Tuesday, September 6, 2011

initial

Something I would do differently - install the clutch and clean up the heater hose tubing before installing the engine for the first time. Although remote, there's a possibility that I may not have had to remove the engine during the motor mount design/build if not for these 2 things. I was able to position, measure, and build a mock set of engine and transmission mounts relatively quickly with some amount of precision. After all the effort of getting the engine off the stand onto the hoist, moving the transmission across the garage, squatting the transmission up, attaching it to he engine, hoisting it all into the car, and positioning it all by my lonesome in 1oo* weather, I can honestly say I didn't want to pull her back out.

Notes on Position: The shifter sat right in the center of the shifter hole; the bell housing followed the lines of the transmission tunnel snugly barely leaving room for fuel and brake lines; the valve cover sits low and tucked underneath the hood latch; the rear of the oil pan sits extremely low but the trans is almost completely hidden from below; the speed-o sensor and opposing side of the transmission hit the inner car side tunnel mounts inadvertently centering the motor-set during installation; the oil filter clears the engine frame rail by a finger width (good excuse for an oil filter relocation kit by the first oil change if it turns out it can't be removed without lifting the engine); the knot of an exhaust manifold loops around the steering column artfully; the front of the oil pan cleared the steering rack on the driver side by less than a finger width and more on the passenger side (good thing the engine torques clockwise) ; the turbo looked like it may clear the hood once installed; incredible amount of room between engine and radiator core support; the wastegate sits close between the frame rail and the car side engine mount.
 






I had to support the motor-set mid installation and undo the engine hoist because I originally set the chains on the last spark plug bolt for the best leverage when hoisting. Apparently it wasn't adequate for installation as it was hitting the hood latch in the engine bay and would not let me move the engine as far back as everything else seemed to allow. After I was able to move the rear hoist chain forward with the use of supporting blocks, a jack, and several carefully placed pieces of 2x4's, the engine fit in perfectly.
















 
Once positioned forward to aft and vertically, I placed some pieces of wood between the engine and the car to position it correctly in the horizontal plane (imagine a fish and it's tail moving) and then to angle it correctly with respect to the top face of the transmission shifter hole (imagine the same fish spinning on it's axis). As it turns out, in order to get the shifter hole flat I had to angle the engine about 3* towards the driver side resulting in the transmission mount angling 3* towards the passenger side. I don't have an explanation for this. I briefly thought of forcing it flat but did not want to induce stress in either the motor-set or the body (no fish analogy, just a strain curve).










After some negotiation, when the engine was in the perfect position, I started to build the mock mounts. I was able to quickly make some 2" diameter engine mounts out of cardboard that were 2" tall. I taped a rectangle piece of cardboard on it in order to simulate the isolators and the bottom piece of the engine side mount and taped the whole semi-solid structure to the car car side mount, centered around its bolt hole. I then bolted the engine side plates to the engine which I had made a few weeks prior in a machine shop. As a procedure note, it's easier to do this when the engine is out of the car, but it didn't matter because I had to pull them in and out several times anyways. They were loose in the direction of the bolts, because even at 1/4" thick, the metal was still thinner than the cast stock mount and the bolts bottomed out in the block. If you run into this do not force them, for the final installation use washers to make up the difference in thickness, but when measuring make sure the plate is in it's final installation position, flat against the engine block.

At this point the fun began. The engine mounts are essentially 2d, while in the same respect, the transmission mount, which I will get to later, is 3d. Once you have the engine plate and car plate portions of the mount in place, all you have to deal with are the perpendicular connector lengths and weld locations. Based on where the engine was positioned relative to the car, the car side end and engine side end of each connector had to be cut at a precise angle and location relative to each other. This would hold the angle and vertical position of the engine in the car. The connectors then have to be welded to the engine and car side mounts at similarly precise locations in order to hold the current forward to aft position of the engine in the car.






While spending more time than I should under the car on my back with the kitchen scissors and a flashlight, I was able to cut a rectangular-ish polygon that fit between both plates snugly. The connector pieces are identical per side but different on either side. MARK THEM CLEARLY - side and orientation. I then went and marked the car side and engine side plates with forward and aft weld positions for the connectors. I had to pull the engine plate and car side mock mount out several times in order to confirm the correct location. Watch out marking the same side of the cardboard for each end of the connector on the respective plate, it does have a thickness. For example, if you were to mark the engine side plate on the forward side of the connector and the car side plate on the aft side of the connector and you lined up those points both on the aft side of your 1/4" thick connector, you would have effectively moved the engine a 1/4" aft. Also note the differences in thickness between the cardboard pieces and your actual metal, as well as your actual isolator height, and perpendicularity, or lack there of, of your cardboard mock up. My engine position was so close to hitting things that the mounts had to be as exact as possible or the engine would not fit back in as planned or otherwise.




It was easier to mark what I call the limiting connector first on both the engine plate and car plate. If this falls in line correctly, the other connector simply sits where it needs to and you can use it to double check your measuring marks. The forward connector was between bolt holes on the engine side and next to a bolt hole on the car side, so of the two, this one needed to be on location first. The rearward connector could simply be placed somewhere after the holes toward the other end of the the mounts. Assuming everything was perpendicular, once the forward mount was welded, the rear mount would fit, or conversely, if both connectors were welded to one plate at the same time, the opposing side should rest flat and be able to be welded easily. This is what I meant by 2d. You are only controlling 2 dimensions in an obviously 3d structure since your engine side and car side plates were fixed.




Once the connector plates, car side plates, and weld locations marked on car and engine side plates, I traced them onto paper full size and dimensioned them with respect to an x-y axis. Datum structure is important because if you measure, and subsequently cut, from different sides every time, your tolerances will easily stack up and your part will not fit as designed. This is especially important when cutting the precise hole pattern in plates that required it. Dimensioning was easy with respect to the engine mounts because the car and engine side plates each had one "uncut" perpendicular x and y side. The connectors on the engine mounts did not have holes at all so it was even less important for them. The same can not be said for the transmission mounts, several pieces of which did not have any uncut perpendicular x-y edges to call o,o.






At this point I also machined the transmission mounts, the build process of which will be explained later. Bam.

I used a band saw and a mill to cut out the pieces I needed. Note: it sounds like a tuning fork if you have to extend your cutting edge longer than it is wide away from the vice. Plan out your cuts and datums before showing up at the machine shop. The instructor doing you a favor may become agitated if you are not prepared to his standard, which although you may not believe it, is a good thing. Thankfully, most machinists love talk talk about your project and have great input, take advantage of this. Finally, regardless of what you had actually planned, it's going to take twice as long to build the first time.





After the pieces were cut I took them to the tig welder for assembly. This time instead of tig welding as on the suspension columns, stick welding was the method of choice. We had simple 1/4" thick rolled steel, all the same thickness with simple perpendicular connections. With an experienced welder, it looks amazing, takes 1/4 the time, is incredibly strong, and is that much cheaper!





I've learned it's difficult to plan when dealing with various people (vendors for lack of a better word). Most have flexible schedules, but it's entertaining juggling time and personalities while stretching patience across the board.

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