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122 T5 motor swap. Its name is Bluey.

My co-worker welded together the trans mount last night. The welding went good, so the trans is now hanging on its own mount!

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That allowed me to do the grinding I needed to do, and tonight I had him tack the motor mounts together.

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The holes line up right this time!

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Plenty of room to lift the engine up if I need to.

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Although the mounts are narrower overall than the holes, but only by like 1/4 inch.

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I have enough meat that I can oval out the bracket holes if needed, but I think it's sitting right where I want it. So with that, the next step is to put these on the engine and make sure the intake and exhaust clearances are still correct. I have to re-borrow the engine hoist from a friend of mine to do that though. I'll see if he's available this weekend. Once I check that, it's just a matter of pulling all 3 mounts back out, and final welding everything.

I finally feel like I'm back on track with this project. Tons of motivation, even though I'm only spending like an hour a night on it due to the heat. I need to go out late when it's cooler and work then.
 
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Got the mounts fully welded about a month ago but it's just been really really hot. Finally had a nice cool morning on Sunday and after dropping my daughter off at her mom's I got the motorvation :dadjoke: to slap the engine all the way in for realsies.

Fully welded mounts:

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Finally installed:

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On center this time

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With the mounts all the way forward I have just exactly what I wanted in firewall clearance.

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The up-pipe still hits the fender but I think I can lift the motor a bit in the mount holes and fix that. If not I'll just notch the up-pipe and put a flat spot on it. It's massive compared to the manifold opening so a small area reduction won't hurt. Once this car runs I'll probably need to get aggressive about the custom manifold.

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Once I got it in, the motor was tilted back and jamming against the firewall. So I needed to slot the trans mount bolt holes and move it forward about a half inch, which I did tonight. Also made a quick universal spacer kind of like a 1-2-3 block, I can space the transmission up 3/4", 1", or 1-1/4" just by orienting it differently. Long term I'll modify the transmission mount to be longer. Maybe.

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A little dark but I have even more clearance around the control arm bolt than I expected. Very pleased with this.

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So I rolled it out into daylight and took a couple pics with the full engine weight in it, minus fluids.

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The engine really looks at home in this car.

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And with that there's a major milestone down. It was really pleasant to be out in the garage but after 2 hours I was wiped. I hate getting old. After cooling off and drinking some water I felt pretty okay. Now I have a list of about 5-6 things I need to get done on all my other cars including oil changes on all 3 and coolant on the convertible. I'm at 6 years on the coolant, fortunately only about 25,000 miles but still. And it's really cramped trying to do anything like that in the right stall, so having this down is great. Daughter's car has developed a fuel smell accompanied by a hard start after it sits a few days so I think I have a fuel filter or pump leak. I'm going to get under and look to see if it's obvious, but if it's not I'm just going to dump it at a shop and pay them to fix whatever it is. No way am I dropping a fuel tank.

So back to the list:

Fit/weld/flycut pan - Done, I think it's actually flat enough to use as is, I'm going to skip flycutting it I think.
Build motor mounts - Done
Obtain transmission - Done
Adapt transmission to motor - Done, factory transmission is as easy as it gets.
Cut floor - Done
Build transmission mount - Done
Build up-pipe - Done.
Modify intake manifold - Done.
Build throttle linkage - Done
Cut floor some more for driveshaft - I won't have to do this
Figure out a radiator - Done.
Figure out alternator - Done.
Build alternator brackets - Half Done, I figured this out after looking at some hot rod accessories, just need to draw it and have it water jet cut.
Mount radiator
Build cooling pipes and source hoses
Mount intercooler
Build intake with intercooler and such
Adapt idle air valve
Build driveshaft
Trunk mount battery
Wire it up
Modify ECU for coil on plug
Re-route brake lines (they run along the firewall with a junction block in the worst location)
 
I missed it: why is the perimeter of your engine bay in black ? Por-15 ? If it is, you can actually paint it whichever color you want, it will also protect it against UV degradation.

Nice milestone, looks like it was always meant to be there.
 
