584 replies to this topic

[RX25SE]

Yep, I'm loving this thread.

Keep up the great work!!

[JDWhiteWRX]

I got some more work done on the weekend, I've welded up most of the dry sump pan now, its not finished because I'm still waiting for the weld on -12 bungs but good enough for me to continue working towards getting the engine mounted in the chassis.



You can see the motor is looking much less tall now.



The lowest point on the engine is now the adapter plate so I have gone to the extra trouble of shaving that down a little for maximum engine lowering.



I have freed up a little extra space in the engine bay by removing these corner brackets. The tube I will be adding to triangulate everything back to the roll cage will be more than enough.



Lots of space now



With the modified sump pan the engine was no longer stable on my home made dolly so I had to make this little bracket to stop it toppling over. You can also see the start of what will become the engine mounts.



So with the engine moved back into position this is the final height it will sit at, I can't go any lower than this.



I started making the front cross-member last night so hopefully soon the engine will be in.

[allpaw4]

Oh hells yes! This is really something. Loving the progress updates! Out of curiousity, is the sideways angle how it will sit once the box is bolted up too? Or will the box sit slightly angled to the left also? I don't have a whole of experience with Toyota stuff.

Edit, should say rolled to the left rather than angled to the left...

Cheers,
Ben

[JDWhiteWRX]

Oh hells yes! This is really something. Loving the progress updates! Out of curiousity, is the sideways angle how it will sit once the box is bolted up too? Or will the box sit slightly angled to the left also? I don't have a whole of experience with Toyota stuff.

Edit, should say rolled to the left rather than angled to the left...

Cheers,
Ben

Thanks Ben, the Honda engine has a lean because normally its in a FWD car in an east/west orientation, they lean them back a little towards the firewall, I guess so its not too tall. The box is actually bolted up in the last photo above, there are more photos on the previous page too.

BMW also mount their straight six with a lean and since the gearbox is from a BMW you have to retain this lean otherwise the shifter would not be level.

I contacted the place that makes the engine to gearbox adaptor plate and asked them if they could make me a zero tilt adaptor but they wouldn't. After receiving it I can see why, the position of the starter motor if rotated around further would not really work.

Joel.

[RX25SE]

Solid mounting for engine and gearbox?

[JDWhiteWRX]

Solid mounting for engine and gearbox?

Almost, I'm using heavy duty leaf spring poly bushings in a shackle style mount. The idea is to just take the edge off the vibrations but still have minimal movement.

 

If I want to change to solid later I can simply get some nylon to replace the poly.

[RX25SE]

Ah, ok.
Good idea!

[allpaw4]

Oh of course. Should have remembered that you were going Honda... Just saw the inline four and thought it looked like the Toyota blacktop 20V, which I know quite a few people using them in various motorsport applications. Makes sense now you explain it like that!

Cheers,
Ben

[JDWhiteWRX]

I have been working on the front cross-member this week. 

 

Starting off with a single tube that joins the existing lower control arm mounts. This tube needed to drop down to a specific height and it was incredibly difficult to make but turned out perfect.

 

 

There will be a second tube coming from further back which picks up some existing chassis mounts. I made these sections for joining that tube to the chassis.

 

 

 

I then decided to fabricate my shock mounts as they are sharing the same space as the first cross tube and their position can't be moved.

 

 

They are just tacked in place for now. I will box them in a bit for added strength at a later date.

 

 

I decided to test fit the shocks too

 

 

Looks pretty cool with the inboard suspension

 

I've tacked the first cross tube in place too to make sure it doesn't move around whilst I'm making up the rest of the tubes.

 

[RX25SE]

Looks like the cross-member has more than one radius in the bends?

[El_Freddo]

I initially thought that cross beam was a sway bar and “geez, that’s a bit low”. Then I realised what it was and had to remind myself this vehicle won’t be negotiating street obstacles let alone anything off-road (my vehicle’s orientation)!

You’re right about the inboard suspension, looks sick! Good thing you’re not running the flat four!

