On a cmc louvre deck lid there is not an inlet for air to get to the engine. Is there any benefit in cutting or drilling holes to allow for air intake flow through the louvres or is it not necessary? If it is a good idea then I need suggestions on where to cut or drill the inlets.
Thank you,
Renfrance
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If you were to measure the square inch of the grill vs the square inches of the left and right openings under the deck lid the openings are larger. You could do additional opens. 
Do you mean louvers like this lid? (Don't recall CMC offering them back in '90s).
Yes - you could leave the rain shield (center portion) and Dremel out the lower portion of each louver.
Renfrance.....post a photo of the underside ofyour engine bonnet........Bruce
Under the grill on the engine cover is what's called a "Rain Tray".
If it was properly made during the car build, then there should be big openings on either side (left/right) of that rain tray to allow air from the grill into the engine compartment. If they are not there, then it's relatively easy to cut them out, using a Dremel tool and a 3/16" rotary hasp. It's probably best to just free-hand it, if you have a steady hand, but I would expect you to find them, instead.
Let me know if you need a photo of what they're supposed to look like and I'll take a shot for you.
@Gordon Nichols posted:If they are not there, then it's relatively easy to cut them out, using a Dremel tool and a 3/16" rotary hasp.
Important to note to anyone doing this: Make sure you use an honest to goodness N95* mask or, better yet, a true ANSI-approved respirator to do this. Inhaling glass fiber is extremely harmful to your lungs. AFAIK, it’s not a carcinogen like Asbestos, but like asbestos once it gets in your lungs it stays there.
After I watched the safety films at school, I wear an N95 mask even when I drill fiberglass.
*There are numerous YouTube videos about how to insure your mask is fitted properly and doing what it’s supposed to do. Pointless to wear one if it’s not fitted and properly sealed.
Wish I'd have known that yesterday when I was sanding fiberglass (gelcoat).
@Lane Anderson posted:Wish I'd have known that yesterday when I was sanding fiberglass (gelcoat).
Sorry. Sanding is (slightly) less dangerous, because of less airborne particles than a rotary grinder, but still.
I think gel coat might be less dangerous than airborne glass particles, but inhaling anything other that fresh air is a health risk.
I failed to wear a mask when drilling a couple of holes a few days ago. I must have inhaled some because I could smell it.
Thanks for the reminder.
Don't do as I did by not giving serious though about the effects of casual body work, primers and finish coats. For a quick coat of primer on a fender etc. I would hold a shop rag against my face, for big applications I'd upgrade to a near worthless paper mask. Do wear a mask even hand sawing or buffing a small piece in a vise, sweeping the floor ( mask on) and do hose the garage floor clean often. Forty five years later it has, caught up with me. Sucks to have coughing spasms when you're trying to have a conversation or laughing and when it gets bad enough, have to breath into a wet hot wash cloth to calm the coughing spasms. Then there's the Rx inhalers even with insurance are costly but do help.....some. Everyone has cleaned parts (and our hands) with brake cleaner, lacquer thinner etc. Skin tissue absorption has serious health consequences too. Keep in mind that both lung & organ damage are irreversible ... Period !
good advice, dont forget ur ears too,,plugs are cheap insurance
I'm still on a life-long study program thru USC. I get checked every 5 years. The study started back in 1979 when it was thought that Stoddard Solvent is a hazardous material. Now it is. Anyway the only thing they think I may have developed from using that stuff daily for parts washing is a first stage heart block. It hasn't gotten any worse in 10+ years. When I die they will do a very thorough scientific autopsy. There were 30 of us in the original group. Half are already gone. They don't tell us what they find.
I kinda think that a lot of us are still here in spite of all the dumb things we did when much younger.
Personally, I look back on dumb stuff I did and am AMAZED that I've lasted this long.
@aircooled Bruce just reminded me of some solvent I used to clean ink platens on old, mechanical cash registers when I was in my teens working for National Cash Register for a year. I can't remember the name of the stuff, but any callouses on your hands just dissolved over time to smooth skin. Made my high voltage RF burns from my Ham Radio transmitter just melt away. Only decades later did they ban the stuff for being carcinogenic.
Carbon tetrachloride? I remember playing with mercury - coating pennies to look like dimes. Melting lead to make fishing sinkers and toy soldiers. Playing with lead toy soldiers (don't recall chewing on them). Living in 150 year old house with lead paint and asbestos. Replacing brake components using air compressor to blow out dust. Both parents smoked Camels when I was young. Washing out my sail boat cabin (mold/dirt) using bleach and laundry detergent (nasty chlorine gas cloud inside). Washing engine parts bare handed with gasoline/kerosene and eventually Varsol. I was going to paint a car with IMRON (but they wouldn't sell it to me - takes full body suit and pumped in air respirator). Remember grinding off pounds of Bondo body filler with no mask. Cutting pressure treated lumber with no mask or gloves - burning left over wood. Cough, wheeze, sniffle.
I could have been a Carl Sagan or Albert Einstein --- save for these mis-steps.
When I was a kid, every time we went to the dentist he gave us mercury to take home and play with. We too coated pennies.
Not to mention that a lot of the Amalgam made up by dentists for use as fillings had/has Mercury as a big component: "Dental amalgam is a mixture of metals, consisting of liquid (elemental) mercury and a powdered alloy composed of silver, tin, and copper. Approximately half (50%) of dental amalgam is elemental mercury by weight."
