The Intake
well yet another pouring wet weekend down here in sunny australia...... :smt022
the old man says its real pommy weather.... so if any of you are planning a nice trip here to aus to escape it might as well stay at home :smt016
i should be happy gives me a break from working so thought i'd get stuck back into DUB74L
i wanted to start on the intake
as posted earlier in the thread in the stock position the throttle body is hard up against the firewall and i wasnt cutting my firewall away to clear it
doing that would also mean fabbing a box into the firewall around it and building a new subwoofer enclosure so meh to all that
easier to either A. spin the intake manifold around as some have said above or B. make a throttle body elbow
this was the easier option for me as flipping the manifold means making custom alt brackets, rewiring the injectors, coolant sensors, etc oh and finding a belt the right lenght considering ive just spent $28 on a belt to fit the alt in the stock position made the choice easier
Custom offroad here in aus make a nice looking throttle body inverter at a good price too
its an easy option, the only reason i didnt go this way was their inverter is a full 180degree, i only wanted 90 as it makes for less visual clutter without intake plumbing sitting on top of the engine
i assume they do it this way so theres clearance under bus engine hatches and buggy bodys
so first thing i did was got a 2.5" 90 degree mandrel bend from the zorst shop
thats the exact size of the of the intake and TB once you remove it
i cut out a template of the bend from some scrap MDF i had so i could keep trimming it till i got a shape i was happy with rather than play guess work with the bend and risk ruining it by cutting to much
it was just a matter of cutting out flanges in 1/4" plate using the old gasket as template and welding it all together
i also ran a quick bead of JB weld over the top of the joints just incase there were any tiny pin holes i couldnt see
it bolted up nicely with enough clearance for eveything and plenty of room for the TPS plug to fit on despite how close it looks to the firewall in this pic
with that out of the way i needed to sort out the rest of the intake
this is the stock subaru donkey dick that goes between the TB and the AFM
it has a big port on the right side of the accordian section which is the the connection for the Idle Air Control valve
the ECU uses this to control the idle speed so it kinda needs to be there
all the smaller ports on the left are just all the PCV breather connectors, one for the case and 2 for the rocker covers
im not overly worried about these as i would prefer to keep the case fumes out of the intake and illl probably just run the bug pack breather box from my 1776 same setup as per a vw engine
my original plan was out of the throttle body a 3" 135* silicon hose, then a 3" 45* metal bend into which i was going to weld a spigot for the IAC hose
then a straight 3" silicon hose joing the 45* to the AFM
i had all the silicon hoses already but hadnt done anything about the 45* bend with the IAC port yet
then i hit on the idea of just using part of the original subi donkey dick as it was made from very tough, thick plastic which already had the port in it, was the right diameter and as a bonus it was that close to a 45*
so out came the hack saw
i already had a pod filter but hadnt got an adapter yet just so happened that a PVC downpipe fitting laying around fitted nicely
this will only be a temporary measure untill i make or buy a proper metal one
so heres how my intake looked all put together less pod filter
i will have to do some shortening of the hoses to get it sitting perfectly but that will come later on
but for now im happy enough i know it will do the job with a bit of tweaking
The Exhaust
i had made a small start on the exhaust system a few weeks ago but hadnt exactly dont much
i got as far as stripping the EJ20 header of its heatshields
this is what i had roughly come up with in my head
Lukey mufflers make a short stubby little box with 2 outlets alot like badly photoshopped quietpack here
i knew id have to shorten the headers abit but when i bolted it to the engine i thought the collector directly under my diff probably wasnt a smart move
so it was back to the drawing board there but anyway i went those 2 headers needed shortening as they hung even lower than the sump
it would be a chance to straighten up the pipework coming out of the base
so i did a bit of marking......
and a bit of chopping
and ended up with something a bit more practical
and welding back together
not going to win any prizes for best looking headers but still welded alot better than any EMPI piece of crap on the market
like most engine conversions this will be a temporary exhauast system, eventually ill buy a nice stainless steel extractor system and mod it to suit the bug
but for now this one will do
thats as far as ive got with the zorst at the moment till i can get some more bends
ill move the collector over to the side of the gearbox so its not underneath it anymore
im thinking maybe a bigger box is gonna be needed tho cos with no resonator only a single box its gonna be very WRX style droany but ill just have to wait and see how bad it is before i worry to much
i also noticed while i was under there that my gearbox cradle is starting to get a slight bend in it
you can see from the pics ive already swapped to an earlier model gearbox cradle as they're just so much better built
i went hunting for another cradle just to replace mine and found another earlier one but i also found an original 73 on one as well just to show the problem
its not the one off my Lbug bug, i think its the one from my red 75.
the later cradel was blatantly obvious cost cutting on VWs part
there is absolutely no substance to it compared to the earlier ones
you can see how bent and warped it is which makes the engine sit at funny angles and just weakens the rear end
any decent motor with enough torque can do this, it certainly wasnt an abused bug.
