43) Get wired!

This mess of wires is what I pulled from the donor Legacy. I know it's not necessary to get every wire from the Suby, but I wanted to be sure I could trace every wire needed. For example the tach and speedometer wires end up in the dash harness, and go to the speedo cluster.


This is after extracting each wire from the ECU. I unwrapped all the black corrugated piping and electrical tape. What a sticky mess that was!


Here's the Suby firewall grommet that I'm reusing. I fed each wire through it while I was shortening each ECU wire -> sensor or plug. I soldered each wire, and used a glue type shrink wrap to seal it all up.


Here I'm measuring the length of each connection. I wanted to get the lengths roughed in before I solder everything in and reapply all the wire protection.

42) Alternator belt

With the new alternator bracket in place, I now had a bit of an issue with finding the right belt that would fit. This belt was too tight, and wouldn't fit with the alternator adjusted as low as it could go. The next belt size up was too long and the alternator didn't have enough adjustment to make it tight.



I then decided to get a set of smaller pulleys to see if my smallest belt would fit.



No luck, the smallest belt now is too big for these small pulleys.



I finally found a belt that was the perfect length, and allowed me to tighten it right about midway through the adjustment of the alternator! The only possible problem here is that this belt has skinnier then the OEM belt. I'm guessing that since this is only driving the alternator that it should hold up fine :) *Fingers Crossed*

41) Alternator Bracket

With the rotated coolant manifold the stock location of the alternator no longer works. Slowly, I built up a bracket that would bolt into the location of the old power steering pump. I mostly used 3/4" square tubing, with a few pieces of spare metal that I had laying around also. (There are some pieces of old bumper brackets and bed frame angle iron in there :)


This is the pivot side of the alternator. I needed to make sure the oil pressure sensor and throttle body preheater hose would fit around the bracket.



This is a mock up of the adjustable side of the alternator. The OEM bracket bolts from the other side, but I'm planning to bolt through in this direction because it is less fabricating and material needed.


This is the front side of the adjuster. You can see here it adjusts like normal, just from the other side. I had to pay a lot of attention to the min and max adjustments of the alternator to be able to get the most travel possible. I ended up having to grind down the intake and alternator a bit to get even more travel.


This is the roughly finished bracket (minus paint of course). I added some gusseting to make a little more rigid.


Finished and alternator mocked up. Next up will be to find a belt that fits!

40) Air filter bracket

Here's the template and the initial fabricated bracket that will hold the air filter to the firewall.


Here I've ground down the welds, and cut a super lightweight "Racing" hole :)


I'm welding in some studs to the firewall so this can bolt up easy. The attachment to the MAF tube is where it all connects up. I actually can't decide between welding in studs or nuts. Any recommendations?


Here's what it looks like all bolted up. The air filter and MAF will stay solid to the car and with the help of the bubble connection (not showing here) in the middle, the rest of it will move with the motor.

38) Room to bleed (breath?)

I thought it would be a good idea to add a breather to the top of my coolant manifold so that bleeding the system would be easier. Coolant will be raising up to the manifold via pipes that will be running low in the chassis (More on this later) I will screw in a valve here to open as I add coolant to the system.


This is the tap I used (1/8"-28 NPT)


This is the valve I'm going to put in there.

37) Cleaning up engine parts

Took some time to clean up some rusty engine parts. I know I'm missing some stuff in here, which I'll get with another batch some other day :)


Sand blasted!


All painted!

36) Coolant manifold

The coolant manifold got the same treatment as the intake manifold. You can also see here the outlet (top right) has been cut and re-welded to be shorter and now fits when bolted down in it's new flipped position.

You can also see on the bottom left a fitting for one of the heater connections. I ended up removing the steel tube that was originally bolted to the manifold, and tapped the hole for the NPT fitting.



You can see here how it fits under the intake manifold. The heater hose will go in between the intake runners.



Here's a quick show of how it all looks bolted up : )

35) Intake cleanup

I took some time and cleaned up the EJ22 intake. I disassembled everything and sandblasted, wire brushed, sanded and painted all the aluminum items. I used new gaskets where I could when re-assembling.

34) Intake planning

Got some parts for the intake here. I also found a nifty little adapter to go from my mass air flow meter, back to a 3" pipe. This is where I'll put on some sort of a cone filter. I've got an old one laying around here, so I'll first try that. Here you can also see some silicon tubing that I'll use for the connections needed to the intake. The two little plastic bags there have some tube barbed fittings that I'll use to attach the tube to the shinny L bends.



