VolkToyZuki

[Suzuki_dude]

Decision was made to swap an ALH. Looking pretty good so far. It'll need some tweaks but overall looks like it'll be fairly simple. This one came from my sister's beetle that was totaled. Broke the oil filter and oil pan. It's somewhere around 500k kms but I know it's in decent shape inside.

 

[Suzuki_dude]

Been doing a lot of little things to make it all fit nice. My old AAZ turbo oil line wasn't going to work and the ALH line wasn't gonna work either. Not a fan of stainless braided lines so I made one from 3000psi hydraulic hose. Engine side and turbo side are both M12x1.5.

Rear coolant outlet is blocked off. Lowest outlet will go to the heater core, upper rad hose will T off and feed the oil cooler. I didn't see a need to have 2 hoses running parallel and taking up space when I don't have much to spare.

This is just to show the depth vs the vacuum pump.

Because of how the acme adapter doesn't have dowels and uses the top 2 bolts to locate it it can change with a different engine. In my case it moved over another 0.020" sideways. I pulled out the side dowel you can see just above the nut. Was in the wrong place for this engine. The small hole is 15/64" (0.234") and I drilled it on the drill press before installing the adapter for the last time. Once I had the measurements close I drilled through that hole and into the bellhousing. I took a 1/4" bolt and stuck it in the drill press and ran it on the faster pulley arrangement (3000rpm) and filed it down to 0.238" on 1 end and 0.235" on the other end (drill bit must've gone a bit oversized). The bigger end pressed into the adapter and the thinner end slipped into the bellhousing. Decently good tolerances for a homemade dowel. I did this method once at work to make a 14mm dowel out of a 9/16" bolt for a Mack flywheel. Works really well. Numbers on the floor are the final result. Value is irrelevant, just the difference of the numbers across from each other.

 

[Suzuki_dude]

Another update. Oil pan is done. Got my welder buddy to tig weld and pressure test it for me. I think he used a 1/2"npt drain. I plan to add a ball valve or something like that in the future. Fits great. Bit more room than I had with the AHU. I can install the engine with the pan attached and diff in the frame. I didn't expect that to actually work.




ALH belt routing for AC and power steering delete. Belt is a 6PK750. Not a common size. This alt clears the steering much better than the AHU did and this is even the bigger 120A.



Here the engine is all wired up. Not a lot of wires.



Here's a crappy pic of the heater core hoses.



And here's the engine bolted in and most stuff hooked up. Coming along nicely.

 

[Newfie-Zuk]

Really nice work !! 

P

 

[Suzuki_dude]

Wow it's been a month since my last update. Still not driving yet but getting closer. Downpipe is wrapped. Never done that before. Turned out pretty good I'd say.






Added a brace to the trans like I've wanted to do for years. It used to shake like crazy at idle. Surprised it never cracked.





Lower rad hose is done. Took a while to find a 1 1/4" pipe at the right bend radius. I noticed a semi trailer landing gear handle looked perfect. My dad had an old one laying around he let me use. Fits great. Welded a tab on so it doesn't bounce around and rattle or wear a hole into the hose. I don't remember where the first hose came from. Bottom one is just a generic straight silicone hose I can get in bulk.





#3 glow plug decided to break off in the head so I figured now's the time to make sure I don't need to use them. I'll pull the fuse for #3 and keep the rest but likely won't be needing them with the espar hooked up. Intake pipe is a bit longer than I'd like but that's the best I could do without drilling a new hole in the frame. Next step is drop the tank to install a proper pickup tube and figure out where I left my controller pigtail. Might just use a rocker switch again.

 

[Suzuki_dude]

And we're back on the road.   Exhaust is mounted semi-properly for the first time ever. Had to get creative since I have no room. But it doesn't touch anything even while driving. Got quieter in the cab too. Maybe wrapping the downpipe also helped with noise?





Not exactly diesel related, but I got the toyota CVs done too. Haven't had 4x4 in years. It's really nice to have. Sidekick handles icy patches on the road way better than the golf. Golf darts back and forth when it goes from ice to dry. Sidekick hardly feels it. Almost makes you too confident in yourself when it's icy.





Had some issues getting oil pressure at first because the oil filter housing broke when the donor was totalled and when I removed it I didn't realize the pump would go dry. Got that figured and it's good now.


