Life in general (mainly servicing/repairs to many cars of friends/family) has been getting in the way of the build in the last few months. I actually started the engine mount brackets mid-October last year and have only just finished them now at the beginning of February! Completing the mounts is a significant milestone since the engine can now bee freestanding in the subframe.
For the purposes of better utilising space (and preventing to need to cut the drivers side inner wing for the larger Starlet mount), I have used engine mounts from a V8 Land Rover for the front and side engine mounts, but have use the modified Starlet mount (see previous couple of posts) for the rear mount.
Side Engine Mount Bracket :
As I have previously noted, my first attempt had the mount brackets angled at 45 degrees but then changed them to 30 degrees to reduce the amount of shear forces upon the actual rubber mount. These pics shows the first design at 45 degrees, however I did not take any further photos of the corrected one. I shaped out some plate so that the mount contoured around the spars
For the engine-side bracket, I was wondering how to get the holes in exactly the right position for the bracket so I ended up tack-welding some thinner plate together while they were bolted onto the engine
...then bolted that to a piece of thicker steel and drilled through the holes to give the perfect hole positions.
The side engine mount bracket ended up looking like this. Due to the position of one of the bolts, I had to cut away the corner of the angled plate and weld in section of tube so that the bolt could still be used
The final design (with additional gusset added) :
Front Engine Mount Bracket :
I didn't take many photos of this one while it was being made, but I used the same procedure as above for getting the holes positioned correctly for the bracket that attaches to the gearbox. The brace that was used in the original Starlet mount was cut and re-welded to bolt to the custom bracket with a blind nut, so that it provides some additonal support between the bracket and the top of the gearbox.
Rear Engine Mount Bracket :
The previous post shows how the orginal Starlet rear engine mount was modified. I have welded plate into the the round holes that are in the standard subframe "wings"
A piece of 5mm plate was cut to fit between the wings for the mount to bolt to (only tack welded for now)...
and the mount was clamped into the final position, which gave enough clearance to the bracket (you can see the single piece of plate bolted to the rear of the gearbox in this pic). The remainder of the bracket was measured and built around the position of the clamped mount.
The final design :
While the mount was bolted in place, I marked the position of the three holes onto the bottoms-side of trapezoid-shaped plate and then cut out from the subframe (simply to make it easier to work on)
From this point, I drilled some 13mm holes ( I will be using M12 bolts for this mount) and welded on some nuts.
The plate was then clamped back in place and welded to the subframe.
The next step is to weld in some steel plate to complete the lower control arm mount (since one of the original holes was cut away to allow the driveshaft CV to fit), and then design and fit some lower braces under the engine that join the front and rear of the subframe. These lower races will also double as the tie-rod mounting points.
For the purposes of better utilising space (and preventing to need to cut the drivers side inner wing for the larger Starlet mount), I have used engine mounts from a V8 Land Rover for the front and side engine mounts, but have use the modified Starlet mount (see previous couple of posts) for the rear mount.
Side Engine Mount Bracket :
As I have previously noted, my first attempt had the mount brackets angled at 45 degrees but then changed them to 30 degrees to reduce the amount of shear forces upon the actual rubber mount. These pics shows the first design at 45 degrees, however I did not take any further photos of the corrected one. I shaped out some plate so that the mount contoured around the spars
For the engine-side bracket, I was wondering how to get the holes in exactly the right position for the bracket so I ended up tack-welding some thinner plate together while they were bolted onto the engine
...then bolted that to a piece of thicker steel and drilled through the holes to give the perfect hole positions.
The side engine mount bracket ended up looking like this. Due to the position of one of the bolts, I had to cut away the corner of the angled plate and weld in section of tube so that the bolt could still be used
The final design (with additional gusset added) :
Front Engine Mount Bracket :
I didn't take many photos of this one while it was being made, but I used the same procedure as above for getting the holes positioned correctly for the bracket that attaches to the gearbox. The brace that was used in the original Starlet mount was cut and re-welded to bolt to the custom bracket with a blind nut, so that it provides some additonal support between the bracket and the top of the gearbox.
Rear Engine Mount Bracket :
The previous post shows how the orginal Starlet rear engine mount was modified. I have welded plate into the the round holes that are in the standard subframe "wings"
A piece of 5mm plate was cut to fit between the wings for the mount to bolt to (only tack welded for now)...
and the mount was clamped into the final position, which gave enough clearance to the bracket (you can see the single piece of plate bolted to the rear of the gearbox in this pic). The remainder of the bracket was measured and built around the position of the clamped mount.
The final design :
While the mount was bolted in place, I marked the position of the three holes onto the bottoms-side of trapezoid-shaped plate and then cut out from the subframe (simply to make it easier to work on)
From this point, I drilled some 13mm holes ( I will be using M12 bolts for this mount) and welded on some nuts.
The plate was then clamped back in place and welded to the subframe.
The next step is to weld in some steel plate to complete the lower control arm mount (since one of the original holes was cut away to allow the driveshaft CV to fit), and then design and fit some lower braces under the engine that join the front and rear of the subframe. These lower races will also double as the tie-rod mounting points.
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