Build The "Red Rocket" Troopy

[AirheadNut]

I don't want to throw another wrench in the works, but looking at your adapter setup I was curious if you built in any way to center the bell housing on the input shaft? Something like precision drilled holes, dowel pins, etc. More than a few thousandths runout between crank center and input shaft center will wear out your input shaft bearing, pilot bearing or input shaft itself.

 

[sodafeld1]

yes true, I recently met a wizard who took great care in 'balance'..

But, we do all sorts of stuff when young with no money, try and see approach, use what is on hand, it is quite inspiring. Expresses extreme resilience and determination. May work for awhile , even maybe some years, which is a long time when young. Learn more from fails than success n all that. Like the 'butthole surfers said better to regret something you did than you didn't do'.

The amount Globb is learning from this adventure shall be unforgettable and ultimately fulfilling when taking it for a spin. Lucky enough to even have dad involved, overall it is an awesome experience, virtually regardless of outcome. The adventures, dolphins, girls, friendships... Globb is like a young brad pitt with a busted troopy in a mechanic's movie, and he is going to fix it!

 

[sodafeld1]

a little hijack!

 

[RHINO]

when i did my swap i was changing the whole drivetrain, so i had the luxury of placing everything right where i wanted. in the end, and we would need to find the width of the 55 series framerails, i had a strong inch of clearance to the starter AND the oil filters.

 

[RHINO]

I don't want to throw another wrench in the works, but looking at your adapter setup I was curious if you built in any way to center the bell housing on the input shaft? Something like precision drilled holes, dowel pins, etc. More than a few thousandths runout between crank center and input shaft center will wear out your input shaft bearing, pilot bearing or input shaft itself.

that reminds me, one of my FJ55's back in the day had a slighlty bent input shaft, i assume maybe a mild drop from previous owner doing a clutch job? i dunno, but the bend was not enough to create a problem mounting trans to engine, but was enough to wobble the clucth enough that it would rip the center from the outer, ya know that thin steel plate, every few thousand miles, stumped me for a while till i figured it out.

 

[theglobb]

Ok problem solved!! Thank you everyone for all the ideas and advice. Still might end up using a mix of all of it but for now gonna try this approach that you can see below.

Took the transmission crossmemeber out and my dad angle grinded slots in it in order to slide the transmission to where we would like it.

Well even with the transmission moved all the way in the opposite direction in those slots... the starter is just this massive EGG of a thing ramming into the frame

About time we grind off the motor mounts..

all of these suggestions are very good, decided to try possibly the worst method for now, literally just angle grinding 1 of the mounting flanges of the starter off line this...

Now with that ground off the start can be clocked upwards! This in combination with the transmission crossmemeber being slotted to move the tranny around gives us lots of room to play with and adjust on the go.

I've read about and heard many times on the old chevy 6.5 diesels of people not putting in the 3rd bolt for the starter cause its hard to get to... and then the starter eventually rips itself off of the engine. I do genuinely wonder if this will happen and may need to find a way to support it. Need to gather more info on 4btswaps.com and see what people have luck with over there. Or if I can possibly source one of the 3 bolt industrial starters that were talked about before... then just do that.

I don't want to throw another wrench in the works, but looking at your adapter setup I was curious if you built in any way to center the bell housing on the input shaft? Something like precision drilled holes, dowel pins, etc. More than a few thousandths runout between crank center and input shaft center will wear out your input shaft bearing, pilot bearing or input shaft itself.

Don't worry and thank you for calling out anything I may be lacking knowledge in, the more I know the better. The only way we have centered anything is just all in CAD... we centered everything around where the input shaft is in the cad file and figured that was good enough, didn't even consider the really small and tight clearances possibly needed to prevent wear. How would we go about centering it now? I don't even know how to start with perfectly centering it within a couple thou

yes true, I recently met a wizard who took great care in 'balance'..

But, we do all sorts of stuff when young with no money, try and see approach, use what is on hand, it is quite inspiring. Expresses extreme resilience and determination. May work for awhile , even maybe some years, which is a long time when young. Learn more from fails than success n all that. Like the 'butthole surfers said better to regret something you did than you didn't do'.

