making spark plug holes in Hemi valve covers

[danman6677]

whats the easiest way to make the holes for the wires in the Hemi valve covers?

[Danno]

With a drill.

[Pete J.]

More specifically, a pin vise and set of wire gauge drill bits.

[John Pol]

That is the easy part what is hard tomake the right boots for the spark plugs.

John Pol

[ScaleDale]

Use a very small pin vise bit to make pilot holes, but make a template first. Take an existing valve cover and measure the spacing and placement of the holes and mark them on a strip of styrene. Drill this and use it as the template. Maybe clamp or glue blocks to it on either end of where the cover will fit to make sure the holes are in the same spots on each side of the pair. Use the small holes as guides for any larger holes depending on what size wire you use. Boots are really optional for a model. Do them if you really want to do the detailing thing.

If you Google How to Make Spark Plug boots for Models, some Aussie dude on YouTube will show you how.

Dale

[High octane]

A pin vise and drill bits are the easiest way. "Back-in-the-day" we used to heat up a straight pin over an open flame to use to make holes in the head or valve covers for spark plug wires which were made of sewing thread pulled through wax to get rid of the fuzz.

[Blown03SVT]

That is the easy part what is hard tomake the right boots for the spark plugs.

John Pol

Alot of the Hemi's I have seen in scale have the boots molded in to the valve cover. So it could be as easy as drilling the hole for the spark wire, paint detail the boot on the valve cover and install the wire.

[Danno]

Alot of the Hemi's I have seen in scale have the boots molded in to the valve cover. So it could be as easy as drilling the hole for the spark wire, paint detail the boot on the valve cover and install the wire.

Use a tiny amount of epoxy to install the wire perpendicular to the valve cover, then as bend the wire to a 90-degree angle at the valve cover and apply a small dab of the epoxy over the hole, creating a tiny mound of epoxy covering the hole and the emerging wire. Once the epoxy sets, paint it semigloss black or dark gray, or if you're getting really dressy, paint it whatever color you want that matches your plug wires.

[Harry P.]

Please post questions in the question and answer section.

[Art Anderson]

Bear in mind that the plugs in a Chrysler Hemi are down beneath the level of the tops of the valve covers. Hemi valve covers have a metal tube for each plug that is a good 2" or more in diameter, crimped into the sheet metal valve cover at the top and with a fairly wide flange at the bottom where the tubes meet the cylinder head.

Early Hemi's (1951-1958) were often used by rodders without the wiring looms installed (those long raised ridges screwed to the valve covers on the first generation Hemi's (Chrysler, Desoto and Dodge), and they used no rubber boots back then to align the wires or keep dirt or debris out of the tubes--the plug leads simply went down into the tubes, and snapped onto the top of the plugs.

Art