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Mini Project: Fiesta
Zetec S gearbox swap
We've acquired a Ford
Racing Puma gearbox which should have more useful ratios for racing,
as we are not even using 5th gear with the standard Zetec IB5 box
and there is quite a wide gap between 3rd and 4th gear too.
The FRP box has much closer ratios, all we have to do is fit it!
As we are working in
a large single garage with basic tools this is a particular
challenge, especially as initial attempts to change the gearbox
while in the car failed with rounding off of a engine bolt.
We're also taking the
opportunity to tidy up the engine bay while it is mostly empty.
Part 1 - Remove
engine and gearbox
Remove battery and
tray..
Remove
air filter and pipes from throttle body..
Remove
fuel hoses and disconnect engine loom electric connectors..
Drain
approx 5.5l of coolant. Fortunately there is a drain plug on the
radiator but there will be approx 1l left in the radiator and engine
for later..
Unclip
the clutch slave feed pipe and clamp hose, wrap up the hose end and
master cylinder to keep leaks to a minimum..
Disconnect gear selector and stabiliser bar and tie up out of the
way. Remove gearbox torque link.
Remove
radiator..
Remove
auxiliary belt and unbolt PAS pump and tie out of the way..
Unbolt
exhaust manifold and remove studs..
Disconnect steering arms, anti roll bar links and bottom ball
joint..
Unclip
inner CV joint boot, pull out hubs to free joint, bag up joint end
and tie up out of the way...
Support
Engine/gearbox with crane and jack and remove engine mount nuts.
Lower to ground (massive amounts of wiggling to be expected)!
Touchdown!
Best to
remove bumper and radiator carrier..
Part 2 -
Swap gearboxes
Now that
we can drag the gearbox out from the front of the car, we have
enough room to remove all the bellhousing to engine bolts. The
bolt earlier rounded off, was still a huge pain to remove and took
the combined effort of bolt extractor, heat and a hammer to shock it
into releasing. Also not strictly necessary to remove the
starter motor completely, even though it will be unbolted.
Mounting
studs, speed sensor and slave/thrust bearing needed to be
transferred to the FRP box. The thrustbearing was in good
condition and just needed a bit of a clean up.
Attaching the box back on to the engine was a bit of a pain with the
fixed drive shaft still in place, which made reattaching the support
bearing difficult. The shaft still fell out of the box and
dumped some oil anyway!
...Also
a good opportunity to check the clutch condition. There was
still a reasonable amount of material left on the friction surfaces
and as we are quite easy on the clutch with rolling starts, we see
no need to change it just yet.
Part 3 -
Reinstall
Somewhat
more awkward than removing the engine and gearbox, is trying to get
the assembly back in the bay and lined up with the mounts. The
assembly needs to be tilted and twisted and persuading to get into
the right place. Having to use a combination of the engine
hoist and jack does not help!
New
gearbox takes 2.1 litres of oil when damp. Don't forget to
bleed the clutch. Assembly is essentially just a case of
plugging back in all the hoses and electrical connectors etc.
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