The amount Globb is learning from this adventure shall be unforgettable and ultimately fulfilling when taking it for a spin. Lucky enough to even have dad involved, overall it is an awesome experience, virtually regardless of outcome. The adventures, dolphins, girls, friendships... Globb is like a young brad pitt with a busted troopy in a mechanic's movie, and he is going to fix it!

Thanks for the comparison! Brad Pitt is pretty cool Yes all of this isn't the biggest waste of time. Even if I had to scrap the entire project right now, I've learned so much and am much more knowledgeable every day, just like learning today about having to have stuff perfectly centered... Extremely lucky to have my dad involved, would be totally lost without him, his tools, extra help, electrical skills, and obviously we would be into landcruisers if he wasn't! It's been quite the adventure and you're totally right, if I'm able to pull this off the feeling will be great! Even if I have to pull the engine 10k miles later due to some issue

 

[theglobb]

Motor mounts... @Dougal said to try and use the stock 3B mounts but at $200 for ONE OF THEM I just couldn't justify it. Well it seems like I might have to justify it just for ease of use, the liquid filled ones will be a pain to mount straight up and down (if they arent then they fail early) this would mean making plate from the underneath of the frame to then hold the liquid filled mounts to then make another plate and another one... If I just use the stock 3B motor mounts, which mount up right to the Isuzu and then I could mount right back onto my frame... then it would just be so much simpler and I would only have to make 1 custom plate for each side I believe. Pic below as usual with captions.

Liquid filled mounts

OEM 3B mounts

Cruiser Outfitters does have an aftermarket option I'm thinking of going with... Front Motor Mount - Fits BJ7x (EGM58030) - https://cruiserteq.com/front-motor-mount-fits-bj7x-egm58030/ Much muchhhh cheaper, they look a lot different too so I hope they arent TOOO different than the OEM ones with mounting and thickness and all, would like to be able to swap them out with the nice OEM ones once I have more money in the future


My $125 miracle china astarter arrived today along with 24v NGK glowplugs for the engine! Before I cut this one up I'm gonna do more research to see if the 2bolt option is somewhat reliable

 

[Pura Vida]

Diesel unobtainium China

 

[robmobile73]

J-Keep at it you will get there.. It will run and drive and then something you did will break, and then you will fix it better, and then something will break, and this will continue until you get it right.

On the centering of shafts and bearing wear: Get all the shafts mated up in the splines and fairly centered.. Tighten gradually all the way around till it's tight and use loctite. Check the tightness of everything after a couple hundred miles of driving............For a unorthodox solution a couple of "sacrificial tabs can be welded to the plates which can be welded together after it has been evenly bolted in a centered fashion to prevent it from becoming "uncentered" in the event the bolts work loose.........If you have to unbolt you just cut those tabs off with a grinder.

I'm suggesting that you buy a spool gun for your mig welder and then go to your local salvage yard and find an old welding gas bottle in the scrap yard like a C02 bottle from a soda machine out of a closed down store....Buy that gas bottle for scrap price and take it to your nearest airgas or praxair store(you have both in ILM). They should give you a store credit on the old tank for trade in on a full argon tank. (they gave me $60 credit in sanford for a C02 tank I got from the salvage yard for $2.)................If you can mig weld at all and I think you can based on your exhaust manifold work, It will take you every bit of 30 minutes of watching you tube and practice to weld aluminum to a 85% standard with a spool gun attached to your mig welder...... I really think you can modify that starter with a new 3rd bolt holl mounting point. If you can get 2 bolts to hold it, just drill a hole and put a bolt in a couple of 1/4 Al bar stock peices and weld the end of 1 to the starter and the other to the belhousing. You'll have 2X bolts with proper holes and flat faces to position and a third just to hold it in place.

 

[iliketrucks]

All the tuner car bois are lusting after the 2JZ and here I am eyeing the 4BD1T. It's gonna be worth it!

 

[theglobb]

Today we got everything bolted up. Nothing inside the bellhousings, as much clutch hasn't arrived yet amongst other stuff, but the whole shell of everything was in there and all bolted together. My dad and I have no idea how to fabricate motor mounts, just like everything else this is totally new to us... but there is always a way.

This is a rough idea as of right now, going back to using the stock 3B motor mounts and maybe even the mounts we grinded off the frame yesterday.

Now with everything also bolted up I can start planning out many other things, intake piping, exhaust, and oil pan clearance, ontop of all the other little stuff. There is still so much ahead of me.

