Most liked posts in thread: 2005 Unintended Rebuild...

Got the new flywheel and clutch installed, hoses were the wrong ones, maybe my mistake I'll have to check the order.

Super cold, but the engine is off the stand, need to get some grease for the shaft and throwout bearing. If I can get the garage warm I hope to have the engine and trans in this weekend.

 

I already had a powerflex performance bushing kit, so I pulled the front subframe and rebuilt that, replacing the power steering hoses.

The head rebuild took longer than expected due to travel for work, and dread/procrastination.

That lands me where I am today...the engine is all back together, the transmission needs all the old oil and grease cleaned off of it. Then I can pull the engine off the stand and install the new clutch and solid flywheel.

I am waiting on some coolant hoses and gaskets for the exhaust. I haven't posted for a while, but I thought if I made this project more public it may motivate me to spend some time in the F'n cold garage and drag this across the finish line. Plus I may have a line on a Fiat X1/9 project to fill the shop space...won't the wife be thrilled!

 

Great looking car. The one I may have is a true barn find - people bought a house and it had the car in the garage on jackstands and they want it gone. No idea on the condition, haven't seen it yet.

 

Got the engine and transmission in the car, now just working out the electrical and plumbing. I was traveling and hung up for weeks on having eight extra bolts I could not figure out where they were missing. Turns out I had a bag labled trans bolt and a bag labeled flywheel bolts. I knew I bolted and torqued the flywheel so what were the other transmission bolts? Long story short, the new engine had short flywheel bolts on the crank, must have had an aftermarket flywheel because the transmission bolts were the stock flywheel bolts.

Once I was sure I didn't need to blow it all apart again I've dropped it in and getting hoses and wires routed, then the subframe back in as well.

 

I looked for a replacement crank, but the cost of the crank and then the cost to rebuild the engine seemed way too high. My next plan was to buy a car from CoPart, I found some great examples that I could use parts from to upgrade other parts like my wheels and seats.

Shipping didn't seem like a feasible option, so I planned to tow the car back myself. This only made sense as I would need a vehicle to drive while fixing the Mini.

I found a 2008 Cadillac EXT truck, and picked it up in early August. Great truck and now my daily.

The CoPart option fell Apart as I learned about all the additional fees and how the auctions actually worked. I went with plan B and bought a used engine from Ebay. I used to the truck to haul it home, so of course that justified that purchase even more.

 

The 'new' engine was from a pre-facelift 2003 with similar mileage, but from the time of the auction listing to time of delivery it had obviously sat outside and had some oxidation on the aluminum parts and rust on the iron. This wouldn't do, so I decided to rebuild the top end and replace parts from my clean shiny '05 engine over to the '03 engine.

"While I'm in there" I ordered an RMW 250 cam, as well as $1500 in seals, gaskets, head studs, etc.

This was in October...why so long, well most of August was spent deciding what to do and shopping for the engine, September was spent traveling for work and we took a family vacation.

 

Once I pulled the head off the '05 to swap it over I found the exhaust valves were coated with crystalized ethanol, more likely methanol. The car has a methanol injection system...


at least two valves were stuck open, which explains why it had a 'bit' of a rough idle.

 

View attachment 47570 Oh, and the Fiat was an 850 Sport, rusty and a caved in roof, I see why they left it behind and I passed on that money pit.

 

Thanks, out of town for the week, but I was thinking of using Permatex when I got home.

 

got it all back together and running. I have a coolant leak, odd thing is that it is where the aircon conditioner mounts.
If I loosen that bolt coolant pours out, with it tight it drips once per second. I can't find anything on a sleeve or seal that is missing there.

 

Applied the permatex to the holes and bolts and that seems to have sealed the leak.

Took it for a drive tonight, maybe a slight exhaust leak, replaced the gaskets and bolts, I'll see if I can tighten that up.

Need to bed in the new clutch and flywheel before I lean on it. I have the meth injection turned off for now.

 

It has 17% pulley, miltek exhaust on a megan racing header (no cat), helix cai, 440 injectors, cam, craven short shifter, hawk talon brakes. The pulley, methanol and exhaust were on it when I bought the car.

Next on the list is coilovers and new wheels, maybe a larger rear swaybar.