I decided that these could really do with a new coat of paint, with Dave Shaeffer offering his services again it seemed like a prime opportunity. With some success I found a local shop to do the stripping, they used aircraft paint stripper and then media blasted whatever was left.
They did a much better job than I could have, can't wait to get the painted items back.
OK, Painted items arrive !!! What a huge improvement, if I was to do this again I would do prep work including filling the casting imperfections. Maybe when I get around to doing the intake :-)
While the castings were gone I took a good look at the bolts & washers for the cam covers, pretty naff looking, like most parts in the engine bay looked like they had seen better days. Well new bolts are approx $20 a piece, replacing wasn't an option.
At work we use plating companies to provide a finish on enclosures, I went down with the bolts/washers and said could they do anything, sure they could zinc plate and they had a minimum $45 charge. Hmmm, OK i'll be back with more. Took anything I could easily remove and bought the lot back, I was going to do silver and then they said they have a gold finish (yellow chromate) that would match the original. Aggghhh too many choices, OK gold then.
With hindsight should have done silver ... anyway here are the parts I had plated.
For comparison here is the throttle assembly before. 
On refitting the cam covers I also decided to sort the cam end plugs out, after having checked the other rubber plugs that block the oilways last year sometime the casting had been leaking oil. In the manual it clearly states to use Loctite 574 for the metal to metal surface. Anyway I had read somewhere this wasn't necessary, MISTAKE !!! When dis-assembled it was plain to see the oil had been leaking at this point.
On
the 2nd pic you should be able to see traces of the Loctite, maybe come in handy
when I have to split the block someday .....
While all this was apart also fitted an Adjustable Fuel Pressure Regulator (AFPR) and new fuel dampers.
Here are a couple of shots with camcovers in the engine, notice how the intake stands out ....
To complete this job I also bought some injection rail covers too, one of the cheaper purchases :-)