Probably won't have much more progress for the next couple days as my dad goes back to work and I have to wrap up shipping a bunch of parts out once the week starts, fixing a 1st gen 4runner to take up back to college, selling a motorcycle, etc etc. Really I'm just stuck with motor mounts and how to even make them. Thats the last BIG piece of this puzzle I think. Everyhting else is just a bunch of small tiny stuff that isn't a notable but just as important, like having to get a much longer clutch hose since the slave cylinder is on the exact opposite side, etc.

New 24v glow plugs

and how it sits now, the engine has been in and out 10 times already. I wonder what the final count will be?

J-Keep at it you will get there.. It will run and drive and then something you did will break, and then you will fix it better, and then something will break, and this will continue until you get it right.

On the centering of shafts and bearing wear: Get all the shafts mated up in the splines and fairly centered.. Tighten gradually all the way around till it's tight and use loctite. Check the tightness of everything after a couple hundred miles of driving............For a unorthodox solution a couple of "sacrificial tabs can be welded to the plates which can be welded together after it has been evenly bolted in a centered fashion to prevent it from becoming "uncentered" in the event the bolts work loose.........If you have to unbolt you just cut those tabs off with a grinder.

I'm suggesting that you buy a spool gun for your mig welder and then go to your local salvage yard and find an old welding gas bottle in the scrap yard like a C02 bottle from a soda machine out of a closed down store....Buy that gas bottle for scrap price and take it to your nearest airgas or praxair store(you have both in ILM). They should give you a store credit on the old tank for trade in on a full argon tank. (they gave me $60 credit in sanford for a C02 tank I got from the salvage yard for $2.)................If you can mig weld at all and I think you can based on your exhaust manifold work, It will take you every bit of 30 minutes of watching you tube and practice to weld aluminum to a 85% standard with a spool gun attached to your mig welder...... I really think you can modify that starter with a new 3rd bolt holl mounting point. If you can get 2 bolts to hold it, just drill a hole and put a bolt in a couple of 1/4 Al bar stock peices and weld the end of 1 to the starter and the other to the belhousing. You'll have 2X bolts with proper holes and flat faces to position and a third just to hold it in place.

Thank you always for your quick thinking and quirky ideas, always keeps me thinking and learn a lot that I would have never known before. We are gonna try something with cutting 1/3 of a washer to clear it and then building a bunch up to then tighen a nut down on the remaining part of the starter, utilizing that bolt still and putting pressure on it. If this doesn't work will have to try that approach for sure.

All the tuner car bois are lusting after the 2JZ and here I am eyeing the 4BD1T. It's gonna be worth it!

Too many electronics on a 2J for my liking. This engine is perfect for me, everything about it I loved while driving other than the fact that it isn't meant to be in a Toyota troopy

 

[robmobile73]

Engine mounts- bolt the rubber mount to the engine and bolt a pice of 3" X3/8" bar stock of appropriate length to the bottom of the mount loosely using a much larger hole than your bolt and some fender washers..............Grind all the paint off the frame in the vicinity of the new mount. lower the engine down into the proper position and then tack weld and weld the 3/8" bar stock to the frame where it touches. Unbolt the engine mount bolts from those bar stock tabs you just welded to the frame. lift the engine out of the way.. Go back in with the welder and seriously weld up those 3/8" tabs and add gusset reinforcement where you can and weld securely.........................You can also have a short tab on the engine mount and another tab ready to weld to frame and then weld the 2 together if it makes it easier.. 3/8" plate is strong, weld hot and alot.

This is the method I used to put a 4BT in my chevy and it took about 40 minutes for me to do this by myself....It never broke or failed, but It isn't really pretty......My mounts were perpendicular to engine centerline and not angled which is perhaps easier.

 

[robmobile73]

Engine mounts- bolt the rubber mount to the engine and bolt a pice of 3" X3/8" bar stock of appropriate length to the bottom of the mount loosely using a much larger hole than your bolt and some fender washers..............Grind all the paint off the frame in the vicinity of the new mount. lower the engine down into the proper position and then tack weld and weld the 3/8" bar stock to the frame where it touches. Unbolt the engine mount bolts from those bar stock tabs you just welded to the frame. lift the engine out of the way.. Go back in with the welder and seriously weld up those 3/8" tabs and add gusset reinforcement where you can and weld securely.........................You can also have a short tab on the engine mount and another tab ready to weld to frame and then weld the 2 together if it makes it easier.. 3/8" plate is strong, weld hot and alot.

