tooter's manifold adventure...

[cali yaris]

Love this project. I think it would be easier to take the general idea and make them from scratch in production runs. The flange will be the same on each one and positioned correctly, for example, as opposed to making each one as an individual project. Would bring the cost down as well.

whoever gets the blueprint, will someone sell just the flange by itself or start buying up old corolla manifolds and doing all the welding themselves and sell it as a whole?

Maybe! And to go back to Tooter's point about wealth, that is when wealth will be created, not before. So far, a fee has been paid for a service to add "value" to a part. Wealth is created only when the part is sold with the added value included (aka profit), not before.

[tooter]

Originally Posted by cali yaris

Love this project. I think it would be easier to take the general idea and make them from scratch in production runs.

Hey Garm, :)

When you say "make them from scratch", do you mean like buying tubing and getting it mandrel bent and building the throttle body base? Don't think I'm ready to go quite that far just yet!

Remember, all this began with the idea to make just one manifold because I saw that the guy from Puerto Rico did it!

The flange will be the same on each one and positioned correctly, for example, as opposed to making each one as an individual project. Would bring the cost down as well.

Well, that's exactly what happened.
I went to my neighbor's big machine shop in town and showed him the project. He said that I'd do much better with a CNC machine. (I didn't realize that he didn't have one) He said that one of his machinists could make one flange, but it would take a day doing it from scratch on a mill and would cost about $1,000.

So I went to two guys who have a this huge CNC machine in their garage and were running their own business. I already knew them because I had installed the wiring that runs their machine. The beauty of a CNC (Computer Numerical Control) is that once the file for the parts are generated, the machine can make 1 or 1,000 all uniformly the same. After the first one, any number can be made on demand at any time.

When the old Corolla manifolds were manufactured, the runners were all stuck into identically machined flanges so they all ended up exactly in the same position. The machinist said that's no problem in that he can capture a profile of the runners as well as the profile of the head intake configuration, and the computer will generate the information to create a seamlessly smooth transition blending their difference from the outer surface of the flange to the inner surface. the flange will even have all of the original Yaris 0 type gasket grooves to accept an OEM gasket. It will also have a recess on the outer surface into which the runners will be inserted to insure they remain in the proper position during welding.

Maybe! And to go back to Tooter's point about wealth, that is when wealth will be created, not before. So far, a fee has been paid for a service to add "value" to a part. Wealth is created only when the part is sold with the added value included (aka profit), not before.

From the point of view of the machinist, he created wealth by making a profit on the materials he supplied, on his machine, on his time, and on his considerable intake manifold design experience. I'm totally happy to pay him whatever he wants because he is making this project possible.

It's a win/win situation for both of us.

...and you're exactly right that from my point of view, no wealth is created until a part is actually sold.