Richard at Vforce sells an aftermarket one that is based on the original earlier ones but made even stronger again
the extra weight of the subi is gonna play hell with my chassis forks
i had planned on making my own brace up but have decided its not worth skimping on something so structural so im getting one of Craigs Kafer bars 😎
I spent this arvo getting my loom ready to install into the bug
Al and Miles had already been thro and removed all the redundant wires so all that was left for me to do was postion all the plugs where i wanted them and insulate it all with corrigated split loom
they sorted out the A/C wiring for me as well
using the ECU to control the compressor as per the stock subi setup is better as it makes the engine idle up a split second before the compressor clutch kicks in and also cuts the compressor out if you floor it or the engine gets to hot
now rather than go out and buy the 300 different sizes of corrigated loom required and only end up needing small amounts of each i instead salavaged it from the main wiring harness i pulled out of the donor as it was all there in good condition with lots of assorted sizes
In doing this i can honestly say to anyone who is going to do there own engine management harness you will spend a good 10 hours just unwrapping electrical tape
those Japs truely didnt skimp on electrical tape
not only is the outside of the corrigated loom all wrapped up, once you get that off then all the wires are wrapped in it as well....
its a sticky, messy, frustrating... C U Next Tuesday of a job that i'm just glad i missed the worst of
but under the guidence of Dweezle the tabby i got thro it
you can see how much electrical tape resulted from just removing a few bits of loom, the whole harness is still wrapped in the stuff
while i did that i also extracted the alternator connections which are a part of this harness
theres 2 of them but they join up into one loom.... the main B+ connector with rubber saftey boot and a round black and orange plug with 3 wires
i cut them off with a good meters worth of wiring as im just going to splice them into the old VW alternator connections thro a terminal strip on the firewall
that way incase of unusual circumstances requireing me to refit a vw engine it will be easy to reconnect the electrical side of things
now the connections for the subi alt are bit more complicated than a VW alt
its an internally regulated alt which is where the small yellow wire comes in
it needs to be connected to the ignition circuit as its as a switch wire to turn the internal regualtor on and off
Im going to use my old coil wire for this, it will flatten the battery real quick if its connected to an constant power source
the black wire with the white trace is the charge light connection
so it can just be spliced into the existing VW idiot light wire
and finally all the large white wires can be connected toghther, theyre the B+ so they connect to the cars main power supply
the subi used 2 connected to the main B+ terminal on the alternator and theres yet another one coming from the round plug as well
luckily the 2 B+ are seprate wires so i got rid of one and as my bug only needs one B+ wire coming from the alt im just going to solder the 2 remaining together at the alt end
Now apologies to people with small screens.....
heres my reward for spending a cold wet afternoon in a freezing garage
I hadnt actually given much thought yet to the ECU/relays placement
most bug engine conversions just place them in the rear parcel tray area
problem in my bug is my subwoofer enclosure takes up the entire area and given that its the 4th box ive made i really dont feel like redesigning and making yet another
under the back seat on the left is the next nearest area
altho thats currently occupied by my 2nd battery
i can live without that tho
its just a leisure battery setup same as used in campervans cept mine runs my audio system at sound offs and shows so it can be run completely flat without running the main battery flat and it charges once the engines started
i'll get rid of it and make up a board to mount the ECU, relays, connectors etc like this to sit in the batterys place
im also going to mount the ignitor there as well
subarus have the ignitor mounted on the firewall in the engine bay but i'd like to keep it inside the car away from the elements
most of the vanagon mob that do EJ conversions all mount there ignitors in with ECU and ive yet to hear about anyone having dramas
Joel, they can mount bumpers too!
Enjoying the thread, looking good mate 👍
mate, my ignitor is on the fire wall in all the elements and has never had a drama. the plug has a rubber seal on it so all is good. also, I've heard the ignitor gets a bit hot, so putting it in a spot where it will get air flow is better than inside the car probably.
btw, those factory headers are very strong. I've bashed mine on rocks and everythign and the sheilds have dings but that's all. I do wonder how well they flow?
