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If it’s the same process it’s very affordable & comes out looking bolt on ready to mimic the O.E. finish.. May not be for some of our NCRS cars but u can decide on that?
If it’s the same process it’s very affordable & comes out looking bolt on ready to mimic the O.E. finish.. May not be for some of our NCRS cars but u can decide on that?
good luck, Chalie
Rocket priced out two valve covers for my 61 at $100 plus shipping. Sounds reasonable to me.
If it’s the same process it’s very affordable & comes out looking bolt on ready to mimic the O.E. finish.. May not be for some of our NCRS cars but u can decide on that?
Vapor hone sounds like a marketing term for wet blasting.
Vapor Honing may very well be a marketing term for wet blasting, but whatever it is, I have been very pleased with the results. It is difficult to find someone who has the equipment and the setup to do it. I have heard that it is a relatively new process (the last ten or 15 years only) but I could be mistaken on that. If it is made out of aluminum, I am taking it to my vapor honing guy.
60$ to do an intake manifold. About a quarter of the price to send it away and have it "reskinned" or blasted (or rolled in a giant tumbling machine) filled with some unnamed tumbling media (walnuts/glass beads perhaps?). A couple of pictures below. The Tri Power on the right had been vapor honed for $60. The one on left was vapor honed at a later date and now looks just as good. Also a picture of the one on the right now installed.
C.J.
Last edited by C2Scho; 10-15-2023 at 03:11 PM.
Reason: Add some verbiage
I have had a number of my C2 friends (who are older than I) take a look at the intake manifolds and the small block valve covers and they were impressed with the results. They felt that they looked brand new original but many of us are too old to clearly remember exactly what that looks like. The aluminum texture was maintained and not smoothed out or altered by the water.
The best thing to do would be to send a sample piece of aluminum to the vapor honing guy of your choosing and see what you think of the result when it comes back to you. C.J.
I looked at as many videos on YouTube as there were available before I pulled the trigger. Search on "Vapor Honing Technology" or Technologies. Research it on the internet and look for listings of shops or individuals who do it and see if there happens to be one near you.
There is a website connected to a vapor honing equipment sales center that listed all of the shops that do it in the United States or that they have sold their equipment to. That's how I found my guy.
It makes it really worth it if you can drive to the shop and drop off a couple of intake manifolds and a couple sets of valve covers. Shipping costs can sometimes be the great cost savings equalizer. Packing everything in shipping boxes is no fun either.
The guy who did the vapor honing for me is the owner of a shop that restores old motorcycles. He got a kick out of the fact that a car guy was coming to him for vapor honing. C.J.
This vapor honing process produces a beautiful, uniform surface appearance. No question about that.
However, in my experience, fresh, as-cast aluminum has a random, slightly iridescent appearance which no restoration process I'm aware of has so far been able to duplicate.
I also offer vapor honing service. I’m in Finland, so much use for my friends in the US. But for those that are interested in this process,in my next GS project update there will be a section dedicated to vapor honing and also another section for cerakote coating.
10-12-2023, 10:51 AM
