Engine & Transmission Removal No.1

A wise man told me that before I finished the build I would take the engine out and reinstall it several times.....so 2 weeks after it was installed, here is the first removal. This was bought about for a few reasons. Firstly, I had to replace the starter motor with a Mazda unit to match the lightened flywheel. This new starter motor had some alloy shoulders that prevented it being mounted on its posts and engaging correctly with the bell housing. Secondly, I needed to measure where the hole in the transmission tunnel would be for the electrical loom going into the fuse box. Lastly I wanted to add the gearbox oil and check the seals. This removal only took a little over an hour and a quarter, but I imagine it will be a lot longer with full electrical, a fuel system and a cooling system all connected.

Here is the bell housing where the starter motor mounts. It needed to be notched and filed down on the two corners where it mates with the engine block. In removing the gearbox I also found that one of the CSC bolts had sheared off (over torqued to many times while fitting), so I replaced all three of these to be safe. Half an hour of filing and refitting the starter motor and I had the notches I needed. From here it was simply a case of refitting the gearbox to the motor (easier done with two people) and re-torquing all of the bolts on the bell housing. 

While I had the gearbox on the bench, I filled it with oil (Castrol Syntrax 75W90 fully-synthetic). This is far easier than doing in the car and I dread having to get the filler plug out from within the passenger footwell in the future.

I had also marked up a 50mm hole in the side of the transmission tunnel before the engine came out, so I used a hole saw to cut this out from within the fuse box. This will have a sealed grommet fitted one the ECU is mounted and the cables are routed. I also got to fix up a few bits of bodywork in the engine bay that needed to be modified, trimmed and riveted after the first engine fitting.

So after all those mods and tweaks, the engine and transmission went back in (in an hour and a quarter). I now know what sequence to put the mounts on to get the best fit, and which cross braces and brackets to remove. Only problems remaining are that the main bolt for the flexible gearbox mount is not lining up, I have small oil leak from the seal at the back of the gearbox output shaft when the car is inclined. I will deal with those and fit the starter motor tomorrow.

Engine & Transmission Installation

Time to fit the engine and gearbox! After attaching the finished gearbox to the engine, we lifted the front of the car up and slid the engine/gearbox combo underneath (these were on a wheeled trolley). It's then a series of incremental steps of lowering the car and easing the engine back into the bay so the gear box feeds into the transmission tunnel. We removed the lower mid chassis braces to assist in positioning the gearbox, and we also removed some of the cooling system and the idler pulley from the engine to allow it to fit.

You will notice a pair of feet or legs appearing in these shots. These are artistically provided by Steve (Shireman on OzClubbies) who has decided that all shots should have his feet featured in them. This exercise would have been impossible without his assistance as the constant positioning and repositioning of the car and engine needs plenty of carefully applied brute strength. The photo to the left is about halfway through the install with the car being lowered. When I do this again I would be inclined to remove the gearbox support subframe from the chassis as well and attach it later (reverse of how we actually did it).
Once the engine is fully seated in the engine bay, its a case of lining up the engine mounts (previously attached to the engine) with the mount points and then bolt these up. Its amazing that the entire engine is supported by only 4 hex bolts (mounts to block) and two large bolts (mounts to chassis).

After some four hours, about an hour of which was spent laying on the floor trying to located and secure the flexible gearbox mount bolts, the engine was fully installed. From here the pieces that were removed were added, the chassis cross braces were reinstalled and the hose for the clutch was routed across towards the distribution point for all of the hydraulic lines.  Engine and gearbox in!. This was a great step as it really now feels like its a car, and I can see what needs to be done to complete it.  Thanks again to Steve for skinning his knuckles and sliding around on the dirty garage floor underneath the car securing bolts all in the name of getting the car finished!

(One more photo from another angle because it looks so cool now!).


