FE-FC Holden Discussion Forum

 :) Hi To All,
                 I pulled out the 186 and trimatic out of a fe parts car and the cross member has not been cut ???.
It has a homemade bracket for the transmission and it has the dept of transport plate for the approvals. I cant understand how the trimatic went in without modification, it all looks standard. "ANY IDEAS".
Cheers Spider. 8)

no,ideas, but i'd be interested in buying the bracket or at the very least having a look at the setup. are you in sydney?

tony

 :)Hey Tony,
                  I live in queensland, I dont think i will sell the cross member but if I do you can have first option. If you like i will try and take some pictures of it and e-mail it to you during the week. The only way that i can gather that they did no chopping is if they made the rear of the gearbox sit low enough to clear the cross member. But if that was the case the tailshaft would be on a angle. Can you the tailshaft on a slight angle or does the tailshaft have to be perfectly straight. For example if you lower your car with blocks on the rear would that not change the angle of the tailshaft?
"Any Thoughts Would Be Great" :D
Cheers Spider

the tailshaft is designed to work on a whole range of angles, so of course that wouldn't be a problem - unless the gearbox was so low that the distance between the output shaft and the diff became too great and the damn thing fell out!! (pole vault!!!) :-X

or the angle on the unis was too steep and put undue stress on the joints....

i'd be worried about those speed bumps though if the thing hung too low  ;D ;D ;D

Spider
Any chance of posting the photos on this site, I think there would be a few interested people myself included to see how it was done.

Was the transmission tunnel cut, any sign of a EK (Auto)tunnel and crossmember having been welded in?

Thanks and look forward to pictures
John M

In reference to those speed humps......ie a certain gearbox crossmember that comes with a certain chassis kit that hits the damn speed humps if you lower your car.

 :) Hi John,
                The tunnel has not been touched, it is all standard. The bracket hangs down no lower than the exhaust system. It has got me buggered. The bracket that was made has everything on it, as in the handbrake cable attachments. It has been well made. The bracket could actually be shorter as they have a small spacer between
the gearbox and the crossmember. When i get some photos i will try to post them up on the site, so bear with me as i wont know what i am doing. ???
Cheers Spider. 8)

Well I'm very interested in seeing this too, so if you have dramas posting the pix, email 'em to me and I'll sort it out for you.

cheers
RET

For the angle of the tailshaft the angle at the front uni should be the same as that at the rear uni, with maybe 2 degrees or so extra at the rear to allow for the twist of the diff as its under load while being driven?
I dont think that the unis should be straight, with no angle.

:o :o

You had trouble with yours Brad :-/  ???

damn  right! it is a very badly designed crossmember. i couldn't even get out of the driveway once i put my dropped spindles and 2" lowered springs in.

you can even see the crossmember that comes with the "kit" when you look at the car from the side  :-X pretty sucky i thought

i redesigned it and now it only hangs as low as the thickness of the metal and a bolt head below the gearbox mount (about 6mm) it raised my clearance by well over an inch.

i have attatched some low res drawings of the crossmember i designed, i can send people good quality versions if they are interested

(http://photo.starblvd.net/~gree/2-3-3.jpg)

(http://photo.starblvd.net/~gree/2-3-4.jpg)

it helped me out of the driveway anyway!  ;D


of course, this cross member only fits the chassis of that "certain" kit... not the standard fc one

PS. forgot to mention that this crossmember was designed for a celica 5 speed. not sure how other boxes mount up. i also moved the entire crossmember back about 30 to 40 mm along the chassis rails by drilling new mount holes

Gee Spider you really have the thinking cap straining at this end, can't what to see what stroke of genius the "mighty blues"(You have to be queenslander or have lived there to understand) have come up with to make it all fit.
Look forward to pictures
John M

Hey Gree

Did you also modify the tailshaft loop of this "certain" kit?


a-c

nah, i took it (the tailshaft loop) off for the time being... it is one of those things i'll get to.... i don't do big burnouts or anything so i figured i am safe for the time being

 :DHey Gree,
                    Would you mind sending me a copy of the drawing's.ctattoo@southpacificsolutions.com
Cheers mate,
                    Spider 8)

Spider sent me some pix of this cross-member, as discussed, so here they are.

