Thanks to all who have contributed to this post thus far....We will let you know how things are going!

To anyone thinking about removing the lower intake manifold to put in new gaskets: I recently took mine off, and the aluminum intake had quite a bit of corrosion around the water coolant passages. Enough so I was afraid that the gasket might not seal it completely. The GM gasket that I used only has small raised silicone rings that make the seal. If they happened to land in the wrong place, I could be in trouble.

So I added additional rings of silicone sealant on the inside edge of where the gasket seals. More specifically, I added the silicone right onto the gasket itself, inboard of the raised silicone rib. So this might be a case when you put silicone on areas other than on the "end seals".


Did it work? I don't know yet, I am just finishing up the job.

My friend and I just finished removing the upper intake manifold and the lower manifold. We know what our next steps are, however, we don't know what everyone is referring to in these posts as the 'EGR Stove Pipe'. We have a Chiltons manual and GM docs on this topic, but we don't know what the 'EGR Stove Pipe' is. Can someone explain please!

Thanks Vital49 for including the note on the oil changes too ! (I even used Seafoam too, on the first fresh oil, and then changed after very few miles.)

Also I spent a LOT of time thoroughly cleaning the cooling system, including ultra-sonic cleaning of the radiator. (came out looking brand new).

Say, tverhein, Mkaake responded with excellent photos of the stove pipe.

Mkaake, WOW way to go working on the Series III manifold conversion There are a LOT OF US anxious to get the details. (we know you will post)

-and excellent advice from jr's3800 on going to "tech info" to read the details on what SO MANY PEOPLE have already been through. -lots of good stuff to be learned there. -highly recommend checking it out.

-and yes, I did have good luck using the "ken-co" kit. -I'd recommend looking at the photos and description of the kit, on the ken-co industries website. (granted, more expensive than it needs to be, but I think it was well worth the extra cost for the insurance.)

Good Luck , and we all will "stay tuned" and offer what help we can.

yeah, i've been working non-stop on this for a while, trying to work out the finer details of how the adaptor would all fit together.

the idea is we are able to retain our stock TB'* - right now there'* an adaptor on the market, but it requires changing out the TB, which I didn't like (i'm cheap). this may actually end up being as cheap or cheaper than replacing a composite upper, depending on how much it'* going to cost to get our adaptor'* made... so stay tuned

<edit>

teaser pics removed for now

OKay...here is where we are at after two evenings of work:

We replaced the lower intake gasket, the upper intake manifold and gasket, the thermostat with a 180 degree model, the spark plugs, the oil, and the coolant. We have a few connections to finish tonight, then we will 'turn her over'. A couple of things we found:

1. It seems the root cause of the problem I am experiencing is due to 'damaged & destroyed' lower intake gaskets. Sorry I don't have pictures, but they looked pretty bad. The lower intake manifold was flooded with coolant and water, so we had a mess to clean up. After we took the sparkplugs out, we hand cranked the engine to work the water and coolant out.
The upper was all 'gummed up' as well. The upper was replaced with a new part while I cleaned the lower with a tootbrush, razorblade, and brake cleaner and got it to be pretty clean.

2. We found a discrepancy on the 'torque specs' for the upper intake manifold between Chiltons and GM. We went with Chiltons because GM'* seemed 'way too tight'.

3. We couldnt get a 'washer/gasket' to fit from the old PCV to the new, so we left it off thinking it the new PCV re-designed.

4. We put a quart of 'ATF' transmission fluid in with our new oil to help cleanse the engine and parts. Tonight we will fire it up, let it run a bit while we are checking things, drive it a few miles, then change the oil again.

Will update this board on our final endeavors. If anyone wants details on anything we have done, just post a question.

Wish us luck tonight!

Sorry folks...I have a few corrections to my previous post.

1. We also changed the PCV valve.

2. Yes, we did find a discrepancy between Chilton'* & GM'* torque specs for the upper intake. Chilton recommended 89 inch pounds, while GM recommended 11 lb foot. We went with GMs recommendation and not Chiltons as I previously reported.

I read a post recently where a 'Stant spring loaded radiator cap' was installed. Can someone explain the value of this cap relative to the factory installed cap?

Thanks to everyone who has responded to this post and to this board in general. This information has been a tremendous boost to effectively diagnosing and correcting problems ourselves.

i've only ever heard the spec of 89 inch pounds... 11 foot pounds is what, 132 inch pounds... eh~ i'm sure it'll work.

i'm pretty sure that any radiator cap is spring loaded - that'* how most systems work. the rad cap acts as a little gateway between the radiator and the overflow. when the fluid in the radiator heats up, it expands, and needs somewhere to go. the pressure works against the spring, allowing it to pass into a neck that goes to the overflow. having a dead spring can kill a car (can vouch for that - lost a head gasket on my shadow because of a bad 4 dollar radiator cap).

anyhew, i haven't specifically looked at our cars to see if they work exactally like that or not, but any replacement radiator cap will work just fine. no need to stick with stant, just buy what'* available to buy.

oh, and you're going to want that PCV to seal up tightly, or it'* going to be rough travels. best check for it, since from what you say, it seems like the o-ring doesn't need to be there (which i haven't seen the recently updated mani, but i can't see how they'd actually be able to get rid of it), you can test it - when you get your car running again, take the oil cap off of your rocker covers. if you can hear/feel a vacuum, you need to get an o-ring in there.