This is a great thread. Excellent info in here for anyone wanting to do a conversion. Great job Joel.👍
Sharpbuilt V2, EJ25, Subaru 5 Speed, Falcon rear discs, Heater & A/C, Rack Steering
btw, those factory headers are very strong. I've bashed mine on rocks and everythign and the sheilds have dings but that's all. I do wonder how well they flow? [/quote]
Pete on the standard EJ22 they work very well providing good low torque. I built custom equal length headers which rev very freely but lost some of that bottom end...oh well can't have everything🙅
ill give the ignitor a go there and just see how hot it gets
as i mentioned b4 the subaru vanagon guys are boxing them into cabinants and containers with no probs yet so hopefully should be ok
before i had the slave battery there one of my amps was there and the heat that comes off them when u really work them is pretty intense
the guy i got my EJ20 header from had just switched it for a borla replica style staino header
he actullly noticed a drop in power right up till the higher rev range but didnt care as he just wanted the boxer rumble
Joel you might have noticed when you cut those headers they narrow down to about 28mm obviously for a good reason. I made my headers from some old water pipe i had lying around about 1 5/8 ID and its a bit big for the NA EJ22 in the heavier kombi but would probably work better in a beetle. I reckon 1 3/8 equal length would be perfect👍
yea i noticed the original EJ22 header off the donor really tapers down in the bottom
but the EJ20 header i got doesnt do it half as much
i reckon i could make an alright equal lenght 4into1 header up if i didnt have to run a cat
Hi
Silly question, would a WRX header bolt up to your heads, the flange looks similar.
Is there a mark on the stock headers where they miss match the head outlet? WRX headers are like this and apparently a bit of porting really helps there.
Steve
Hi Steve,
yea there is a mark but the gaskets have holes about 10mm bigger than the head and header so that doesnt help
yup the WRX headers do fit and a few people have gone that way with EJ22 engines. only reason i didnt is the headers look as though they are cast so cant be easily cut and shut shorter
good thing about EJ motors nearly all have the same zorst port flanges
only exception seems to be OBDII EJ22 which have single ports
well i was hoping for a start up this weekend
instead it has to go on the back burner for a littler while
isnt it just typical.......
you turn your back for 2 seconds and a sick and injured vw will appear in the garage
got a mates Sbug for a couple of weeks with a shitload of work to be done, my new other new car ive just bought needs some small jobs done before i wanna drive it and my mainstreamer has 11 days of rego left and i still need to legalise a few mods to get thro pinkslip
yeesh never ends with frigging cars.....
on a positive note tho i did make a start on brain central
As i mentioned earlier in the post im going to mount the ECU under the back seat where my second battery was.
as im not using the stock heater outlets it made sense to get rid of the heater junction pipe as its dead weight and taking up alot of space
and once its gone the bakolite tube mount thingy will be perfect for the loom to come into the car from the engine
now theres a fun job...
the bakolite housings need to be unbolted to get the junction pipe out
the bolts for them are in some nice little hard to reach places behind the torsion bar housings
not only that they can only be losened off not removed without lifting the body off the floor pan
so heres my board with ECU mounted and terminal strips for all the wire connections
i still need to make a rack for the relays
sits nicely in the floor pan
i also worked out once the VW regulator is gone the mounting holes for it are perfect for the ignitor bracket
regulators get pretty hot so i have no issues mounting the ignitor there
Who are you Joel2? Are you an alien that's taken over the body of Joel?
yea im the new improved better lookign version 😂
AVD is playing games with my profiles
which reminds me VWCOOL i cant read your PM
can you email me boosted_bug at yahoo dot com
cheers
Joel , make sure you run a few good earths while your doing that wiring.
Looking for that special lady : PM me for coffee & cake
cheers Neil,
i had a quick talk to Al about earths, hes got me all sorted
Well I guess people may have noticed the lack of activity in this thread
classic Joel tradition.... with the end almost insight i lost motivation
mainly cos i got a new toy/pet project that ive been too busy driving and tinkering with.
its not a vw so i wont go into details but if people wanna hazard a guess think 2 door hardtop coupe from the mid 90s class of "Orphaned Performers"
Ive also been stuck working on everyone elses cars so when i got a free moment working on mine was the last thing i felt like
and being upto the hard part of the cooling system was making it hard to get motivated
but i had a good look over Brads Orange Lbug this morning for some rad mounting and coolant line ideas which has re-kindelled my interest
so with a few spare hours this weekend i got back into and finished off my exhaust
Also a few weeks ago my Craigy bar turned up
i was too lazy to drop the gearbox so i just supported it with the jack and took the cradle off.