Cheers

Bennie

[JDWhiteWRX]

Looks like the cross-member has more than one radius in the bends?

No just one.

I initially thought that cross beam was a sway bar and geez, thats a bit low. Then I realised what it was and had to remind myself this vehicle wont be negotiating street obstacles let alone anything off-road (my vehicles orientation)!

Youre right about the inboard suspension, looks sick! Good thing youre not running the flat four!

Cheers

Bennie

Ground clearance will be 50mm at the lowest point, it has about 35mm of bump travel and yes the car will have a full flat floor eventually.

[JDWhiteWRX]

Mega update time!

 

I have been very busy working on the car.

 

First off, the dry sump pan is all done. Since my last post I added all the weld-on bungs required. 2 scavenge stage bungs which accept a -12 AN fitting with mesh filter screen and the -10 AN turbo drain.

 

 

 

 

turbo oil drain

 

 

These are actually M4 Rivnuts that I flash tacked on with the Tig. I needed something to hold down the small windage tray I made.

 

 

This is the finished pan, it has been painted with engine enamel which has been baked in the oven for an hour.

 

 

 

 

I'm very happy with how good it turned out and it cost me very little money to make.

[JDWhiteWRX]

Next up was the continued work on the front crossmember. 

 

I notched out a bunch of tubes and tack welded them in place on the car before removing it so I could weld it all together with the comfort of my work bench.

 

To do this without everything moving I had to build a jig.

 

 

It came together quickly with the hot glue gun (Mig)

 

 

 

Before welding the crossmember together I had to finish of the shock mounts. I had to fully weld them to the tube and then add some gussets using CAD.

 

 

 

The gusset also joins them to the main cross-tube to stiffen the mounts up some more

 

 

and then it was just a whole lot of welding

 

 

 

one of my better welds

 

 

and here it is all done on the car

 

 

With that finished I have something to build my engine mounts onto. Next job will be putting the engine into its final position and building the mounts.

[El_Freddo]

Geez you make this look easy!

It must be super satisfying bolting it to the car and it all “just works” as you made it to! Looks very mint.

Cheers

Bennie

[Barbbachello]

[RX25SE]

That sump looks epic!

[allpaw4]

Oh wow. That's insanely good man! Looks like it's really starting to come together now. That said, there's usually just as much, if not more, small crap to finish as there is in the major stuff like this. Really hanging out to see how everything sits with it all together. Gonna be a weapon.

[JDWhiteWRX]

Work continues on getting the engine mounted into the car.

 

Start off by getting some paint onto the new crossmember.

 

 

Then onto engine mount fabrication. I'm using heavy duty leaf spring bushes which fit perfectly into some 42mm pipe. I had to make up some cradles to hold the bushes on the crossmember.

 

 

 

The next step took a long time with the minimal equipment I have available in my garage. I had to get the engine into the precise position it needs to be in before I could start welding on the engine mounts.

 

I rolled it into position on my dolly but then had to use the engine crane to lift it up and slide the dolly out. Getting it to lower back down resting on some specific thickness timber blocks was the hard part, it needed to be millimeter perfect and the crane does not lift it very level at all so I had to wrestle it into position.

I have a laser pointer clamped to the output shaft of the gearbox so I can see how it is aligned to the rear differential. This is a pretty critical alignment to get right.

 

Many hours later I had it in the correct position with the crossmember bolted up underneath.

 

 

I put my engine mounts where they needed to be to line up with the plates on the motor and marked their position. I then removed the crossmember so I could do all the welding on my bench.

 

 

Next was the welding and adding a few gussets.

 

 

 

 

With that all done I touched up the paint on the crossmember and put it back on the car.

 

 

 

 

That's about where I ran out of time once again. There is probably another days work to join the shackle mounts up to the plates on the engine using some tube.

 

After that its just the gearbox mount that needs to be done.

[allpaw4]

Nice man. Really loving the amount of work involved and the attention to detail. Keep it up!

What size tube are you using for the engine mounts? I'd expect this to be fairly meaty?

Cheers,
Ben