This is the method I used to put a 4BT in my chevy and it took about 40 minutes for me to do this by myself....It never broke or failed, but It isn't really pretty......My mounts were perpendicular to engine centerline and not angled which is perhaps easier.

J-When you weld "hot and alot" on your frame have a friend closeby with a water hose because something is going to catch on fire. YOu also really need some good leather shoes or some boots on when you do this. When globs of molten steel fall on your feet and burn through your shoes the skin and down into the meat it's hard to sling that steel off or jump around in pain when your crouched down in the engine compartment. Welding is not a activity to do barefoot. Molten steel on your arms hands and elswhere is bearable, but in your shoes or on your feet is the worst. Welding above you while you lay on your back underneath is also a bad idea without alot of good protective clothing.

 

[Felde]

The approach @robmobile73 suggest should work out in general. The bolting makes sure the motor mount rubberpieces and the bracket on the engine and the new bracket (3x3/8" piece) for the frame are mating flat. The tricky part will be the angle between frame and the new bracket.
Not very likely that will be 90° straight. But you must not bend the rubber and you can not bridge much of a gap in your weld.
In order not to bend the rubber, make sure the engine is still hanging and new mount to frame are barely touching. Do not have the engine squeeze down and deform the rubber. Will be a lot of wiggling on the crane.
Depending on how it works out, you might need to flatten or sharpen the angle of the 3x3/8. A solid anvil and a decent hammer does the job. (Maybe some heat, too, but don't forget to quench in water then to maintain hardness).
But welding things like this requires some practice and some training. Burning a hole into the frame at the place it requires the most strength happens quicly when welding 'hot'. Welding 'alot' but only the outer edges may also create stress in the metal, making it prone to cracking.
There are techniques to prevent this.
Buy any chance: Try to get a skilled welder for this job.

You are doing great! Good luck Ralf

 

[RHINO]

I used the isuzu motor mounts and made new perches off the frame

Wish I was closer, I'd cruise over and make the mounts for you

 

[FJBen]

I used the isuzu motor mounts and made new perches off the frame

Wish I was closer, I'd cruise over and make the mounts for you

Road-trip.

 

[AirheadNut]

Don't worry and thank you for calling out anything I may be lacking knowledge in, the more I know the better. The only way we have centered anything is just all in CAD... we centered everything around where the input shaft is in the cad file and figured that was good enough, didn't even consider the really small and tight clearances possibly needed to prevent wear. How would we go about centering it now? I don't even know how to start with perfectly centering it within a couple thou

For centering the bell housing at this point I would recommend getting a dial indicator on a mag base and attaching it to the input shaft, then running the point of the indicator around the inside rim of the bell housing. That will show you how close to centered you are. If any adjustments are necessary I would slightly loosen a couple of the adapter bolts and tap the bell housing with a soft hammer, then retighten and check again. Kind of like centering a workpiece in a 4-jaw chuck on a lathe. EDIT: this is assuming you have enough slop/clearance in the bolt holes to move it around enough. Hopefully it isn't off by much. Also, Harbor Freight carries a cheap dial indicator/mag base set that works just fine.

When I built my motor mounts I lowered the engine into place, bolted it up to the transmission and then made a bunch of measurements to the frame on either side where my mounts needed to be. I made my mounts from 1/8" plate which was easy to weld, but probably a little light for your application. 3/16" would be about right in your case I think. Before I welded my mounts in I bolted them to the engine to make sure they fit properly, then tacked them to the frame. Pull the engine and finish weld the mounts. Like @Felde said be very careful when welding to your frame, if you use too much heat you could burn a hole. That's why I recommend using 3/16" material, properly gusseted, rather than 3/8" because you will be able to get full penetration in your weld on both sides without risking blowing through.

 

[sodafeld1]

Road-trip.

x2!

