The Project Pad

Sure looks great John! SOOOOOO CLEAN! I love it! Nice pictures Hank! It was sure an awesome experience to get to see this beast in person.

You need to keep moving on it John. You gave me a bunch of inspiration as I watched your progress and I can say that I now have a running urq with a 20VT. I got it started a week ago and drove it to the exhaust shop this past Monday to get the RR downpipe modified so the stock cat and Borla exhaust fit. I can now get it through emissions. Luckily the exhaust shop was close by and I could cruise through industrial parking lots without the headlights, bumper or valence.

Now I just have to get the front end back together, put on the front sway bar and reinstall the center console, then its off to the DMV.

Then I get to sort out all the other stuff that you get when you buy a car that wasn't running and parked for 4 years. Every now and then I do have to tell myself I like doing this.

dbldmnd wrote:You need to keep moving on it John. You gave me a bunch of inspiration as I watched your progress and I can say that I now have a running urq with a 20VT. I got it started a week ago and drove it to the exhaust shop this past Monday to get the RR downpipe modified so the stock cat and Borla exhaust fit. I can now get it through emissions. Luckily the exhaust shop was close by and I could cruise through industrial parking lots without the headlights, bumper or valence.

Now I just have to get the front end back together, put on the front sway bar and reinstall the center console, then its off to the DMV.

Then I get to sort out all the other stuff that you get when you buy a car that wasn't running and parked for 4 years. Every now and then I do have to tell myself I like doing this.

That is way cool that you have you engine swap up and running. Is it running pretty decently? Get the bugs worked out for next year in Vegas.

I got mine running, and even though I knew that I had a ton of the little crap to do, I was stoked to keep moving. When I let the car down off the jackstands, fired it up and put it gear only to let the clutch out and not even try to move, it was about more than I could take at the time. Since I have realized that I can't pull the tranny without dropping the engine quite a ways. It's looking like the new header hits the subframe when lowered and will have to be removed and the hydraulic and A/C lines get in the way while lowering and might have to be removed or loosened off of the firewall. :( Remember what a pita those lines were getting back on the firewall and arranged to look decent? Oh well, thanks for the encouragement and especially now that I know your car is running, I guess I'll have to make another go of it.

John, you don't have to lower the engine at all. Just take the steering arm bracket off and move it above the rack. that allows the trans to slide off without interfering. It's less work than undoing all the engine bay now get back to work!

Im with Derek, I have dropped mine twice and at best I let the engine rock a bit. I removed the steering bracket as well, pulling the diff actuator helped too.

The trans will definately not come out without the steering bracket removed. What these guys are saying is true though. I can get the wider 01e out of my URQ without unbolting my solid mounted motor mounts. I have to loosen the front bolts on the subframe a bit to get the belhousing to clear the subframe, but other then that, it is pretty easy.

Get er done Dad!

I have an adapter that goes on the floor jack that makes a platform to steadily lower the transmission if you need it. If it don't fit your jack I can bring that too.

I usually drop the transmission one night after work, I can usually have it out in under 3 hours. I left the subframe in this time, but still removed the axles just to keep them out of the way. You can easily put a bag over the ends and tie them out of the way for a quick swap.

Then I casually address whatever I have found while I was in there. This time I discovered my shifter linkage was cracked and probably one more drive away from failing where it connects to the shifter. I guess the constant punching the shifter to unlock second gear had taken it's toll.

Install is usually a little longer, 3-4 hours for me without a lift.

And if these guys haven't assured you that you can do it, I'll jsut say that even *I* dropped my trans twice with only disconnecting the steering bracket. Remove trans mount ears/brackets too - makes it easier still to drop. Bungie axles up above. Having two floor jacks helps to align it back on. That's all.

Is it done yet?

I guess I can't come up with any excuses with you guys it seems. I looked at disconnecting the steering bracket first, but because of the 3b mani, the coils on the firewall, the A/C lines along with the hydraulic lines and reservoir, and the vacuum booster being larger has access to the rack pretty tied up. I thought maybe I could do it without by just loosening mounts to be able to tilt some. It looks like I need to go back to step #1 and deal with the steering. I thought that I might be able to complain and buy some time from you guys, but it's obvious I'm dealing with a tough bunch. I'll just have to give it some more effort I guess. Does anyone know how to do all that is being suggested without scratching new paint. :(

You can plasti-dip all your tools or just not worry about it and do it. I don't see why would you scratch the paint. Turn the wheel all the way to the right. Get a 17 or 16mm(whatever nut size) box wrench for the nuts that sit below bracket. Get some long extensions and a right sicket on the bolt and hook up th eimpact. Loosen the bottom nuts first and then just take the bolt out the top....piece of cake, but you know this, c'mon!