this allowed me to shuffle it to the sides enough to weld the back brackets
front ones are easy enough
and yes the underneath of my cars are filthy, its pissing into the wind trying to keep them clean
according to GPS and the car odometers its 0.8km from the farms front gate upto the shed which for the last 6 months has resembled a colin macrae mud stage more than a driveway
while i had the cradle off i took the opprtunity to swap it over as it was starting to get a bit bent with this much straighter one
formerly at home holding the engine and gearbox into a late 50s splitty i hope it doesnt feel inadequate now
my current bananna mounts werent in bad shape, i replaced them in 1998 and they had a bit of life left but it was the perfect oppertunity to replace them
and they're only $14 each
i use german OEM ones as ive tried the pretty red poly ones before and dont like them
now back to the zorst
i had already cut down the manifolds over a month ago but thats as far as i got
so heres what the EJ20 header looks like cut up and welded back together
i was pretty happy with how it fitted, it got the collector out from under the diff and didnt hang down to much
from the collector i wanted to run it in 2.25" with mandrel bends
so i got a 45degree out of the collector into the cat
i also welded a bung into this for the o2 sensor
a small amout of body trimming was needed to keep the cat outlet up nice and high
a 90 degree mandrel bend out of the cat and i could stick on whatever muffler i wanted
for now ive just welded on one of the staino cannons ive got lying around
just needs a dump pipe on it now
i doubt this will stay permanant as when it was on my celica everyone moaned about it being to deep and hurting your ears.
we'll see how it sounds first
im happy with the overall result
it doenst hang down too low or stand out at all
unless you get down on your hands and knees you wouldnt notice anythings any different
so all i have to do now is finish hooking up the rest of the electrical, run some coolant lines, mount the rad and fit a shortened sump
everyone i speak to involved with subi dubs says fit a Custom veedub sump, and after seeing a few im impressed
Brad showed me his alloy Bug@5Speed sump and they look neat but it only gave less the 2" raise is no good to me anyway
COR is good for 85mm and i need every bit i can get with my bug
i got a spare sump and pickup from the boys over at subi-village ready to send to be shortened
forgot to add you can see in that last pic ive done the trimming to my valance so it clears timing belt covers and sits down properly
i went totally overkill with what i cut off but as they say you can never have to much overkill
Hi Joel
Looking good, will it be on the road in 2 weeks?
I'm working flat out on the sons bug getting it back on the road.
Steve
quite possibly
but im not real keen on the idea of its first trip being 200kms from home till its been thoroughly soak tested .
ill see how things pans out
Hey Joel you are going great👍 yes lots of short trips to see what leaks etc...i had trouble with coolant hoses blowing off...with the radiator at the front the thermostat didn't open so too much heat and pressure...answer? no thermostat...heheh... better than cooking an engine😁
yeah the cooling system is my biggest concern
i was originaly thinking of going with one of those remote BMW/rover external thermostats on the hot side but a good chat with brad got me sorted
the subi setup with the bypass working correctly works fine even with the the extra looooooooooong coolant pipe runs
what are u usiung for coolant lines rob?
the main issue with no 'stat is the ecu uses coolant temp to dictate cold start enrichment to a degree
Hi
No worries Joel hope you can make it, its sucks going to VW events without a VW.
Give all your hoses a good re-tighten after the car warms up a few times, they will usually take a few turns.
The Subi thermostat is a 2 stage unit, so they cant be removed, just make sure your header tank is as high as possible.
Steve
yeah i should really have the thermostat back in for winter perhaps with some holes drilled in it...by the time i get around to it will be summer👍 coolant lines...heheh i had some 38mm stainless "lying around" and bought a couple of metres of pressure hose from the local hose shop for $20 or $25/m...had to flare the end of the pipes to stop the hose popping off😬
What's this silly testing close to home talk. I drove my V6 Baja to Fraser Island not long after the conversion. Sure it would have been more convenient to be close to home instead of Fraser Island when I found out the cheap brand of kombi clutch plate will explode at 8000rpm, but it wouldn't have been the same exciting experience. Luckily the fragments jammed between the pressure plate and flywheel causing it to be stuck engaged rather than disengaged. Driving home from the middle of Fraser stopping, starting and changing gears with what was like a broken clutch cable wasn't that bad! 🙂
Wes -
www.offroadvw.net - 200HP Quad Cam V6 in a VW Baja - with climate control...
🙂
www.taylorcycles.com.au - My DH MTB racing brothers shop.
This is agood thread was thinking of doing similar conversion
Hey joel,
i was wondering what gearbox you are running,
just stock Lbug
good thing about EJ22 is it wont break the gearbox any more than a modded VW engine
its the turbo motors that eat gearboxes
i can finally get stuck into this abit more often now as i finished harvest for this year on thursay which frees me up alittle
i must have been going soft driving around with a sick 1300 engine till it finally bit the dust on thursday
a drive in Daimos berg screamer and Ians VWRX (thanks again guys!) was the reminder i needed of how much fun a high power VW is
As a few people here already know the outcome of this weekend has probably changed the direction this project is heading thanks to me spending to much time in Ians bug and a little birdy whispering in my ear about an EJ20T that may be up for grabs
ill still finish the EJ22 off but it most likely wont be staying in for long
