Mystery Metal

This past Friday was on a push to get the AE86 rolling again so could move it out of garage for planned work on J’s headlights. I’d earlier glopped on some cast iron weld to fill up the crack on the exhaust, and after some name calling got it all back together. However while I was in there, I started taking off the EGR system. A rather superfluous system which in more cases than not is malfunctioning by this age anyway. It’s pretty straightforward. Unbolt the bung from the exhaust, find a transmission filler plug from the myriad of transaxles in Root’s Toyota salvage yard, and replace the bung with that. Then unbolt the other bits that hang between the bung and the intake. The only little thing is a bit of fabrication to make a cover to plug the intake hole. Pulling out the barstock of mystery millitary surplus metal, I traced out what I needed to cut. Just about the right size. Decide to give it a go with the jigsaw. Holy cow, this stuff is hard to cut! It’s likely some kind of stainless steel. SS is known for its bad thermal conductivity, so I think what is happening is the heat is building up in the blade. Despite liberal amounts of oil, the blades cook, turn blue, and loose teeth. Four blades later and I’m not even close to halfway through. Darn it. I switch to the angle grinder with cut-off disc. It makes quick work of it, but just as I figured it wasn’t terribly acurate. No big deal, this isn’t a critical fit thing. Break out the little drill press jig thingy and the two holes are made with minimal fuss. A little finish grinding and filling, and here we go! EGR intake blockoff plate. Cut a gasket to match, bolt it on, and Bob’s your uncle! Car runs, except now I discover a stumble in engine rpm when fiddling with the throttle. I suspect the AFM sensor might have a bad spot, but I’ll deal with that later. Other than that it seems to run pretty well. Ah, that much less to worry about!