Like I said, a tough crowd!! You know Peter I COULD drop one of those long extensions on the paint.

Unscratched paint is reserved for those who do it right the first time OWwwwweeeeeee lol

Notice I said "those" not "those of us" ;o]

i made a bracket for my steering that moved the link ends up top of the rack just because of that interference. but its funky, and i am moving them back to the front. i will just pull the bracket if i need to drop trans.

You can aslo cut the top of the bellhousing off and weld it shut with straight piece of alu....didn't AudiSport do that so they can swap transmisions between stages in like 15 minutes?

once you have the car jacked up all the way and supported, turn the wheel to the right, then you can stack extensions and reach up to the bottom nuts of the bracket bolts, then the same from the top. you don't have to reach all the way down in there with a long handled ratchet

sheesh, is it out already?

Just to add fuel to the fire - yep - just turn the wheel all the way and with a nice long extension or two you can take those two steering bracket nuts off easily. I also really like how the bolts thread in, too. With the steering bracket out of the way the tranny is good to go out. I remove the aluminum mounts, too, like Peter said. Pull axles back. But its the sway bar links (late style suspension) that I hate - they stick down and hurt like a mofo whn you hit your head on them.

All that said I know where you are coming from - being so close and having the clutch setback. Like last year after my basically 3rd transmission swap of the summer only to find IT was bad, too! :curses: :frustrated:

Take a _quick_ breather then get back at it. Before you know it Vegas 2012 will be near. And selfishly I want to see/hear this beautiful kick arse car run in anger.

Boy what would I do for some Vegas weather now...btw, is it done yet?

Thanks for the push guys. I decided to pull the tranny today and see what's up. Darin was betting on Hank so I thought I would get myself out to the garage. Not having a lot of time, I got everything disconnected and pulled the tranny out this morning.




Thats the good news. The bad is that I can't see anything obviously out of line. I'll have to do some measuring as it almost looks as if the input splines might be bottoming out on the disc hub. I guess I will have to figure it out on my next days off, but for now it's out.



Sure wish I had this good help now. 8) If so we would have had the tranny trashed by now and changing it out for a replacement. Those Oregon boys know how to get it done....Derek parked his 4ktq and Ben just bought another car.

So, do you wash your hands before working on that car?

Can't complain about working on something that clean. Me<--jealous.

EDIT: Second thought, you may want to touch up that clutch. There is some blue paint coming off.

good lord I wish my cars were that clean underneath...

Nice work Dad. The header looks sweet from that angle. I wish I would have painted my old SPEC clutch before I gave it to you. Keep going. I would look at the difference between the fork between the URQ trans and the 5ktq trans. I know for a fact that clutch worked without issue with a 7a flywheel, 7a flywheel, that clutch and a 5ktq trans(or 20020vt trans for that matter). I used the throwout bearing htat came with the 200 20vt kit I bought from SPEC through Javad. Perhaps you can get someone with a 200 torsen tranmission apart to measure the key dimensions on that TOB

EDIT: Second thought, you may want to touch up that clutch. There is some blue paint coming off.

Chris, I almost didn't want to post that picture because of that. The reason for that paint chipping is because this clutch pressure plate and disc was bought for Hank's Urq when he first went 20vt. He ran it for quite a few miles and upgraded to the Southbend I believe and since it was a heavily subsidized initial purchase, I ended up with it. Part of the reason I didn't do much measuring or checking when installing.....figured it worked for Hank it would work for me. Oh and did you notice the subframe scratch? :(


I went out and pulled the pressure plate before I have to go to work and found that the inner portion of about 10mm had been rubbing on the new flywheel insert. This tells me that my suspicions of the splines bottoming out is probably correct. I think that when the engine/bellhouse bolts are sucked up tight, it pushes the bottomed out splines into the hub and bells the disc so that only the inside is grabbing, or not grabbing in this case.

Flywheel with inside wear



Corresponding wear on the disc though harder to see in the picture.



The hub had already been clearanced some when Hank experienced this same problem......again I didn't figure I would have the same problem.
I guess I will have to take a bit more off and remeasure everything. Hank says he never had this clutch setup in the Urq 016, but with a torsen center 016. Maybe the splines are cut further up the input shaft on the torsen even though I wouldn't think so. Oh well.

Hank, the arm of the urq and 5ktq 016es look to be identical. Did you use an arm and throwout bearing that didn't have the bracket as part of the bearing like the one I'm using? It looks like the same throwout bearing as the 5ktq by just glancing, but tomorrow I will pull one off and measure.

Wow. I'm impressed John. Hope you solve this soon and get the car on the road!