Lessons learnt:
- Remove the gearbox support from the chassis
- Remove the old manifold studs first.
- Have the engine on its trolley as close to mount height as possible.
- PUT OIL IN GEARBOX BEFORE YOU INSTALL!!! (its a pain to do it once fitted)

Instrumentation

I received the remaining switchgear and dash lighting from CBS Online in the UK. This allowed me to go and sort out the final placement and do the fitting. I fitted the steering wheel (tapered spline so its not coming off anytime soon!), and then was able to slide in and see where everything should go. For the additional warning lights I masked up the carbon fibre, did some set out and then drilled pilot holes in increasing sizes until I could get the step drill in. From here I widened these holes out to 14mm diameter, and I also used the step drill to enlarge the existing holes. For the round switch gear I simply used the Dremel to enlarge the holes to get a snug fit, and the rocker switches just snapped into the rectangular holes with no dramas. 

The gauges are the VDO Cockpit Vision family, and they are easily fitted with screw on backings. These came from Airco in Sydney, who are the distributor for VDO. They are well worth a visit and were very helpful and friendly. My loom was already wired for VDO gauges which made it that much easier to choose them. Visibility of the top of the speedo and tacho is an issue, so I have also purchased a Shift-I light cluster for the top of the scuttle to help with watching revs and shift points.

Wheels

The wheels and tyres arrived today from Performance Alloys. They are 15 x 6.5 Speedline Corse Marmoras in Anthracite. They are a lightweight and gorgeous :)

The tyres are Toyo Proxes T1R. I opted for these over full R spec tyres until I learn how the car handles and what it feels like.

And now they are on the car, and its down off the build table and on chassis stands. Hopefully now I can get a lot more done!

Progress so far

I realised going back over this blog that I had not published an overall photo of the progress so far. So here it is. The suspension and steering are finished. The body wiring loom is in and most of the dashboard is fitted out. All of the hydraulic reservoirs and lines are in. The seatbelts are fitted and I have one seat in for testing gauge and warning light positioning. I expect the wheels to arrive tomorrow which will allow me to drop the car off the table and then fit the motor and gearbox which is waiting patiently on the other side of the garage.

Starting the Wiring

While I am still waiting for a few missing parts to turn up, and for the wheels to arrive I am getting as many fiddly little jobs out of the way. Today was the mounting of the wiper motor. Nothing to tricky there. Also got the dash Ground hooked up then cable tied in all the wiper motor cables and plugs so they were secure.


Main job for today was to start stripping back the donor car engine and dash looms to get the wires and connectors I need to merge with my existing body loom. The wiring is all now exposed and all the tape and flex is removed so I can begin the cutting and joining. Just doing some final checks on my wiring diagrams before I start cutting!

Bits and pieces

While I am still waiting for a handbrake pivot (which will unlock a whole range of build activities), I have gotten a lot of little tasks plus some shopping out of the way. I have purchased a set of VDO Cockpit Vision gauges, as my loom was already configured for these. These have been "fitted" more to see what that dash looks like, but will probably come out again before I do the switchgear and warning lights (which all need larger holes to be drilled first). I will finalise the dash loom after all the dash equipment goes in.

As the car will need seatbelts for compliance with the ADRs, I have fitted two inertia reel seat belts and buckles. This would seem like a fairly easy task, but required a fair bit of reconfiguration of the belts and some shuffling of bolts to fit. All in all that task took nearly 2 hours! 

Last thing tackled today was to fit the fuel pump to the tank. The pump was supplied already modified to suit the tank and the VDO gauges by Meridian. I chose this path rather than using the factory Focus pump as this would have required extensive modifications to the tanks, and it had suffered some damage in the donor wreck. I will also have to add an external regulator and filter when I connect the fuel lines up. I made a simple gasket from cork sheet before bolting the collar down on the pump. The tank is now ready to fit once I have the diff fitted (which is all back to the missing handbrake pivot!). I have put all the handbrake cables and the handbrake in while I wait for the pivot to arrive.

