Decided today to fabricate some brackets so I could mount the engine on my engine stand in order to remove the oil pan. As you can see, they didn't turn out too bad. Upon removal of the oil pan, why was I not surprised to find--Tada!! silicone rubber. I used a gasket cleaning pad on my 3" grinder to clean off the old gasket cement, silicone and other assorted crud. I used the correct tap and chased all the threads except one hole, it had a broken bolt in it. After its removal, the last hole was chased and I turned my attention to the oil pan. I had to scrape the lead deposits off the bottom of the pan on the inside before putting it in the parts cleaner. When clean and dried, I blew high pressure air through the false bottom to remove the cherry seeds, pieces of old gasket and such. I then removed the dents I was able to get to and straightened the edges and the openings for the false bottom. It was set aside to dry overnight. If you look at the lower left corner near the flywheel between the two brown smears, you can see the broken bolt.

Just got my manifolds back from being Jet-Hot coated inside and out. This is how they look and this is how they look on the engine. Still recuperating with my back so nothing else got done.
Sue me.

They are a bright shiny silver color, the yellow cast in the pics are from the lights in the shop. I guess

The preparation is all done, stripped, cleaned, de-greased, metal prepped, washed and dried. It's all ready for the metal etch primer. My back is hurting so I'm quitting for the day.

This is the fabricated part I made and this shows it installed on the car. Now I can go back to the paint prep I was doing while I was waiting for parts.

This shows the panel still on the car. The other shot shows the panel after drilling out the spot welds and removing it from the car to use as a pattern. As you can see it is rusted through almost the entire length of the piece. I fabricated a new part and am now in the process of welding it in.

Well, still waiting for parts, so I decided that this was paint removal weekend in the engine room. I used a chemical stripper, several different sizes of scrapers, and a lot of newspaper. I now remember why I don't like doing this. I couldn't talk my wife into it so I was stuck with the job. I took three days because of my bad back but it's down to bare metal now. I will go over it with a Scotch Brite disk to clean any last bits of paint off. The plan is to wash it with metal prep, degrease it, prime it with acid etch primer, sand it smooth and apply the color. I'm going to use a single stage paint in the engine room and the trunk area, and catalyzed paint on the body, whenever that happens. I discovered a rust problem on the left side of the engine compartment near the bottom. There is a piece of sheet metal that sticks out there that has no use other than providing a place to mount the left side apron (which I still haven't found). The rust worm had done its job and the plate was completely eaten through for about 90% of its length. I decided the easiest way to fix it was to drill out the spot welds, remove the damaged plate, use it for a pattern and fabricate a new piece from sheet metal stock. I took pictures but haven't down loaded them yet, maybe tomorrow.

I need to give credit where credit is due. A friend from the Corvair Center forum, screen name "nodice" did it for me using a program called Gimp. How many of you noticed the side trim pieces were moved and the body cove repositioned?