 

[robmobile73]

For centering the bell housing at this point I would recommend getting a dial indicator on a mag base and attaching it to the input shaft, then running the point of the indicator around the inside rim of the bell housing. That will show you how close to centered you are. If any adjustments are necessary I would slightly loosen a couple of the adapter bolts and tap the bell housing with a soft hammer, then retighten and check again. Kind of like centering a workpiece in a 4-jaw chuck on a lathe. EDIT: this is assuming you have enough slop/clearance in the bolt holes to move it around enough. Hopefully it isn't off by much. Also, Harbor Freight carries a cheap dial indicator/mag base set that works just fine.

When I built my motor mounts I lowered the engine into place, bolted it up to the transmission and then made a bunch of measurements to the frame on either side where my mounts needed to be. I made my mounts from 1/8" plate which was easy to weld, but probably a little light for your application. 3/16" would be about right in your case I think. Before I welded my mounts in I bolted them to the engine to make sure they fit properly, then tacked them to the frame. Pull the engine and finish weld the mounts. Like @Felde said be very careful when welding to your frame, if you use too much heat you could burn a hole. That's why I recommend using 3/16" material, properly gusseted, rather than 3/8" because you will be able to get full penetration in your weld on both sides without risking blowing through.

This is a more deliberate way to do it and more proper welding. If you have the time material equipment space, room to work and skill to do it that's the way to go.
If you go 3/16 I think you really need to gusset. With 3/8" it's really mostly for good measure.

I think you are using a mig welder with gas and not flux core or a stick welder. When I weld thick to thin I tend to either move fast while "weaving" back and forth, or do multiple passes to create a filet slightly larger than normal. When I burn through I just turn it down and weld the hole back up....... I had to do my mounts with a always hot spool gun welding with two car batteries and flux core.. awkward difficult to maneuver in tight places and hard to make a nice good weld when you can't maneuver into the proper position with the gun. Hence a lot of heavy filets and multiple passes hot to penetrate through previous filet and surrounding metal.......... I'm often in awe by the level of work that a lot of the guys on this forum do those frame off builds done in workshops with white painted floors etc.. It's something to aspire to achieve.

Those magnet Mount dial indicators are really nifty tools to have and they're not that expensive I think I've even seen them for less than $25. That's good insurance if you can get it right before you try to bolt it in. It will save you a lot of time if you're off too much and it could save your bearings if it's tough to go together and you just crank it down anyway............... If you can't manage to center it with a dial indicator but it all slides in real nice and you have that little bit of slop that you can feel in your input shaft not binding up tight when things are bolted down you're probably okay. You know how precise or not your adapter plates are the rest of us don't.

 

[robmobile73]

The approach @robmobile73 suggest should work out in general. The bolting makes sure the motor mount rubberpieces and the bracket on the engine and the new bracket (3x3/8" piece) for the frame are mating flat. The tricky part will be the angle between frame and the new bracket.
Not very likely that will be 90° straight. But you must not bend the rubber and you can not bridge much of a gap in your weld.
In order not to bend the rubber, make sure the engine is still hanging and new mount to frame are barely touching. Do not have the engine squeeze down and deform the rubber. Will be a lot of wiggling on the crane.
Depending on how it works out, you might need to flatten or sharpen the angle of the 3x3/8. A solid anvil and a decent hammer does the job. (Maybe some heat, too, but don't forget to quench in water then to maintain hardness).
But welding things like this requires some practice and some training. Burning a hole into the frame at the place it requires the most strength happens quicly when welding 'hot'. Welding 'alot' but only the outer edges may also create stress in the metal, making it prone to cracking.
There are techniques to prevent this.
Buy any chance: Try to get a skilled welder for this job.

You are doing great! Good luck Ralf

J-Felde is right on many things. I've been welding since 1990 and you are relatively inexperienced........
.If you squeeze and torque the engine moutns off angle they will transmit excess vibrations to the frame, even abnoxiously so.
When you weld it is difficult to get a 100% great perfect weld at all times. If you are working with something that requires a 100% perfect weld to be strong enough like a aircraft engine mount made of light guage chromoly tubing, then it's pretty darn important you be perfect. ....................Don't let things discourage you. Move forward the best you can. If as you weld, you know it's not a good pass then weld more. After it's all together you can go back and inspect later after some driving. ...compensate for your imperefections by going above and beyond in whatever way you think you should. It will work out.
You will be better than all of us by the time you are our age. Keep it moving!