Master Cylinders

During the week, the master cylinders, reservoirs and hydraulic lines arrived. My mate Steve (Shireman on OzClubbies) put together the reservoirs and mounted them in their bracket, while I fitted the cylinders above the pedal box. A bit of wrangling with circlips and we had all the cylinders mounted. We then ran the first set of lines down to the distribution plate in the engine bay, and connected up the front and rear brake circuits. the clutch line will be finished once the engine and transmission goes in. The lines to the reservoirs will be connected once the reservoirs are mounted on the scuttle (which is currently off for wiring).

Transmission

Please ignore the CSC mounting details in this post as I have made some new discoveries. See a later post about the clutch


I sourced all of my transmission parts from Eurospeed in Brisbane. Geoff and Dan provided heaps of assistance both via email and on the phone. I settled on a rebuilt close ratio Ford Type 9 gearbox and matched it to a short throw shifter. The flywheel is mucher lighter at 4.5kg than the stock dual mass one in the Focus (at about 9kg). It's also about half the thickness. This has been bolted up with an Exedy heavy duty clutch disc and pressure plate. The only major challenges presented here was torquing the flywheel bolts (all new Ford parts) to about 112Nm, and getting the clutch disc centred between the pressure plate and the flywheel. Due to the much thinner flywheel postioning the ring gear closer to the motor, I will need to get the gear on the factory Focus starter motor machined down to about half its length to stop it from being constantly engaged on the ring gear.

The next challenge was to assemble the clutch Concentric Slave Cylinder (CSC) assembly and bell housing on the input shaft end of the gearbox. The CSC assembly consists of a new end plate for the gear box, spacer bolts, an adapter plate for the CSC to mount on to, the CSC, a bleed pipe and the clutch hose. Firstly I removed the stock end plate in the gear box and fitted the lovely machined alloy one supplied, including a new bearing. The new end plate is secured to the gear box by 4 bolts that also double up as the spacers for the adapter plate providing 4 anchor points. In mounting the end plate I had to also replace the gasket on the gearbox (best to order that when you order your gearbox!)

With the end plate on, next step is to mount the bell housing on the gear box. This is a custom bell housing specifically designed to mate the Duratec motor the the Ford Type 9 gear box. It also uses M12 x 1.5 bolts which are quite unusual (meaning I had to go and buy them separately). With the bell housing in place, the CSC adapter plate is then mounted to the spacer bolts in the end plate. This is where the fun starts. Depending on the clutch and flywheel configuration you have, you may have to shift the position of the CSC forward or backward to allow the thrust bearing to be properly engaged. This is where my lack of knowledge of how a CSC actuates the clutch is glaringly obvious. Abley assisted (and guided!) by my mate Steve (Shireman on OzClubbies), we came to the conclusion that we needed to have about 10-15mm of compression on the CSC itself when mounted to allow it to properly actuate the clutch when the pedal is pushed.

Through an exercise of trial and error (repeatedly assembling the finished gearbox to the motor and peering through the hole in the top of the bellhousing with a torch), we deduced that we needed to bring the CSC forward by about 6-7mm. We did this by adding a series of washers between the CSC and the adapter plate, and using longer bolts to secure the CSC. This has meant that the breather pipe and hose can "just" use the existing hole in the bell housing without any further modification. Once the final assembly was done and all the components were Loctited in and properly torqued, we were able to mate the finished transmission up to the motor and secure it with the 10 bolts. The final photo shows the finished package and you can also see the Birkin engine mounts low on the block, ready to go in. A huge thanks to Steve for his assistance and muscle as lining up the gearbox to the engine is definitely a 2 man job.

Sump

I received a package from Raceline in the UK, which had my new low profile wet sump kit and a horizontal facing oil filter housing. This allowed me to finish the motor off in preparation for attaching the clutch and gearbox and then installing the car. First job was to flip the motor over and remove the factory sump and oil filter housing. This exposed the bottom end of the engine, and as expected it was very clean given its only just over 1 year old. Next job was to remove the factory oil pickup. Once this was done, I cleaned off the existing gasket on the mating surfaces to get it ready for the new sump.

