philistine

iTrader: (2)

The OEM dampener/shield covering the transmission area needed to be retired. So I purchased RattleTrap 80mil and installed it to replace the OEM stuff.

Here is a pic of the OEM stuff. It was loose, brittle, and if touched...got airborne with fiberglass material. I wore a mask to remove this and took a good shower afterwards.






Here I am installing the RattleTrap dampening material. You have to cut reliefs to get the air bubbles out and roll it on really tight. I cleaned it thoroughly with brake cleaner. This stuff is really sticky and adheres almost immediately.





I purchased it from Amazon:

Thanks for looking!

punishmentcycle

iTrader: (6)

How's the sound dampening ?

philistine

iTrader: (2)

Quick answer - I don't know yet, car is still in pieces.

I'll do a follow-up and give some impressions. I had some rattles/noise in this area beforehand which were a bit aggravating so I expect an improvement. The OEM stuff was disintegrating and poorly attached.

I had this stuff on my list for my other car, s2k. I purchased enough to do both but in totally different areas.

RADEoN

iTrader: (12)

that stuff is badass for car audio, so i am sure it's going to be better than the OEM by a mile.

tmonttt

iTrader: (10)

Looks good. Mine is also disintegrated, so I plan on doing this whenever the next time the trans is out of the car.

philistine

iTrader: (2)

Thanks! This is reminiscent of my early days of car audio. IASCA competitions in FL...hmm, good times.

jeffrey james

Nicely done. It should make a difference! Just ONE more thing I need to do when I do my Clutch. Thanks alot!!

barrok69

I posted this over on CF so fyi ls1tech folks.

I don't want to come off sounding like a dick.... but you just replaced a heatshield with a sound deadener that is isn't meant to reflect and dissipate the massive amount of heat that gets generated and shoved up in that trans tunnel area. I've used this stuff before inside the cabin of my old car and the tar based backing actually melted off the body from the heat generated inside my car with windows up on a sunny day. I ended up having "drips" of tar running down my pillars and other surfaces (I didn't have trim installed for a while). And at that point the thin aluminized surface just de-bonds and does nothing.

So caution to all... this stuff isn't really meant for exterior of the vehicle. It will end up getting too hot, melt, de-bond and make a nice mess of whatever is underneath it, covering it in gooey tar that is next to impossible to get cleaned up.

Ideally you want a flexible aluminum shelled multi-layer fiberglass piece of insulation that has an air gap to the trans tunnel to dissipate the heat from even getting to the tunnel surface.

BudRacing

iTrader: (3)

Agreed with above ^^

Even putting sound deadening on the underside of the roof can be bad with heat from the sun. I can imagine the heat from the trans tunnel will do some melting as well. I would have gone with DEI heat shielding. Still not perfect, but definitely intended for the purpose.

philistine

iTrader: (2)

Thanks for sharing your experience. I did a test using a piece of 12 gauge stainless steel, the FatMat RattleTrap Extreme 80mils and a Milwaukee 1220 heat gun. The heat gun has 2 settings 750F and 1000F.

Here I have the heat gun about 2 inches away on 750F. The specimen is positioned at 45 degree angle. I heated it for about 15 minutes. With my bare hands I touched the backside of the plate directly behind the RattleTrap material...bad idea, gave me a good blister! The RattleTrap didn't move or become gooey. Wearing gloves, I pushed on the material to see if it was soft and if I could get it to slide off - nothing! It was a bit softer but no goo and would not budge.



Not satisfied, I set the heat gun to high (1000F). I wanted to melt this stuff off! I heated it for another 15 minutes at 2 inches away. The black bonding material began to show some fatigue.


I let it cool down for about 2 minutes. It did not slide down or melt with gooey stuff dripping from around the material. I pinched a corner and decided to rip this stuff off since gravity can't do the job. The stuff looks a little wet when you peel it.






