Guest Anonymous Posted September 7, 2000 Share Posted September 7, 2000 What exactly was interfering with the steering shaft that made you have to cut it? ------------------ Morgan morgan@z31.com http://carfiche.com http://z31.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scottie-GNZ Posted September 8, 2000 Share Posted September 8, 2000 The bracket that was welded to the crossmember to bolt up to the driver's side motor mount. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Anonymous Posted September 14, 2000 Share Posted September 14, 2000 would it have adversly weakened the bracket to notch or section it for the shaft? and how did you secure the shaft so it would'nt flop around. turbo 3.8 in the works Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scottie-GNZ Posted September 14, 2000 Share Posted September 14, 2000 The bracket is made of 1" id square tubing with gussetting at the base for rigidity. I supposed if it was made of something stouter, it could be notched to eliminate the steering mod. The steering rod is mounted in a bearing with a plate that is bolted to the frame rail. I wish I had taken more and better pics. If I pull it next week, I will. In retrospect, there are other options. One is to do it like JTR and utilize the existing OEM mount bracket and fab a setback plate with the piece that fits in the motor mount for the big bolt. Because you have make this yourself, here is my advice for how to approach it. Bolt up the drivetrain and fit it in the car with a hoist. Put a jack under the trans and get it in an horizantal position that looks close to the final fit. Push the entire drivetrain back as far as it will go checking for clearance problems. Areas to watch out for are leaving some room in the rear-pass sideof the engine for the DP, clearance for the crossover pipe with the back side of the T/C rod on the pass side and front pulley with the crossmember (pulley should end up behind the x-member). Make sure you remove the original trans x-member humps in the tunnel. With the trans supported, lower the engine then place a floor jack under the pan with a flat piece of wood to distribute the weight. Try to have the engine level, then give some slack on the hoist to allow up/down and side movement of the floor jack. At that point you can start eyeballing fitment and mount options. This is a technique that has worked for me in the past on swaps for which there were no kits. Put the finsihing touch by using cardboard and masking tape to mock up the mount brackets. It will take a couple of shots but you should end up with a mockup that any good machine shop can fab. For the trans x-member I believe you can use the JTR unit. Your exhaust will be on the pass side when it passes the trans mount so you want the "hump" on the mount on that side. BTW, search this forum for good info on driveshaft angles. HTH and sorry if this bores others who are not interested in the 3.8L swap. ------------------ Scottie 71 240GN-Z http://www.mindspring.com/~vscott911/gnz.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pparaska Posted September 14, 2000 Share Posted September 14, 2000 Scottie, that's the first time I've heard anyone give details on how to do an undocumented swap. Thanks, I'm in the V8Z crowd, but love seeing all kinds of swaps. One thing that you probably do but didn't list is to make sure the driveshaft u-joint angles are proper (less than ~3 degrees each, and equal). The exact placement of the engine and trans has a large effect on this. When I was doing the JTR swap, I was amazed at what a small movement of the trans rear or engine mounts would do to those angles. It's very important to get them equal and small, for if you don't you'll have from just mild to horrendous vibration issues under load. And most people are doing these swaps to put lots of power to the wheels, so this is very important. There's info on how I handled this part of the swap on my site under "Driveline Modifications", along with a link to a driveline shops very good web page on this topic. HTH somebody, ------------------ Pete Paraska - 73 540Z - Marathon Z Project - pparaska@home.com">pparaska@home.com - Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
clint78z Posted September 14, 2000 Share Posted September 14, 2000 Yes I would like to second the point on angles of u-joints . My dad did a swap of a 302 into a 56 ford . I told them about the driveshaft angles, but they shrugged it off . The truck has vibration under load, they still don't know what's wrong . I can only tell them so many times, but doesn't sink in . Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Scottie-GNZ Posted September 14, 2000 Share Posted September 14, 2000 You guys are right on the money with the importance of the driveshaft angles. Pete, I read the article a long time ago and could not remember where and thats why I told Philip to do the search. I could not come close to giving the exacting information needed there. Should have known it would be you or Terry, hehe. ------------------ Scottie 71 240GN-Z http://www.mindspring.com/~vscott911/gnz.html Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pparaska Posted September 15, 2000 Share Posted September 15, 2000 Scottie, I hope my post didn't come across as a criticism, it wasn't. But the driveline u-joint angle issue is overlooked and missunderstood by the beginning swapper many times, unless they are aware of the problem from a book on the subject (JTR covered it a bit in the later revisions, the first one didn't cover it) or some other source like this site. Since I know it's a particular issue with what seems like a good engine/trans placement/attitude in the Z, I never let a swap thread go by here if it isn't mentioned. I'd hate to see someone make custom engine and trans mounts up for some kind of undocumented swap and then have to do them over once they found out that it gave them driveline vibration. Driveline vibration can cause people to start looking at other things ("bad" u-joints, bent driveshafts, "bad" differentials, "bad" halfshafts, etc.) before they come to the driveshaft u-joint angles. Cheers, ------------------ Pete Paraska - 73 540Z - Marathon Z Project - pparaska@home.com">pparaska@home.com - Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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