Bell housing to engine fixings

[Davo1805NZ]

Hi all - I'm currently preparing to reunite my engine and BW65 box in readiness for re-installation into the car. I thought I'd make things easier by buying a new kit of bell housing bolts, rather than try to figure out the motley collection of what had been removed. The kit I bought from one of the UK suppliers consisted of 12 x 5/16 UNFx1.75" long bolts together with nuts and spring washers - which appears mostly consistent with what is shown on page 03-02 of the parts manual (apart from the fact that the manual differentiates two of the bolts - p/n 157274 instead of HB814, though I cannot find a description anywhere of 157274). Looking at what is actually needed for the job, the 6 x uppermost fixings (1 - 6 in the photo) are made into blind holes in the engine block, and while the bolts supplied are compatible with these, the nuts are superfluous to requirements. Fixings 7 - 12 are through-holes, each requiring a bolt and nut, though the length supplied is excessive - in fact they are too long to use for fixings 7 & 8 due to insufficient clearance behind the engine plate. I'm confused by the fact that the kit supplied is incompatible with what I need, but more so by the fact that what I have is inconsistent with what appears in the parts manual.

Can anybody offer any advice based on their own experiences? Thanks in advance.

Engine plate.jpg

[flying farmer]

That adapter plate looks nothing like the one that was on my BW35, that was a U section not a flat plate hence the nut and bolt combinations that did the top half. The long bolts were for the bottom couple of holes where the plate was about 2 inches thick.
Neil

[Lingen]

Davo.
It doesn't look like the one in the parts manual either, which fits both BW 35 and BW 65 boxes.
Mike.

[DJT]

This is advertised by Robsport as a Stag auto adapter plate. Part 402762

8E87E071-5D13-42DE-9193-A2585DE912D7.jpeg

[Davo1805NZ]

That looks like mine.

[Davo1805NZ]

Now I'm out of bed and have my computer cranked up - the picture below is what is shown in my parts manual, which concurs with Dave's photo from the Robsport website, and would appear to be what I have. Considering Neil's comment, is this plate perhaps specific to the BW65? Still confused about the apparent incompatibility of the bolt kit (bought from Robsport - KIT209/65). Guess I just need to move on from that...

Considering then, the well-documented issues with accessing the bolts and nuts at the top of the bell-housing when mating engine and box in-situ, does the fact that there are no nuts to deal with make this that much easier, and so a better prospect than shoehorning the combined assembly into place? I guess the bolt heads would still be a pig to access? Perhaps somebody out there who has experience of installing engine and BW65 can advise?



Engine plate PM.JPG

[DJT]

I’ve removed/replaced a MOD gearbox, leaving the engine in situ, and removed/replaced an engine leaving a MOD gearbox in situ. Both of which were quite a struggle, but doable single-handed with the car on axle stands. I was much younger then........
When I swapped my BW35 gearbox for a ZF4HP22, it was done on a 2-post lift. ISTR that all the bell housing bolts were accessed from below. With the gearbox crossmember removed from the chassis the assembly tilts down at the back (be careful not to trap the brake pipe against the front cross member) and, using sockets and extensions, the bolts are reachable.

[Davo1805NZ]

Thanks Dave - that all makes sense.

[jbuckl]

Recently done an engine refit to a BW 65.
Box was left in the car.
None of the bolts were a problem to access with mid quality 3/8” or 1/4” drive tools & combination spanners. Forget using 1/2” drive tools for most under bonnet jobs though.
At the time I bought the bolt kit, nobody was offering an auto bolt kit. Had to rely on spares I had & a manual bolt kit.
Trickiest thing was upper starter motor bolt & nut...but nothing to report as really tricky at all.
Modern cars are far more tricky.

[thebadleys]

I think your photo shows the bolts for fixing the adaptor plate to the engine block, the bolts for transmission to the adaptor plate are shown under the transmission.

Part number 157274 are dowel bolts to align the transmission, these bolts appear unavailable but Peter at LD does offer this ( http://www.ldpart.co.uk/shop/shop.ph...0&sid=sidd6fb2) as an alternative but I am sure they are shouldered with a smaller head than the diameter of the shouldered portion and a 5/16" thread,I did managed to acquire 2 for my car but have not found any since.

I seem to recall that there was a article in SOC magazine regarding these but cant recall when it was, it appears that the majority of cars probably don't have them as on removal they were not refitted.

Hope this helps

Nigel
IMG_0726.jpeg

[Davo1805NZ]

Thanks for the feedback guys. Nigel - I referred to the drawing you show in my original post. Can you tell me which holes the 157274 dowel bolts go into? I notice that the top centre hole (between #3 & #4 in my photo) is larger - fits a 3/8" bolt - though is just a blind unthreaded hole; so would seem to indicate use for a dowel, but not one that screws in. Hole #10 in my photo is also 3/8"; this being a through-hole to the back of the engine plate, and which coincides with one on the bell housing.

What I'm trying to achieve is putting things back together "correctly", which has not been the practice of the car's previous owners. Though I'm slowly coming to the conclusion that putting bolts, nuts & washers of appropriate lengths and thread sizes into as many holes as possible may be as good as it's going to get!

[thebadleys]

Dowel Bolt.png
I'm sure the dowels are located at 11 and 2 o'clock, and they are a 3/8" shank with a 5/16' head and thread.

Hope this helps

Nigel

[Davo1805NZ]

As a footnote to this, and hopefully helpful to somebody else in the future, I noticed today that among the fasteners which came back with the engine after being rebuilt was one dowel bolt similar to that pictured above. The parts manual indicates that there should be two of these, however per the extract below, the ROM only mentions one. This concurs with what I have, as the hole at bottom right, indicated 2.5 below, is the only one that is big enough to take the 3/8" dowel bolt. The 5/16" threaded part passes through, and is used to secure, the angle bracket which is fastened to the stay on the engine sump pan.

There is in fact a second 3/8" hole, in both the bell housing and the adaptor plate, at top centre, though there is no corresponding threaded hole in the engine block.

Conclusions from all this -

The parts manual and ROM are out of kilter with each other.

The kit of fasteners I bought was about 50% correct - I have a handful of the 1.75" long bolts and nuts left over from this, but had to source some shorter bolts to use for fixing in the lower half.



Bellhousing bolts.JPG