeping between the ground wire connection to the bare frame so corrosion is prevented. The exhaust is held to the manifold by silver plated high temperature steel self locking nuts.
Awesome Paul ! Just Let me know when your done with it. Maybe I could steal the Goddess and your jeep! 🙂 🙂
Roy, I was planning on being done with the Willys rebuild about 20 years ago. Oh well, I think I miscalculated somewhere. Given the choice I’d rather keep the Goddess.
Roy, you need to put down your computer and get to moving or Connie’s going to steal your jeep!
Good plan!! Good ladies are not replaceable!!! jeeps are! Keep up the good work Paul. My brother is a mechanical engineer (picky picky) You guys would get along great. He would die first before the jeep was finished!! The man does awesome work just like you. 🙂 🙂
She has the title!! lol goodnight Dave 🙂 🙂
Roy, the winter nights in Alaska can be long and cold. The Goddess generates quite a bit of heat when she’s sleeping so that’s just another reason why I want to keep her.
You know, I have an ex-wife who generated plenty of heat while she was awake, and not the good kind of heat. That’s when I learned that I preferred the sleeping heat to the waking heat.
I’d guess the bad kind of heat is generated by friction.
And not the pleasant kind of friction.