Project 2 into 1, Mk1 Auto to Manual.

[Zebbysebby]

The Gearbox installation wasn’t straight forward, I had kept the engine level but it appeared to be hitting the transmission tunnel so I jacked up the front of the engine to angle the rear down and it went in quite easily.

With the aid of new extension bars I was able to access and tighten the transmission bolts easier than when they were removed however access is much better with the manual Gearbox. I would advise jacking up the rear of the gearbox in order to tighten bolts 1 and 11. I remembered to tighten the 14mm starter motor bracket.

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At this stage don’t insert bolts number 2,3 and 5. There are three brackets to attach.

Brackets.

In total there are four small brackets to attach. These will need to be obtained from a manual car. The first is on the passenger side and holds the Clutch pipe.

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The second is on the drivers side and holds cabling. It’s joined by a 10mm bolt to a bracket on the 14mm bolt, number 3. The existing rubber/ metal clasp on the cable is attached to the bracket via the 10mm bolt accessed from the engine bay but don’t tighten at this stage as you’ll need to work it down and under the inner wing, it’s tight. Attach the bracket to nut number 3 from underneath then tighten this and the 10mm nut.

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The third bracket on nut number 2 is frustrating, the pipework to the Clutch Slave Cylinder at the top of the Bell housing. Working from underneath, I ended up removing the cable tie clip, rotating the bracket to the correct angle and sliding in the clip before inserting the 14mm bolt, number 2. In the photo, I still have the cable tie to re-attach via the hole on the left side of the bracket.

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The fourth bracket is on bolt/ nut number 5 which is the 17mm for the starter. The bracket fits on the rear and is secured by the nut. A 10mm nut, (with phillips screw head), secures the pipe to the bracket. I was going to advise fixing the bracket to the pipe ahead of fitting however after a fight getting it on I would advise fitting the bracket to the 17mm bolt and torquing up first as the pipe gets in the way and prevented me getting the spanner to seat correctly. Hard to understand why and very difficult to see in to understand the problem. To secure the pipe to the bracket I had to use a long phillips screwdriver coming in from the wheel well whilst pushing the pipe into position / alignment with my left hand and all whilst trying to lean in and see what was happening. For some reason a PITA job.

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I would advise/ consider doing away with the existing Clutch pipework for a simple single braided or rubber hose from the master to slave cylinder? These can be bought for under £30. The original design with two metal pipes, one rubber hose and three brackets is OTT.

Installing the PPF.

I encountered a problem here at the final stage of torquing up requiring the PPF to be removed. I earlier advised removing the rear top lug nuts securing the PPF to the Diff then rotating it out from the top and dropping it down and out where the lower right lug is slotted into the diff. This is something I had read to do whilst researching the job. This will still work but I would first try to remove it whilst intact with just the bolts removed. If it won’t detach then the lug nuts will need removed as previously described.

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On my manual car, the spacer remained in place on the diff when removed. On the Auto car, the spacer detached. On attempting to tighten the top rear lug nut I found it kept spinning and wouldn’t fully engaged to grip the splined internal teeth. I suspect the spacer was slightly out of alignment, I couldn’t adjust/ lever it into place so I removed the PPF and ended up pressing the lug in using a vice. The PPF then quite easily slotted in at the bottom right lug then rotated in at the top.

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I did find this which suggests that the top lug nuts shouldn’t be separated from the spacer. It seems as though it comes as a one piece unit.

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Ensure the Speedo cable has not been attached to the Gearbox at this stage, it will pass through the PPF later.

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Attach the rear of the PPF to the diff and insert the two 17mm bolts finger tight. Connect the front of the PPF to the Gearbox and insert the two 17mm bolts finger tight. Loosely attach the Gearbox bracket to the PPF with the 17mm bolt and two 14mm bolts onto the Gearbox.

I see no reason not to raise the rear of the Gearbox at this stage, (further explanation below) and using a straight edge, spirit level or similar, placed against the Chassis rails measure and set the distance/ gap between the Chassis rails and PPF, (see picture) to 66mm, +/- 5mm, (some guides state 60-72mm). Guides typically tell you to do this measurement after tightening the front two Gearbox bolts. My Chassis rails have some damage caused by incorrect jacking which made the measuring a bit harder.

Tighten the two front 17mm bolts and torque to 104-124 Nm or 77-91 Ft/lb and recheck the gap.

Tighten and Torque the two 17mm bolts at the diff to the same amount as for the front given above and again recheck the gap.