View attachment 20220228_210050.mp4

And the espar is back. Had issues with that too. ECU failure in a way I've never seen. Not running the fan but no code. Usually it'll run the fan and throw a code saying the fan is bad. Then after testing the fan I reinserted the wires backward. I had a spare heater to steal the ECU from and now it's working great. Heats quick. I gained 20c at the head in 5minutes. Great to have.

View attachment 20220305_183527.mp4

Couple more little things to do. Pretty sure my brakes need bleeding. I swapped a stock sized master back on because the subaru master was far too big. Also changed to a dual diaphragm booster. Pedal is super soft and hits the floor. Might have to bump up to a 4dr master if bleeding the brakes doesn't help. It feels closer to what I want than before anyway.  [black_s]

 

[Suzuki_dude]

It's been a year already? Where has the time gone?

It's still going. This motor runs like crap compared to the AHU. Smokes out a street and misses on 1 cylinder for a while if I start it below freezing. AHU would sputter for 2 seconds and run perfect. I'll just continue to preheat it until I can put a lower mileage/rebuilt one in.

 

[Chuck78]

Have you done a compression test on the ALH to see where it's at?

 

[Suzuki_dude]

Have you done a compression test on the ALH to see where it's at?

No. #3 glow plug broke off in the head so I can't connect to that cylinder anyway. 

 

[Suzuki_dude]

Went to go bleed my clutch because it leaked too much and got air in it again. Noticed the clutch fork pivot stud had backed out and jammed crooked. Crap. Got it out through the hole for the fork. Slid the trans back a few inches (can't remove it with the engine in) and pulled the fork out between the clutch and bellhousing. Took some figuring out got it reassembled with very little room to work. Small hands and skinny arms to the rescue once again.

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Unfortunately you can't get just a valve cover gasket for the ALH. So it got a new valve cover. Should really help with my oil leak.

View attachment 20230513_163659_HDR.webp

Not a lot of stuff going on. Just driving.

 

[Suzuki_dude]

Turns out the worse mileage I've been getting the last few years was from my rear disc conversion. Discovered that when I started to get really squeaky brakes. Both rear inner pads down to the metal while the outer pads looked fine. Sliders did move by hand but not very well. Got new pads and rotors and it coasts way better and mileage is back up. Did a 605km round trip (according to google maps) recently with unfavorable winds and burned 39.1L which comes out to 6.46L/100kms. 36.4mpg for the metric impaired. Still need to replace the slider boots that I think swelled and are still causing some tightness. Due for trans and diff oil change. Considering trying something thinner especially in the trans because it shifts like crap in winter and half decent on a hot summer day.

 

[Suzuki_dude]

Again almost a year later. Had 7 weeks of school in the beginning of the year. As always, something happens that has never happened before. Crankcase vent froze up one day and I lost a bunch of oil. After that I had to clear the hose every day before leaving home and before leaving school. Mileage was around 7-7.5L/100km I think. Better with the 1.5hr trip to school than the 0.5hr trip to work. Engine heater was awesome. Cheaper, non powered parking but still had a warm engine when school was over if I remembered to turn it on during our break.

I did finally change the trans oil after school to Redline MTL. It is thinner and seems to work a little better. Still shifts like garbage and half the time I'm revving it and playing with the clutch pedal trying to get the next gear. It's less bad if I don't quite push the clutch pedal all the way. The day I changed it I could shift directly into 1st at a stop sign. I haven't been able to do that for years.

New highest amount towed. Probably around 2k lb. I don't tow much. Tractor is my latest diesel swap project. Kubota D722 into a '82 John Deere 400 garden tractor. I used to mow with this one as a kid before the motor blew up and my parents bought a 2305 tractor. There's a build thread on mytractorforum if you're interested in that. Anyway, tractor is supposed to be around 1000lb plus it has wheel weights, a snowblower, and a slightly heavier engine. With a trailer it's still faster than it would be stock without a trailer. Shifted at 3k and it pulled no problem. Grill mostly blocked with pipe insulation, rad covered with a mudflap, close to 0c outside that day I think. Temp still normal.

Not exactly diesel related but my frame broke where I dropped the crossmember. Guess that's why you're not supposed to learn to weld on the frame? And why you don't grind your welds totally smooth.

Steering felt tighter on the way home. Crazy.

Love how easy it is to work on. I could reassemble everything with the old timing belt, laugh at myself, do it all over again, and still take half the time it takes in a car. I did the belt on this engine when it was still in my sister's beetle. Now it's ready for another 160k km. And a new thermostat again. I liked the hotter aftermarket one I had in but it only lasted a year.