Build thread: 1969 2a 109 SW w/ GM 4.3 v6 on RRC LWB chassis

[RamblerRob]

Thought I'd start a build thread to chronical my stumblings through this project.

My initial scope was to build up a similar (but worse off) truck on a fresh designa chassis but I was able to nab the current truck having already been converted to run on the rrc LWB chassis and equipped with some nice upgrades for less than the chassis alone would have cost me let alone the massive project of getting the skeleton of my old truck in decent shape to even start the project.

PO of my current rig had her converted to a NA diesel /lt77 / lt230 so the main part of my project hot narrowed down to just an engine swap from a full on frame off restoration, Making me very happy indeed!

Engine/ transmission /Tcase mounting & position

My drivetrain selection I had been working on already and consisted of a Chev 4.3 v6 out of a 2006 silverado, mated to 4hp22 and lt230 via the kit from Mark's 4wd.
Having already shelled out for the engine and the kit I didn't want to switch gears again. The truck came to me without engine or transmission anyway.
Fitment wise it's snug but comfortable in the engine compartment and I didn't need to modify the bulkhead at all. I did need to shift the transfer case mounts rear ward about 5".
The marks 4wd kit came with engine brackets that are a bolt on job for chev 350 replacing rover v8 but my truck no longer had the v8 brackets, so I opted to get some adjustable weld in brackets from advance adapters.

http://www.advanceadapters.com/products/713001-s--chevy-v8--43l-v6-engine-mount-kit/

Nice brackets that let you adjust for placement and bolt in temporarily but require welding before actual use.

Power steering box/pump

The power steering pump really wanted to occupy the same space as the power steering box and was super tight against the steering shafts so I removed the gm pump and downgraded to the pump from my '95 disco (parts truck) two of the holes in the block for the AC/PS bracket match up exactly to the holes in the land rover pump housing/bracket so I fabbed up a small bracket to get my third bolt hole and shaved down the back of the Rover bracket to bring the pulley into line with the rest of the GM belt drive pulleys

Mating the 4.3 to zf4hp22

This part took a fair bit of head scratching even with the kit from marks. The kit consists of a bellhousing adapter plate and a crank adapter that has the gm crank pattern on one side and the Rover crank pattern on the other. You fit a GM 153t flywheel to your crank and couple it to the Rover torque converter via a land rover flexible drive plate. This is where the fun began!
So gm doesn't use 153t flywheels on any of their Kate model v6 engines and no longer drill their blocks with the bolt pattern for that flywheel. I was only able to find one starter that mounted to the staggered bolt pattern and allowed for the 153t flywheel.

https://m.summitracing.com/parts/csi-100sbp

This kit comes with a little bracket that bolts into the staggered bolt holes with one starter bolt and a socket head cap screw and has an extra hole for your straight across pattern bolt to mount into.
I ran into a few issues with this set up. Firstly the aluminum oil pan on the engine has to be trimmed back significantly to make room. Secondly all the included bolts are standard and my starter bolts are metric. They did thread but I was concerned about how loose the fit was. I ended up getting the starter mounting block cur down and bored out to accept my stock starter bolts... Better safe than sorry.

The other issues I had were that the newer engines used a dished flex plate so I had to add a crank spacer to bring my flat flywheel out 5mm to get my ring gear teeth in the correct location.

Another as yet untested possible problem is that there is very little room to access the flex plate to torque converter bolts and I'm not sure how I will be able to torque them correctly. I may widen the inspection cover on the bottom of the Rover bellhousing to give me more access but I still won't be able to get a torque wrench between the flywheel and flex plate.

 

[Contractor]

You got everything but the pictures.

Sounds nice.

 

[ezzzzzzz]

I can't say for sure but I think the bolt pattern for the one-piece seal (86+) is the same as your LU3. To mate a '96 LT1 (later one-piece seal) to a ZF4hp22 I did the following. I purchased a JW Transmission's flat flywheel (93000-1X) to bolt to the LT1. The flywheel is drilled to the ZF converter 4 bolt pattern which eliminates that stupid smaller second plate. A flat adapter plate was fabbed which bolts between the ZF and GM bellhousing eliminating the need of an engine/transmission adapter plate. A thin spacer was cut out of another GM bellhousing to increase the depth of the bellhousing and space the converter correctly to the ZF pump when everything is bolted together. I don't have a picture of the GM/ZF bellhousing adapter but you can see it nestled in second photo.

 

[RamblerRob]

That looks like a much more elegant set up!

 

[RamblerRob]

General pics & info on the truck

https://nas-row.com/dto_garage.php?do=editvehicle&v=1066

 

[mgreenspan]

Check your link. That's your personal editable one.

