This weekend was a public holiday here in South Australia, fortunately I had the foresight to book the friday before off from work, this has given me plenty of time to spend on the Ghia.
With the gearbox back together I decided it was time to look at getting the engine properly mounted up. First thing to deal with was getting the gearbox mated up to the engine - but to do that there were a couple of other jobs that needed finishing off.
First job was to sort out the clutch release. The 915 gearbox uses a release arm that 'pushes' instead of pulls - a bit of a problem when fitting this type of box in a VW. To overcome the problem I flipped the arm around 180 degrees so that it stuck out of the side of the box rather than sat underneath it (this is easy as the shaft is splined). The overall effect is that the arm now needs to be 'pulled' to release the bearing
Normally you would attatch the stock VW clutch cable with a custom / modified cable mount somewhere on the case. As I have a 911 clutch fitted, I opted for a hydraulic conversion kit as I dont think a stock cable is strong enough (nor is my leg - lol) - Normally the cylinder that comes with the kit simply replaces the cable and fits between the cable mount and the release arm, I fitted some ball joint ends and bolted the cylinder between the release arm and the case. You can see the finished article HERE
With the clutch release sorted out the only thing left before I could mate the gearbox to the engine was to finish off fitting the fan shroud. The shroud required a little trimming to fit - I'd prevously left this as I needed to mount the fan straps to hold the fan in place first. To mount the straps I used the existing distributor mounting bolt (this is redundant as I am using a distributorless EFI system) for the left strap, and I also drilled a hole in the right side of the breather tower for the other strap. I made a couple of plates to spread the load and also cut a rubber gasket to seal under the fan. With the fan fitted I trimmed the shroud to suit and drilled a couple of holes to allow it to be bolted into position.
I also took the time to check that the starter motor fitted. I have both a VW and a Porsche 911 unit - the main difference is that the 911 unit has a bendix gear which means that the starter actually disengages - the VW is a pre-engaged type which means that it always turns with the engine. In addition the 911 starter requires a bearing to be mounted in the gearbox case to support the shaft - I need to sort one of these out.
Mating the gearbox up to the engine was an interesting experience as the release bearing on a 911 setup is actually mounted to the clutch plate - this requires carefull maneouvering to get the input shaft, bearing and release arm all lined up correctly.
With the engine all together I then removed the fan and shroud so that I could get the engine under the car for a trial fitting. The main aim of the exercise was to determine how to make up the rear engine hanger and fabricate the rear engine mounts. After a little pondering, I decided it was probably best to modify a stock bus rear hanger.
I made some cardboard engine mounts up - basically these 'triangulate' the rear corners of the engine bay - they will pick up on the exising bumper mounts and an additional mounting up under the rear valence. A modified bus hanger will then mount to these via standard 911 engine mountings - pretty similar to a 911 really.
With the rear mounting sorted out the front mounting needed a rethink - originally it used the stock 911 front cross-member mounted up underneath the torsion bar tubes but I found that this setup left the gearbox too low - I have another rear subframe that I have cut the torsion bar centre out of - this allows the gearbox to sit up higher but requires coil-overs to be used. In anticipation I removed the subframe from the car - this will also allow me better access to the rear of the shift tunnel as I also need to run fuel and oil lines though it.
With the rear suspension out of the car I decided to also remove the front suspension - the whole unit needs to powdercoated so I stripped it down in readyness- this also allowed me to paint the frame horns with the same stuff that I had previously painted the floor pans with. I also took the opportunity to have a look at the steering box. The box was in pretty good condition with no play on the output arm, I regreased everything before giveing it a clean and paint.
Overall I had a very busy weekend, making loads of progress with only one minor mishap - I managed to close the automatic garage door onto the front of the car - taking a big chunk of paint off. However - it's not as bad as it seems - I was planning to take the car in to get some bits touched up anyway - guess there's now one more to add to the list.
There's some more pictures of the weekends work in the media library.