With the motor now ready, I turned to assembling the new sump. This is a relatively easy task. First you mount a block to pickup the inlet to the existing oil pump. Then you add the oil pickup pipe into the tray and connect to the oil pump pickup tray. Then you assemble the windage tray which sits above the baffles. Finally you fit a thimble gasket to the block that connects the block in the sump to the existing oil filter. From here its a dry fit, then apply the gasket and refit the new sump and torque it down. Easy job and taking your time no more than 1 hour. Last jobs were to add the sump plug, finger filter and plug and a new dipstick, before flipping the motor the right way up to marvel at my new ground clearance.

 

Lastly I fitted a new gasket and the horizontal oil filter housing low on the intake side of the block. This has an M12x1.5 threaded takeoff for the electrical oil pressure gauge. This will need an adapter as I have gone with VDO gauges, and their senders all use 1/8" 27NPT fittings. As always I have photos of every step, so if you are interested in seeing more drop me a comment.

Loose Ends

Not much going on at the moment while I wait for a few critical parts to show up. I have used the idle time to tidy up a few loose ends and get ready for the flurry of activity that will occur when the parts turn up.

• Checked all the bolted connections and added the odd washer here or there where I missed out on first pass. 
• Used the Dremel to open up the fuel filler hole in the body and test fitted the fuel cap. 
• Marked up the additional holes that need to be cut in the dashboard for extra warning lights.
• Fitted the handbrake lever.
• Fitted brake pads.
• Setup initial camber on rear hubs and camber/toe in on front hubs in preparation for wheels going in.

I have also ordered wheels and tyres, gearbox and a new wet sump and oil filter adapter. Research continues on gauges, switch gear, lighting and clutch/flywheel combos.

Front Suspension Finished

I received the missing front stabilizer linkages this week (along with a bunch of other new bits for the engine and gear box). I set about to finish the suspension off by fitting the stabilizer linkages. I started on the right hand side, and along with everything else on the right hand side of this chassis so far, it was to tight to fit on the lower wishbone. So I set up the left side first with no dramas, adjusting the linkage length to given clearance over the steering tie rod and away from the coil spring. Once that was fitted I went back to the right side. I decided to machine down the threaded tube that fits into the wishbone rather than trying to widen the bracket, which would of damaged the powder coat on the frame. Once I knocked about 1.5mm of the tube, everything went together nicely. From here I adjusted and tightened the block connectors on the stabilizer bar, and then tightened the retaining rings on the stabilizer bar near the mounting blocks. The bolts on the mounting blocks will be tightened later. 


I finished the day by doing a "rough" camber and toe in set up on the front end, and installing the disc pads and pad retaining bolts in the front calipers.  Front end done!

Body Loom

Still at a loose end waiting for a few more parts to turn up. Decided to see what boxes I could empty to get a few more parts on the car and tidy up the garage. The electrical body loom was an easy choice as it gets a major step out of the way. I started by putting some cable ties between the dash panel and the support frame to hold the dash part of the loom. This required a gentle application of flat screwdriver to open a gap between the dash panel and the frame which is glued together with silastic. The cardboard clamped across the dash is to protect the carbon fibre which already has at least one gouge in it (perfect place for the ADR warning sticker!).

Next I popped the lid of the fuse box cover, and removed the rear support bracket in the fuse box. I was lucky enough to acquire a loom complete with relays and fuses already mounted on a bracket. So it was a (relatively) simple task to pull the sealing grommets out that provide access into the cockpit, transmission tunnel and engine bay. I fed the engine part of the loom forward first...easy!. Next I fed the largest part of the loom into the cockpit and up behind the dash. I secured the backbone of this loom to the frame with cable ties, aligning each connector behind its respective switch, gauge or light....even easier! 