Lloyd, as far as that up pipe interference you should just trim the pinch weld back a bit. I know I trimmed mine quite a bit when I installed my V6. Looking closely at the pic I can see a series of factory spot welds just aft of the pipe interference. Trimming an inch or so with a hack saw to create clearance won't cause any issues and it's a lot better than denting the up pipe!
 
I missed it: why is the perimeter of your engine bay in black ? Por-15 ? If it is, you can actually paint it whichever color you want, it will also protect it against UV degradation.

When I bought the car it had surface rust forming around all the front fender joints due to poor bodywork when the previous owner hit a deer.

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Fortunately it was only about a year old so I pulled everything off and POR15'd it. Once I get the car running well, everything comes apart for a full cosmetic restoration. So the black is "temporary" although I'm going on like year 8 with it now.
 
Gotcha, that makes sense. I wonder how tempted you'll be to just leave it alone after getting the mechanical work done. I save that for last, I'm willing to ignore cosmetic issues if it means being able to enjoy the car on a daily basis.
 
Gotcha, that makes sense. I wonder how tempted you'll be to just leave it alone after getting the mechanical work done. I save that for last, I'm willing to ignore cosmetic issues if it means being able to enjoy the car on a daily basis.

Yeah, it'll be a while. I plan to own this car for the rest of my life, and I eventually want to make it show quality, but I've owned it 10 years now and only put 3500 miles on it. Once it runs I'm thinking I'll drive it between May and October and tear it down for cleaning/upgrades over the winter. Then every year it'll be better and better. I want to try and tuck the engine wiring, probably just run it in the fenders. I want fender liners, I want to super clean and polish the engine, I want to put in a crazy stereo and full leather interior, etc.
 
Is there any way to do this swap without modifying a 960 pan? I dont have access to an aluminum welder. Whats the reason for using that pan? Will it sit way too high with the stock pan? Thanks guys. i have been looking at a lot of swaps for my 67 122 (ka24de turbo, ecotec, buick 215). I like the idea of a white block, cheap to buy and easy to find parts for.
 
yeah the FWD 5 cylinder pan has no clearance for the crossmember so the engine will sit about 4 inches too high and the transmission won't fit under the car.

If you want to cut 3 or 4 inches in to the firewall you could just put a 6 cylinder whiteblock in and then the pan would fit stock. Hehe.

Sorry everyone for the lack of updates, I've needed a lot of work on my other cars. I'll get back to this soon.
 
Is there any way to do this swap without modifying a 960 pan? I dont have access to an aluminum welder. Whats the reason for using that pan? Will it sit way too high with the stock pan? Thanks guys. i have been looking at a lot of swaps for my 67 122 (ka24de turbo, ecotec, buick 215). I like the idea of a white block, cheap to buy and easy to find parts for.


Dont know where you from, but you can ship your 960 stock pan to uk, retroturbo, and get ir shortened and welded for about 180 pounds, dont know exactly. There is no easier way to put a t5 in a rwd car
 
Very interesting thread! Curious about the next episode(s). Found some 'motorvation' in the meantime? ;-)

It's really tough for me to find motivation, I was on a roll and then right after posting that I just fell flat. I have another update with some cool stuff, I just need to do like 3 more little things and it's worth posting about. But in February I sold my money pit V70R and replaced it with a super clean 2.5T, and I've really been enjoying getting that to stage 0. I did the timing belt, got it tinted, lowered it, and now all I have to do on it is brake fluid and summer tires. And I bought a wing which is at a paint shop right now.

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(After tint, but before lowering). So with the daily needing nothing, and my C70 needing nothing, I'll have no excuses.
 
Those wagons are underrated, they can do most of what the R can do but without the massive expenses.
 
Thanks for asking, sadly no updates on this car. I moved across country and bought my 85 yr old dad's house, and I've been working on the house and taking care of him. The plus side is the new house has a 4 car garage. The bad news is it has 30 years of clutter and maintenance debt. So all my money and time is going to the house maintenance and elder care, and the car just sits. I do plan to get back to it but life just gets in the way. This is where it sits all cozy for now:

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The garage is now significantly cleaner than when this picture was taken - dad loaded it up, I'm taking it down. Decades of junk just put on shelves to use "someday" is slowly being removed. If you haven't used it in over 5 or 10 years, someday ain't coming.
 
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