 

[RamblerRob]

Must be a time limit on editing the post however..
Here is the correct link
https://nas-row.com/showthread.php?t=260

 

[RamblerRob]

I was surprised at how much of a pain in the ass it was to get the air intake set up!!
I dont have much room under the hood so I went with a K&N Orion in line filter box and a a handful of connectors, reducers, inserts and elbows to connect to the stock MAF sensor and a resonator from a chev blazer. The siverado one has too high a profile to fit under the hood.
I had to remove the little clamp thingy that secures the resonator to the throttle body so I will need to sort out an alternative

 

[RamblerRob]

Taking a break from the engine compartment to fit second row seats. Mine didn't come with any but I have the set from my Disco1 parts truck. Fit looks to be pretty good. I don't have the mounting hardware from the stock seats so I cant say whether it could have been modded to fit. Being that my truck is not sitting on a stock chassis (I'm using a modified RRC LWB chassis) I also may not have the structural support underneath the body work for the stock mounts. I can identify a couple of points where the Tub section meets the second row floor where I have something substantial to bolt to they are just a bit wider apart than I'd like the mounting legs to be.

I decided to run a piece of 1.5" angle iron across the back of the rear floor/tub between the mounting points and secure or weld the bracket to that. I'm planning on constructing a mounting assembly of 1" square steel tube. I need the mounting points on the seats to meet the bracket at 5" forward and 7" up from the angle iron.
Once in place I'll have to add a support leg to the rear of each side of the 60/40 rear seats. I ground off the small rear foot from the outside each seat and they sit at a nice height/position on the stock seat support. I've pulled the catch that secures the seat backs in the disco and I should be able to mount that to the side structural components of the 109 tub.

If all goes well I should have decent rear seats that fold and tilt forward for extra storage as needed.

I'm still not sure what my plan is for front seats. I have defender front seats currently but I may look at swapping them out. I've never had a chance to ride in them so I cant say but I keep reading that they are lacking in comfort. I could try to fit the discovery front seats for a matching set, but I do have a friend who has helped me out a fair bit that may want them and I'm not sure I find them that comfy either. I'm not too concerned with matching the set as I plan to get knightsbridge overland seat covers for the rear (and front if I stick with rover seats). D2 seats look a fair bit more comfy than D1 and I understand that they aren't much different to fit. I've also read about smart car seats, rx8 seats or volvo/saab seats. With the defender front seats I find the steering wheel seems pretty tight so I'm reluctant to gain much height, though I would like to take the opportunity to shift the seat inward sightly If I do end up refitting seats, I definitely feel a little squished to the door when sitting in the defender seats so an extra inch or so there would not go amiss!

 

[RamblerRob]

More messing about with seats today. Looking at fitting my D1 front seats. It'll match the set with the rears and I'll at least know what seats it is that I have. I find the current seats reasonably comfortable but I cant figure out what they are exactly which poses a problem for getting the Knightsbridge overland seat covers I want. The guys at knightsbridge can definitely make covers for whatever seats but It would be a bunch of mucking about to get them done with non-standard seats. The series seat box is at a fair steeper angle rearward than the base that the d1 seat sits on and the seat is a little thicker at the front. I haven't decided which way to go on this exactly but I wanted to sort out how I would go about fitting the D1 seats so I knew my options.

I spent a fair amount of time trying to picture how I would adapt the D1 sliders to the series seat box and whether the seat would fit at the correct angle and height or not.
After mucking about for a while I was moving the extra series sliding seat bracket that I had out of the way and ended up putting it down on an over turned d1 seat. Turns out it was a pretty good fit! It also sits in such a way as to self correct the mismatch in angles between the d1 seat base and the series seat box. It does sit slightly higher and the series seat bracket doesn't slide as much as the D1 sliders allow but there really isn't a lot of room to slide anyway.

I really like the seating position as it sits, though I may take out the bar that runs behind the seats if I go the d1 seat route as it will allow a bit more freedom of recline if I want.

In the final image you can see the underside of the seat. I'm going to add some support material that will be bolted to the D1 seat but not the series bracket. It would sit in place much the way a series seat base does however I will want to come up with some means of securing the seat that allows for quick & easy access to the under-seat compartments. The red lines to the rear represent some 1"square tubing while the ones to the front represent a metal plate of some sort.

 

[RamblerRob]

Its been a bit of a slow winter as far as work on the project. Tripping over too much stuff in the garage and weather not well suited to driveway work. I did get a couple of things sorted however.

The previous owner had let me know that the series brake booster wasn't quite cutting it so I looked at fitting a defender pedal box and servo. The internet said it would work but it was too tight for my taste. I did have an extra D1 servo on hand so I set about fitting that to the series 2a brake pedal box.

It needed a spacer and adapter plate made as well as some minor modifications to the pedal box.

It ended up fitting quite nicely however I had planned to sneak my air intake past the servo and master cylinder to the snorkel on the drivers side wing top however that will no longer be possible.

The next thing I have mostly been able to put to bed is the rear seats. The truck didn't come to me with 2nd row seats so I re-purposed the ones from my discovery parts truck. In order to get the mounting points correct for the seats I cut a section of the D1 floor out and constructed a frame to support it and anchor everything to the steel mounting tabs under the tub. Its really quite sturdy. I set it a couple of inches higher than the D1 had them but it allowed me a few extra inches rearward placement for leg room and to allow the seats to tip up. I still have to muck about with the latches that secure the rear of the seat in place and I have to re-do the feet at the rear of the seats as I made them too short