Just got my new plastic upgraded upper intake in today. Will be installing it in the morning. On the box it says Hollander. My first impression is that the pathways have indeed been beefed up. Seems thicker through and through.

:? -yes, I also just noticed the "hollander" name and number on the box (one from 1AAuto, that I have in my garage tonight, installing a stainless steel sleeve in it.)

It still bothers me though, that on the bottom of the new part it says clearly, "made in Korea"

Oh well, -guess it'* just further proof that today'* economy is very truly "global."

BTW, I'm using one of Bill Buttermore'* sleeves on this new UIM. Man it is terrific !
I bored the hole in the plastic with a brand new 7/8" twist drill in my drill press. (very honestly, NOT the safest thing to do,,,) And then it took very little sanding to bring the hole right out to size, for a "light press fit." Then I "roughened" the outer surface of the sleeve to give some "tooth" for the JB Weld. Have quit for the night, leaving the epoxy to cure. -hope to be able to continue the job tomorrow evening.

Also, from what I can tell, my external coolant leak was actually coming from the bottom of the Throttle Body, and soaking along the UIM gasket. So, I think it was the TB gasket that failed, not the UIM gasket, as I had first thought.

OH, also, the GM gasket kit I picked up today has a couple of very obvious design changes: The TB gasket is now black, as well as the two coolant passage rings in the UIM. -the rest of the silicone beads are still red. hmmm,,, hope this is better,,, :?

mine failed last year and got GREAT help from people in these forums.

Here is the story along with pictures:
http://www.bonnevilleclub.com/forum/...c.php?p=272773

this one says it all:

Would the UIM and TB from a series3 work on a series2?
I know someone is working on an adapter plate for the TB but I figure why not use the genuine article. They should be common enough by now at the yards.
Popa Tim

*chimes in*

trust me, they're not common at the yards. i've tried sooo hard to find them. I picked one up through GM SPO, and am working on an adaptor as we speak, but am having some machining issues... trying to find good ways of getting the job done cheaply, so that other people can actually afford to either buy one or do it themselves.

if you were an EE geek, you could make an electrical adaptor to do the series III throttle body (I came close to doing this, but decided to go the adaptor route because it was more feasible for most), that runs off of the inputs from the IAC, and the output from the TPS (you'd have to maintain the original spring setup, and have the original TPS hooked up, feeding into some op amps of some sort). the other problem with that is that I haven't been able to find the P/N of the connector that mates up with the throttle body, and it'* not something common... it'* something like a 20 pin connector, in a not-so-standard shape.

so it goes.

I know that this is an old thread and hasn't been posted for a couple months, so let me know if I'm out of line, but I'm new here and can't help but wishing I had known of this forum two years ago.

Last year in March, I started using coolant and thought it was the water pump, so, being real busy at the time, I took it to the dealer for a new water pump. Can you say stupid?? $1300 later, I had a new water pump, intake, and intake gaskets. With me not knowing any better and the service manager implying that my problem was unusual.

On the plus side (I see now after reading all the threads on the intake issue) my '96 SE already had about 135-140K on it at the time. The only explaination I have for that might be that it was a Detroit Michigan car for its first 4 years of life? I've put tons of highway miles on it, including 5 straight-through round trips, Florida-Michigan. The last six years in Florida.

It always ran Dex-Cool until the dealer changed the intake, pump etc. Then they replaced the Dex with all-purpose green, telling me it was "better" for the engine. I personally don't have an opinion one way or the other on that.

I will certainly be replacing my 'stat w/a 180* this weekend. I've done that already last year for my Ranger and it eliminated the chronic pinging so common with that 3.0 engine.

Thanks to everyone on this great site for so much reasearch and information! Better late (for me) than never and it looks like I'll need to continue to monitor this.

Cheers!

I live in Deltona and work in DeLand.

I spent a few hours reading all the old threads, tech articles, etc. on this before I posted, so I now know how common it is and how much I was ripped. But that ship has sailed and it is just recently that I started taking the time to really learn about my vehicles and started doing most of my own work.

Now I want to tweak the performance a little and keep it running well for another 75-100K miles.