Last part was the rear loom. This is separate and connects into 2 connectors on the main loom. I started feeding the rear loom through the opening from the fuse box into the transmission tunnel. This went well until the last connector (the Hall Effect sensor for the speedo) which was to large to fit through the hole with the cables in it. So I had to pull it all back and open the hole more with the Dremel (can't build a Clubman without one!). Once it was larger the rear loom went in easy and is now sitting in the passenger side footwell. I will not finish running it to the rear until I get the engine, transmission, diff and prop shaft in to make sure it all fits snug. I will also get some heat shrink and wrap all the loose leads before I tighten everything up with cable ties. Last task here is to fabricate a second bracket to mount the fuses/relays on so I can mount it in the fuse box (leaving room for the ECUs).

Seat Runner

Not a lot of progress build wise as I have been waiting for parts to arrive. I decided to try to do a couple of little bits and pieces that would not get in the way of other build steps. Firstly I thought I would rivet on the press studs for the tonneau cover. Only problem was my rivet gun head did not fit into the press stud so it was impossible to get the rivets to fit snugly. Drilled those attempts out and will leave it for later (either getting a different rivet gun or a mobile motor trimmer to come past.

Looking through my other bits and pieces, I decided that the driver's seat runner would be easy to fit with just 4 bolts. So after putting the first 3 in ok, the 4 one seemed to be crossed in the thread. After a few retries it felt like it was moving, so I popped on the socket to only have it go PING...the bolt head sheared off. No drama, will drill out the bolt, tidy up the hole and re tap it. All good accept I hit the same level of resistance and PING, the tap is now sheared off in the same hole %^$&!!!. From here I grabbed the Dremel and a carbide grinding wheel and started to grind out the tap. Two days later and I still have only ground half the tap out and the hole in the metal is getting bigger by the minute. Mind you I am doing all this in the floor of the car, leaning in at odd angles. Then it hits me, I can pull the entire seat frame out and fix it on the bench!!!. So 5 minutes later the seat frame is on the bench, and a further 5 minutes saw the tap ground out, the lower bolt removed and replaced, the hole in the frame fixed up and the seat runner back in the car. Amazing when you think things through how quickly they are fixed! 4 bolts, 3 days :)

Rear Suspension

I started with the right hand side wishbones. Having read a lot of other build diaries, I expected the act of getting the washers in between the chassis and the pivot was going to be hard. The upper wishbone wasn't to bad......but the lower was unbelievable. The whole art of getting the washers to line up with the chassis holes and the pivot was a dark art. Also getting the final washer in took a very gentle hand with a hammer, needle nose pliers and a screw driver to progressively tap the washer home. So after nearly 4 hours I had one pair of wishbones in! Decided that was enough for one day and would come back tomorrow to tackle the left side. Would you believe the left side tolerances were much better and I had both wishbones on the left mounted in under 30 minutes.

Flushed with my new found success, I moved on to the right rear damper. It took a few goes to work out the right combination of spacers and washers but I think I have the top mount sorted. Bottom mount was easy although the bolt protrusion and nut fouled the front of the upright casting. I decided to set up the camber and caster now, as this would help with the shock mount fouling the upright, and I needed to make massive changes to the ball joint adjuster on the upper wishbone to get it to fit into the upright. This brings me to an interesting point. How much thread needs to be left in the upper wishbone after you have adjusted the upper ball joint for camber? The overall thread length is 34mm, and after setting up a neutral camber (admittedly with no wheels/tires on, and no load on suspension) I have exposed 19mm of thread, leaving 15mm in the wishbone as can be seen in the photo below. This doesn't seem a lot given the importance of that contact point so I will be sure to be checking this with Birkin and on the forums at Ozclubbies.com.au.

After leveling the chassis and setting up the camber and caster correctly the issue of the damper bottom mount fouling the upright has now gone. While I was in the general area, I adjusted the hard lines for the rear brakes, and attached the flexible brake lines to the hard lines, and then ran the flexible line out to the brake caliper and attached. Again everything at this stage is only finger tight. I will probably replace the brake lines with braided lines in the future, but will use what is supplied for now. I am waiting for a few missing parts, so will leave the left upright and damper off until they arrive. I still have the handbrake pivot assembly, differential, rear stabiliser and fuel tank to fit before the rear is done.