Valve cover baffle removal and reinstallation without a welder
Overview:
This tutorial has been made for people who are welding on -AN fittings onto their valve cover for increased crankcase pressure relief, powder coating, or sandblasting your valve cover without the fear of leaving contaminants under the baffle and/or don’t have access to a welder. This will be using approximately the same baffle fastening as the factory uses. This will only work with a virgin cover that has never had the baffle removed.
Recommended tools:
*Hammer
*Dremel
*Small straight carbide cutter (3/32"x1/8" Tungsten Carbide Cutter
Dremel Part Number: 9904)
*1"-1.5" wide putty knife
*A couple flat screwdrivers (longer with smaller shafts)
*Flat tipped punch
*High temp silicone (oil/gas resistant with high temperature threshold, i.e. Permatex Ultra Black RTV)
Safety:
Safety glasses to keep the metal out of your eyes and gloves to keep from getting cut on the thin valve cover baffle would be a good idea. A little common sense is a benefit as well.
Steps:
1. Take your removed valve cover and set it on a firm work surface. If you notice the baffle is held in with nothing more than mushroomed aluminum stubs that are part of the valve cover. What you want to do is grind with the Dremel just the mushroomed part of the stub until it is small enough to let the baffle come off. Don’t worry about grinding it to the perfect size. You can always come back and remove a little more whenever necessary. You don’t want to remove too much because you will reuse the stubs to hold the baffle back in.
2. Next use the putty knife and screwdrivers to wedge under the baffle and VC and start to get it to pop loose. You don’t want to bend or gouge either up. Just slowly pry it out stopping and possibly having to grind a little off the stubs.
Be very patient and take your time observing each time you get to a new row of stubs if you need to grind more off. It’s ok if the baffle gets a slight “roll” bend in it as long as you can flatten it back out without distorting the baffle tabs.
I also used the baffle tabs to pry on to get a little leverage but be very careful not to bend them. You can also use the vent holes to pry up and free the baffle from the valve cover.
3. Once its free you can do whatever you want to the valve cover knowing you can clean all the crap out of the inside. I sandblasted mine clean, had an fittings welded on, Ceramic painted it, and cleaned the inside before baffle installation.
4. Reinstallation! It is recommended that you lay something down on the work surface to keep from damaging your paint, powder coat or other surface finish. A towel or thin piece of foam works pretty well. What you need is a firm support underneath the valve cover stubs to peen them back to a mushroom state.
I laid down a small bead of high temp silicone to help seal and hold the baffle before peening the stubs with the flat punch. Don’t try to mushroom it out to be flat like a rivet because the pot metal aluminum will crush. All you need is the stub to be bigger than the hole in the baffle.
Let the silicone cure according to the directions then install your clean valve cover.