Seems to me the front of the motor must have been jacked up to buggery to get the tranny to fit under that tunnel, but I've been wrong before ::)

 :)Thanks Ret,
                      I know the pictures are a bit dark and ret has made them alot better than what i sent him, so thankyou ret for doing that. The motor was siting on normal engine mounts, there were no spacers. So it has still got me buggered ???
Cheers
          Spider 8)

 :( Hi Everyone,
                        Does anyone know what they might have done for this conversion, without cutting everything. "PLEASE SOMEONE MUST HAVE AN IDEA"
CHEERS Spider 8)

maybe the motor was moved forward, so as to bring the lumpy part of the transmission into the open area of the tunnel....

where are the engine mounts welded to on the crossmember. they usually go right near the back of the crossmember on an hr front end. maybe yours are more forward...

just a guess anyway

G'day Spider
Was the motor sitting at the normal height? Where the metal mounts on the actual crossmember the normal height or shortened? Only way I can see fitting the trimatic in.
Thou on another site they reckon it is possible to fit the trimatic in without modifying the manuel tunnel, looks like they where right.
Spider put the machine in mothballs as a truly unique machine ::)
See Ya at the Nationals
John M

the gearbox crossmember does hang a really long way from the floor. you said it didn't hang below the exhaust, but i notice that it too is a long way down from the floor. so maybe they just simply leaned the engine back to buggery on its original mounts, hanging the end of gearbox really low....

anyway, just chucking around some theories

 :)Hi Everyone,
                      Thanks for the replies. The mounts are right to the back on the crossmember, as for the height i am not sure on what length the mounts should be, that is the one's welded on the crossmember. Can anyone give me a measurement so i can check. It is really starting to bug me. Anyway thanks again. ;)
Cheers Spider 8)

I'm with Gree, I think the engine has been leaned way back.  My Trimatic rear mount is level with the crossmember under the floor and this has the engine sitting on the correct angle.
I used a EK Hydro floor, but the crossmember depth is the same as the FC, I used a slightly modified HR gearbox mount for the rear which is flat.

The trans in the picture seems to sit about 3 inches below the crossmember, and I think it would be a real problem with a lowered car.

Ken

 :)Hi Ken,
             Before i took the front end off today i measured the gearbox mount and the front suspension, and the gearbox is actually a quarter of an inch higher than the front crossmember. Would you know how high the bolt is from the base of the engine mount on the crossmember to where it bolts thru the engine mount ::)
Cheers Spider 8)

Paul, when I said crossmember, I meant the crossmember under the front floor, not the front suspension crossmember.
Bolt height dimension you asked for is about 2 inches - standard HR front engine mounts cut from the front and moved to the back.
Ken

Hi Ken,
           Sorry about that,  I measured where you were talking about and it is 4 & 1/2 inches hanging past the crossmember. The engine mounts are right they are 2 & 1/2 inches from the base to the hole centre and they are at the back. I remember the tailshaft not having much of a angle on it, so i am still buggered. The bloke i bought it off was right into hotrods, so unless he had some super secret of doing it,  i will never know. :-[
Cheers Spider

Its funny how we make life hard for ourselves by always looking at the hard way of doing things.
the guy who made this bracket has subscribed to the KISS (keep it simple stupid)method with perfect results,dont question why it works just copy it

Perfect.. maybe not...

the x-member metal looks pretty weak, the stress on the 2 hanging bolts is a result of poor design and takes the weight of both engine and box plus fwd/backward forces caused by acceleration and deceleration.

there probably should be some gussets reinforcing the hanging  x-member rather than these bolts.

Im not keen on the thru the floor mounting either, even tho its got spreader plates, the metal around it may fail under high stress.


sorry. i wouldnt do this to my own car.

Ed

 :) The funny thing about all this crossmember debate is, that it has been passed by the TRANSPORT DEPARTMENT, and in Q.L.D. that is not easy for they are strict. The bracketery made up for the crossmember is 8mm thick, the side pieces that you see holding the gearbox bracket just doesnt have the spreader plate but also has a bracket bolted to the underfloor crossmember, this is all done in 8mm right angle steel, and gusseted. You can swing off the brackets and they dont move. The only way it will fail is if i had a high impact collision, and the original all steel steering column which does not have a crumple zone, would spear straight thru me first, before i tore out the floor. But anyway you will see me at the nationals and everyone can have a look. If it is good enough for the QLD TRANSPORT DEPT and they must think it is safe, it is good enough for me
Cheers Spider 8)

Spider
We are all waiting with baited breath to see this in the flesh.
As to previous suggestions that the motor was tilted back, to get that much angle at the back the tappet cover would have to be bashing it's way through the fire wall (Not much room there to start with).

Maybe the installer has found a way to do it, maybe he lowered the whole front crossmember, ie spaced it off the front chassis.

Maybe maybe maybe.

Maybe we will all see the answer at the Nationals and to those that aren't going, maybe you will never know.

John M

I stand corrected Spider!  ;)

will have to see it at the Nats.

Cheers

Ed