Worked on Baffle Connecting Rods

The bottom of the baffles need to be tied together to keep them tight against the cylinder fins.  You can either do this by using safety wire through some washers (to keep the safety wire from sawing through the aluminum baffles) and a piece of plastic tubing (to keep the safety wire from sawing through the cylinder head oil return lines.  I’m sure this works fine, but it seems pretty cheesy.  The other suggested approach is to use some stainless steel rod, bent to clear the cylinder head oil return lines and threaded for 6-32 nuts on each end.  I got started by fabricating the left outboard connecting rod.  This needed to be a little longer than the plans specified, and the angle of the bends at each end differs from the plans to make the threaded ends sit perpendicular to the baffle flanges.  I installed the optional plastic tubing to ensure that there would be no abrasion if this contacted the oil return line.  I tried threading the end, but the shitty Harbor Freight tap and die set I have is really junk.  I basically stripped the threads on the 6-32 die.  This junk is okay for creating threads on aluminum, but I need a decent tap and die set to do stainless steel.

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