Working on a freinds car. Installed drop in pistons and rods. New FP Red setup. And new ETS intercooler with upper and lower pipes.

After the engine work was completed and running again the e-bay intercooler was replaced with the new ETS kit. During the install of Tial valve I peered inside the upper pipe to make sure the rubber oring seal didnt get pinched. It was then I spotted this shard stuck to the inside of the last turn. I thought what the heck is that? I touched it with my finger and the shard popped off. Turns out this shard was a result of the mandrel bend process. I guess the bender has to scrape the pipe as it bends the metal.

I did inspect the pipes and remove shipping peanuts upon arrival. I didnt notice the shard then. I feel very, very lucky I caught this. Very good chance this peice of metal could have damaged the motor or turbo or both.

Dont know if ETS normally inspects the insides of the pipes. But I think its a very good idea for the consumer to thoroughly check before an install.

disaster waiting to happen

 

luckily u found it

 

Yeah that could have been ugly.

 

good catch!

 

Are the pipes coated? It looks to be a piece of powder coat from the coating rack. You said it was on the inside bend? I will have a meeting with the shipping department and coating department to make sure this doesn't happen again.

Thanks for heads up.

Michael

 

That kind of crap can happen for sure. The mandrel bending process is not a clean one. The tubing has a pretty thick coating of water soluable grease in it (from our benders) when we get them. Most of the tubing is cut to length, hole sawed for bungs/BOV flanges etc., and of course debured. It makes a mess inside the tubing and all that machining "stuff" ends up stuck inside the tubing in the grease. We send every piece of tubing we ship out of here that's used for any type of intake tubing through an aggressive cleaner and a large round brush is passed through each pipe to completely remove the grease and anything else that could be left in them. It's a lot of extra work to do but there really is no choice, you don't want that stuff in your engine.

Good catch.

 

Nice catch. I've always double checked that type of stuff because of an odd experience with my brother. Just a quick visual inspection as well as blowing air through it from a compressor.

He decided to slap his IC pipes on. I showed up at the point where he was about to start the car. He started it and it would rev really high. I checked the throttle body and the plate wouldn't close. Took the pipe off and there was a wad of paper. Took it all out and it was the install directions from TurboXS. xD

Luckily I got all the pieces out and made sure it was all there, but wow that was hilarious.

The best part was my drunk neighbor coming over to see what the problem was. Like he had any idea what the hell he was doing.

 

Wow, great thing you found that. That could have definitely done some damage.

 

Haha that's exactly what my neighbor does all the time, he is unemployeed and every time I work on my car he comes out hammered lol and starts acting like he knows what's going on lol

 

The pipes are coated. But the shard is magnetic. It was right at the end of the bend on inside. You can see where the machine was scraping the pipe to make the bend. The shard was at the end of the scrape.

 

great catch!!!

 

Close one!

 

I always double check everything connected to the inlet system just because of things like this. Good catch!

 

nice catch

 

It looks to be excess powder coat on our rack. It's kind of crazy that it would be magnetic though.

We have a very detailed cleaning process, so i'm very surprised that this slipped through the cracks.

Here is a quick run down on our process.

• We cut the tubes to length.
• Debur the tubes.
• Clean the tubes.
• The tubes then go on on the mandrel bender (brass mandrel)
• We then fit the pipes on the jig.
• Weld brackets and bov flanges.
• Debur/Port the piping.

The pipes can go 2 ways from here

Brushing/Polishing

• we have the guys brush or polish the pipe

3 Stage Cleaning

• Degrease soak
• Brush/clean pipe
• Solvent soak
• Brush/clean pipe
• Water rinse/dry

Pipes moved from shop to shipping area and QC for pin holes, scratches, etc.

Coated Pipes

On the rack for coating then coated.

3 Stage Cleaning

• Degrease soak
• Brush/clean pipe
• Solvent soak
• Brush/clean pipe
• Water rinse/dry

Once they are cleaned and coated they go into the shipping area for QC for pin holes, scratches, etc

then shipped

There is no excuse for the piece showing up to your location that way, the last guy to check the pipes prior to shipment should have found it. It shouldn't be any type of metal, just extra powder coat from the rack. The shop brought in a piece off the rack and it looks exactly the same.

We are very sorry about this and encourage everyone to look at there products prior to installation. Problems like this don't happen often, but they can happen.

Michael