Need Help/advice With Engine Conversion

[86RollaWagon]

(ke701986 dx corolla, wagon) Seriously thinking of dropping in a 7k engine, pro's cons? was initially thinking of a 4age but i seriously lack experience apart from a couple family and freinds that could help. so 7k it's gunna be.

 

How hard is this to do, and what do i need to look out for when buying a complete engine?

 

Help much appreciated :(

Edited September 18, 2013 by 86RollaWagon

[Mechanical Sympathy]

Do it! Sump likely needs to be cut to clear crossmember. See if you can get the Townace 7K engine mounts too. Because the 7k block is wider, I've read a rumour they fit to the KE crossmember or you have to space something from something with washers. The mounts to the chassis presumably, which I guess must sit the engine higher. Try the 7K mounts instead.

 

Put your old inlet manifold on it, or something better. Get extractors too. And a 1 3/4" exhaust.

 

Get the alternator and starter motor. Get the EFI manifolds, ECU and loom if you're interested in running that or using it for forced induction later. Get the air con bracket if you're thinking of a supercharger.

 

Try get the fan. I had a clutch fan on a 5K and it was awesome for peak hour traffic.

 

Do a build thread and take photos and tell me if I'm wrong, because I want to do one.

 

edit: supercharger bracket

Edited September 18, 2013 by Mechanical Sympathy

[B.L.Z.BUB]

If you are going EFI 7K you may as well go EFI 4AGE. Both conversions are similarly complicated/expensive.

[Mechanical Sympathy]

Reed is correct. Using the EFI set up will require grafting of two wiring looms - which can be quite tricky without diagrams.

 

But of course you wouldn't have to convert to hydraulic clutch, convert an FWD engine to RWD, purchase another gearbox, clutch, tailshaft, modify engine mounts or swap crossmembers and get it engineered.

[altezzaclub]

Why don't you use the Y engine?? The 1800cc 7K has a bore to stroke of 80.5 to 87.5mm That's a long stroke slow-revving motor.

 

The 2Y 1800cc has one of 86 to 78mm, so it is oversquare and would rev far better.

 

Looking at them they are very similar, crappy old 8valve side-cam tractor engines out of TownAce vans/utes, and Wiki says the valve gear can be swapped so there can't be much difference in it..

[Chairs with Flares]

I have/put a 7K into a (now mine) KE30, so I don't know how much will relate over to the KE70 in terms of measurements. It was put together on a budget, so we re-used as many parts as we could.

 

The rear of the sump will not clear the center tie rod (steering box setup on KE30) buy about 10mm. We heated and gently 'massaged' the sump with a hammer, a little at a time until it fit. There were 3 of us and we took it slowly, pulling and fitting the motor 3 or 4 times, each time removing and heating/reshaping the sump until we got the clearance we needed. It sounds dodgy and the 'proper' way would be to have it cut and welded with a recess, but the end result was the same, no cracks or leaks and a sump that seals up against the block.

 

No combination of left/right 3K/4K mounts would have the mounts fit flush with the crossmember. We ended up shortening the passenger side mount about 7mm by cutting and rewelding, then shimming the bottom (where it bolts to the crossmember) about 4mm with some steel plate cut to match the mount. There was a lot of experimenting with shims and lengths to get the mounts to sit flush so the rubber wouldn't be twisted.

 

The 7K mechanical fuel pump had a return fitting back to the tank, which I didn't have on the KE30 tank, so that was replaced with the 3K mechanical pump which bolts straight in and turned out was enough to feed the twin solex carbs.

 

Now for the fun part; driving experiences.

My setup is just the stock 7K (I think, not sure if it has a cam, if it did, it's pretty mild) with twin Solex sidedraft carbies and a header, with a 4speed K40 behind it.

The motor is all lowdown torque and there's no point revving it much past 5100RPM. That said, there's no need to as it will pull smoothly without lugging almost from idle. This means in 4th gear, it will pull from about 30kph without lugging. I run the stock 13in steelies with 175 profile economy tires and in the wet, it will spin up both rears (stock open diff) in second gear under power. Not clutch kicking, not bang-shifting, just a smooth 1st-2nd then plant it. In the dry I try not to shock the driveline as it's stock and probably won't take too much abuse before breaking the diff or trans from the additional torque. The standard 3K clutch started to slip after a while so I put in an Exxedy HD unit. From a standing start, it will juuust edge out a standard V6 VN Commodore to about 70-80kph where the Corolla runs out of legs and the Commy takes off, so while it's a good balance of power, it's still no rocketship.