Mercury is considered to be a "Heavy Metal". "There are 35 metals that are of concern for us because of residential or occupational exposure, out of which 23 are heavy metals: antimony, arsenic, bismuth, cadmium, cerium, chromium, cobalt, copper, gallium, gold, iron, lead, manganese, mercury, nickel, platinum, silver, tellurium, thallium, tin, uranium, vanadium, ..."
So we all carried on our lives, slowly getting Mercury into our systems..... Yes, I know that the FDA says the amount of Mercury in those fillings is trivial to our health, but how do we know for sure? They once thought Asbestos was safe, too.
My current dentist uses a mix of powdered ceramic and "non-toxic adhesive/binder" of some sort. I wonder what I'm gonna catch from that?
carbon tet, came in army green spray cans and grease cans....used in electronics for cleaning components,,,we used it to clean everything in Nam,,,electrical, grease on equipment,clean ur hands, insect spray,crotch rot, toilets ...this stuff works wonders...
then there is agent orange..didnt know it was around..lost 2 of my best buddies both from LA "Big Mac" and "Beaner" within 5 years of getting home in early 72..massive organ failure...such a shame
The first sound company I worked for kept me employed full time by running their speaker reconing dept. I used MEK to dissolve the old glue on the surrounds. No mask, no gloves, no eye protection. Along with all the various and sundry gasoline, kerosene, brake cleaner parts washing over the years.
No known issues, yet, except I have to be really careful with brake cleaner and parts washer fluid now. If I get it on my hands, I suffer from about 24 hours of horrible cramps.
But due to my asthma, I have to be really careful about inhaling particulates. I don’t even go outside when the 2.5 or Ozone numbers are up. (Which has been a bitch this summer. I’ve only driven the Spider twice since May.)
@Gordon Nichols posted:@aircooled Bruce just reminded me of some solvent I used to clean ink platens on old, mechanical cash registers when I was in my teens working for National Cash Register for a year. I can't remember the name of the stuff, but any callouses on your hands just dissolved over time to smooth skin. Made my high voltage RF burns from my Ham Radio transmitter just melt away. Only decades later did they ban the stuff for being carcinogenic.
Trichloroethylene, probably. TCE for short.
Yeah that stuff was bad. Besides ink, it was the other stuff newspapers bought by the barrel. In Central Florida (and I'm sure elsewhere) those barrels eventually got kicked into open pits and buried. Plenty of lawsuits resulted, but surprisingly little news coverage...
Lived in Trenton NJ as a kid - used to go surf fishing in in Seaside with my dad. We'd drive thru the Jersey Pine Barrens for 30 miles and see tanker trucks pumping that stuff into the sand along the road. Never did see the Jersey Devil.
At the old VW shop in NJ we had three cleaning solution barrels along the wall the first was Safety Clean, the second was a mild caustic soda and the third, God only knows what was in that one ( we called it Hoffa Juice) it's where I set a crankshaft in and forgot about it over a weekend, come Monday AM it was 2/3rds.........gone .
Hoffa juice 😂
I used to suck on the pennies to remove the tarnish, then rub the mercury on ! Used to chew paraffin and tar too ! How bout eat a raw onion like an apple ? Or Ruhbarb right out of the garden, dip it in salt, then eat.........Bruce
I chewed wax. I remember people chewing tar at the time but I don't think I ever did. I ate rhubarb without salt.
You guys are both sick puppies………. 
Tar? 
Sounds like the “Day’s Work” chewing tobacco my uncle Waldo used to chew. It came in a cake (he called it a “plug”) about the size of a pack of cigarettes and you just gnawed off however much you wanted.
I tried that stuff once (just once).
@edsnova I’ve been trying to remember the name of my NCR stuff, but c’mon….That was, like, 50 years ago. I have trouble remembering things from last year!
It’ll pro’bly come to me in the middle of the night (and then I’ll forget it again by the time I get up in the morning). Such is the life of an auld phart. It was some really rugged solvent!
Many decades ago I worked at a lumber company with a slight man about 5'4" and weighing around 140 lbs. he was 74. "Mose " could do the work of a 23 y/ o ( me) and every Monday by hand, we off loaded 538 - 94 lb. bags of Portland cement. I had all I could to to keep up with him, Mose ate a large sweet onion like an apple every day after lunch, he lived a healthy life until his passing at 96. He would tell tales of farm work from when he was in his early 20's when he would drive horses that pulled a manure spreader even when temps were below freezing. When done, he would un- hitch the horses bringing them back into the barn. However his overalls would accumulate a few inches of frozen manure and that's where the other farm hands came into play as they would beat the frozen manure off of Mose until he was able to get out of the overalls....Mose said that's where the phrase "They beat the shyt out of me".... originated :~)
I was born in and grew up in Battle Creek, Michigan, home of the breakfast cereal industry.
When in college I worked summers in the Ralston factory. Because there was a danger of explosions from grain dust, smoking was prohibited. So, many workers chewed. Occasionally, some offered me a chew. It would bother my mother when she would see me with a chew in my mouth after work.
I spent two summers during high school working in the aluminum extrusion and anodizing sections of a plant that made screen doors.
The anodizing tank area wasn't well ventilated and there were gloves, but no masks anywhere.
That may account for the 3'' blue tail I have grown.
@Panhandle Bob posted:I spent two summers during high school working in the aluminum extrusion and anodizing sections of a plant that made screen doors.
The anodizing tank area wasn't well ventilated and there were gloves, but no masks anywhere.
That may account for the 3'' blue tail I have grown.
Look on the bright side: you’ll always be able to get work with the circus if things really go sideways.
—or sign on with the Anti-vax movement! They'll help you monetize that tail.