You can draw your own conclusions. I didn't perform a fatigue test at 300-400F. This was just a quick test exposing the material to high temps, 750-1000F. I hope my floor boards don't see that kind of abuse. The material becomes very soft at 1000F for 15 minutes and is quite possible to get some movement.

Another possible application is to reattach the transmission heatshield over the RattleTrap.

Personally, I'm satisfied and gonna take the risk.

Also to correct you, it is a heat shield and not just dampening material - facts are facts!

FuzzyLog1c

iTrader: (4)

I wouldn't have used RattleTrap because of its low design temperature range, but kudos on that nice, neat installation. I suspect that the viscosity of the RattleTrap damper layer will change dramatically with temperature, and will not do its job effectively.

I plan to replace my stock heat shield with two 70 mil Thermo-Tec Suppressor layers. The stuff is sitting in the closet, awaiting other parts. At some point, we'll have to compare notes, philistine. I might do an extra layer on the bellhousing to quiet the twin-disc floater rattle, but we'll see how much material I have left over when I'm done with the tunnel.

philistine

iTrader: (2)

Definitely have to compare. If I get a big gooey mess under there I will definitely rip it out and start over. It's not clear if the Rattle Trap Xtreme is asphalt based or not. I haven't stabbed the transmission back in place yet so I'm thinking of overlaying the Rattle Trap with another material.

The Thermo-Tec looks pretty good. I wonder if applying that over the Rattle Trap will give added heat protection - or I could get tar soup if it doesn't work out.

I originally purchased this for a different car where I have a very beefy sound system and it is going in the interior. Installing this in the transmission funnel was an after thought. I rolled around on the OEM fiberglass dust that spewed out with a face mask when I pulled the transmission. I didn't know whether to F**k or fight after it was over.

9t8z28

iTrader: (19)

I used the same stuff on the interior of my Camaro which never got as hot as the tranny tunnel and it ran all over the place. Make sure you use the tape for duct work on the seams and where it ends. (HVAC guys use it, can't remember the name) (foil tape?)

IdriveaV

iTrader: (5)

Flue Tape!!
I used that to cover and seal up under the passenger seat when I cut a fuel pump access hole. That and some roofing tar and aluminum sheeting

philistine

iTrader: (2)

These are good ideas. I'll post the results...good or bad.

54inches

iTrader: (4)

On a side note about noise. I just replaced my starter with one out of a 6.0(has the ring terminal connection) and then wrapped it in DEI as I was installing headers too.

It is SO quiet now when it starts; the starter that is. No real point, just thought I would share.

philistine

iTrader: (2)

Yeah DEI stuff has been good to me. I'm looking at their "Floor And Tunnel Shield". If I decide to use it then I'll trim the Rattle Trap stuff, tape up the seams with thermal tape and lay the tunnel shield over it. If it holds up, it should provide good dampening from road noise. I never really noticed a heat issue so I can't comment on that.

I'm glad I got some solid feedback posting the pics!

54inches

iTrader: (4)

Yep, I wanted to yank mine down and toss it when I did the clutch, but I decided not too. I wounder if there is any woven(like burlap) fiberglass matting type material that would work.

Best I could find:

http://www.thermotec.com/products/16...at-shield.html

We need this exactly for the CTSV:
http://www.thermotec.com/products/16...at-shield.html

And here it is in universal sizes....
http://www.thermotec.com/products/16...ting-mat-.html

54inches

iTrader: (4)

And another....

http://www.designengineering.com/cat...und-insulation

philistine

iTrader: (2)

Yeah that's the stuff I was looking at. A few reviews gave it high ratings for the ability to reduce radiant and convective heat. The adhesive is good for 450F and the outer surface is good for 1750F. The metal shielding from what I read is more rigid.

The reviews I read come from the Miata forums and they are known for owning auto-x and deal with tunnel heat for racing. That community had some good feedback on DEI floor tunnel and Thermo-Tec - not a lot of feedback but it was all positive.