Here's the first mock up. You can see that I didn't need my long straight piece. And I also picked up a 90 degree silicon bend to fit on my throttle body. While I was setting this all up, I kept closing the deck lid to make sure it all fits. So the air filter in the back will need a bracket to bolt it up to the firewall. I'm also thinking about using one of those "bubble" silicon joints instead of the straight joint there. This way when the engine moves it will allow the intake to move separately.

33) Pieces parts

I've been ordering parts left and right for the engine. I'm replacing as many seals and gaskets that I can find on the engine. I'm leaving the head gasket for now, because I'm not sure the condition of it, and I'm planning on tearing this thing down next winter anyways. I just want to get it back up and running leak free to see how she handles. You can also see the new oil pan there. The original was rotted straight through! Wow, I know!



Hose clamps and various tubing that I found on McMaster Carr. The blue tubing will be used for the heater core which will be placed under the back seat.



Some gas delivery items from Summit. There's an external fuel pump, aluminum 5/16" tubing and some NPT barbed fittings that will screw into bungs that I'm going to weld into my gas tank.



This was a great tip that I found on one of the many Subaru -> VW websites. It's a lower water manifold for a 2.5 RS. It is pointed in a better direction then the OE Legacy one. This way the lower coolant hose will be pointed straight towards the front of the car.

32) Intake and coolant manifold mock up

After cleaning the engine, I started messing around with intake positions. Putting the intake on the stock way makes the throttle body point directly at the firewall. I don't want to cut the firewall, so I needed to find a better way. Thankfully the Internet has many Subaru -> Beetle projects, and I found that you can flip the intake 180 degrees! Works great, except I see that the stock intake piping is too big and will hit the decklid. My plan here will be to get some 90 degree pipe bends, and a 90 degree silicon elbow to connect to the throttle body. (More pictures to come)



Here is the other side. You can also see the coolant manifold has also been flipped around 180 degrees. This will make for nicer piping location to the front of the car. I didn't want to have to pipe from the rear of the engine and down past the exhaust. My plan is to use aluminum tubing and radiator hose to go from below the right axle, inside to the center channel and out the front of the car from the middle of the beam. Stay tuned for pictures of the whole thing!

31) Clean up on isle EJ

Corny I know, but anyways... A few shots of current progress. I used some foamy engine bright, and some brushes to clean as much of the dirt and crud away. For future reference, get an engine that is A) Almost new, or B) Not from the North East. This thing was dirty!



Valve covers after a good clean and a little work with a 3M scuff pad.



New water pump! I will be replacing as much as I can without taking apart the long block (for now). I just want to get everything in the car and mocked up enough to start it, and possibly drive it for a bit to work out the bugs. If the rings are worn, or head gaskets need attention, I will have a fun project for next winter!

30) How it got there

I wanted to show the adapter plate, and how this Subaru engine bolts to the Beetle. This show is of the KEP adapter plate bolted to the engine. The studs are installed to slide right into the VW transmission. All the hardware came with the kit: Adapter, flywheel, nuts & bolts.



This is with the KEP flywheel bolted into place. This allows the VW clutch, and the VW starter to mate right up! (Notice the little flywheel lock on the upper right. Makes life a little easier when torquing down the bolts)



I elected to buy a stage 1 clutch / pressure pate from KEP. Here is the clutch matted up to the flywheel. The kit even came with the alignment tool that you can see in the center.



And finally here is the pressure plate bolted up and torqued down. Be sure to tighten slowly and in a star patter here, as you can bend the pressure plate if done incorrectly.



I also wanted to show a picture of the VW transmission all ready for the engine. I got a new bushing and throw out arm. The clutch kit also came with a new throw out bearing you can see here.

29) It fits!

Here is the Subaru EJ22 all bolted up and the body temporarily back down on the chassis. This thing fits in there without any modifications to the body. (Note: I will need to modify the rear apron a bit for it to fit around the timing belt cover) I bolted the engine in with a Kennedy (KEP) adapter plate.

I can see now that there are a couple of items to address here. First of all the throttle body is pointed right at the firewall. I will rotate the entire intake assembly around 180 degrees. Secondly the coolant manifold is pointed strait towards the back of the car. I will flip that around 180 degrees. This will have to be cut and re-welded to clear the crank case (Pictures to come).