Tighten and torque the 17mm bolt on the bracket to the same amount also. Tighten and Torque the two 14mm bolts on the Gearbox bracket to 36-54 Nm or 27-40 Ft/lb and give one final check of the gap.

The speedo cable can now be passed through the hole in the PPF and connected/ tightened onto the Gearbox.

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As I’ve said, I fitted the PPF twice. On the first occasion I tighten the the two 17mm Gearbox bolts then attempted to set the required gap which for me was at 60mm. As I jacked the rear of the Gearbox, the car began to lift with no change in the gap. On the second attempt, I set the gap to 65mm with the bolts finger tight then tightened the bolts and was able to maintain this measurement.

Continued..........

[Zebbysebby]

Ignition Park Interlock Device.

Earlier I showed the Park Interlock on the ignition with the cable dis-connected and slider cable tied in the forward position. I thought I’d look at disabling the unit internally. It appears to be a very simple device and you just need to remove the slider in order to disable the function.

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With the ignition key at the off position, the small tab to the left will be in the down position.

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With the ignition key at position 1 and beyond, the tab will be in the raised position.

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[Zebbysebby]

So far, my underside of the car is complete, surface rust removed, treated, zinc primed and Dinitroled. Cavities injected also with clear Dinitrol. New exhaust, heat shields, brackets repaired and painted. Engine bay work is complete waiting to be re-flushed. I still need to find out if the water galleries are blocked. Rust repairs and painting within the engine bay. I still have the brakes to go through and bleed.

I did get a surprise when I checked the air filter and not just because it was new.

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Always worth checking I suppose on these cars, it’s quite easy access for them.

My problem just now is the Clutch Master Cylinder which wouldn’t bleed. It produced pressure in the circuit but wouldn’t allow fluid into the circuit. The car drove fine originally whilst not needing to be topped up. I opened up the CMS and saw that the rubber seal at the end of the spring had partly failed and it was very dirty inside. I cleaned the dirt away and cleared the blockages but couldn’t get it work consistently so I’ve ordered a kit.

I’m getting the interior back in now but don’t know when I’ll be able to give it a good test drive in the current situation. I will update again when the car is driveable.

[blackyb]

Looks like our cat has found a new place to leave his daily catch.

Cracking read.

[Zebbysebby]

This is the final update. The car is converted and drives fine. I did wonder if the lack of a connected Clutch switch might cause some problem but it doesn’t. The car seems to be more torquey/ have more grunt low down than the standard manual donor car. I think the Auto engines had 5 horse power less than the manual cars, different pistons, cam and timing. It seems it was the right decision to stick with the Auto engine.

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The bleeding of the Clutch was bit of a pain, I read about the various techniques known to work but after fitting a rebuild kit to the master cylinder I decided to purge the air and fill the MC with Oil before fitting it in place then connect a 4 ft clear tube onto the bleed point of the slave master cylinder and sucked on the tube, it didn’t take much effort or time for the oil to come through. I still recommend a single pipe from the Clutch MC to the SC and I’ll do this at some point.

I’m still able to use my Air Con as the replacement dash with wiring used from the non Air Con donor car had the wires taped up within the harness.

Doing this conversion is for the most part easily do-able. The difficulty for me was not having a lift and working on my back. If you have access to a trailer I would suggest considering doing what work you can, do all the Donkey work and let a Garage pull the Auto box, fit the Clutch and Gearbox then complete the rest yourself. For a few hours labour it will save a lot of frustration.

I now need to sort the body and paint which is a mess, keeping costs down for this will be difficult.

The engine was cold flushed 6 times, hot flushed 4 times, hot flushed with Holts cleanser and still the water was slightly orange. It now has a long term flushing agent which I’ll keep in for a month without the thermostat before looking at it again. The cost of the project for a rot free manual car with a nice interior is £1400 with a spares car to sell on yet and a lot of spares I’ll keep.

I hope this information will help someone in the future and thanks for taking the time to read.

[blackyb]

Well done that man but its one topic less to read in this frustrating world we are currently living in.

[Mazda Mender]

M-m

[Zebbysebby]

Thank you, thank you...

[agent_orange]

Great write up!

Thanks for sharing your experiences, Im planning on doing the same for my 91 Eunos so its good to see what the potential pitfalls are. Ill probably do what you suggested though - getting a garage to take out old gear box and fit in new one as I dont have a suitable work space.