Damnation: The Cynos Project

Z0mg, sounds like a desperate situation if you were to give caution to the title O_O. But no, it's the only collection of words I could drum up in 5 seconds that contained the prominent precursor to this topic.

Yes, at long last, I have installed the proverbial straws, hurrah! And what an astounding difference they have made!

*Cough*

Anyway, the clutch is finally installed, and what an obstinate little miscreant getting the gearbox proved to be, mainly in lieu of that retarded little Fracking Flywheel backing plate!

Anyway, in order to establish a little chronological correctness, I started out whichever day this was by installing the AutoStaff Intake Manifold Insulator gasket - on first glance it looked to follow the same principal as my former "Daox" gasket (which shall live on in the 5E), albeit slightly thinner. No doubt it'll perform the same duty. However, having the engine OUT of the car will make installation FAR easier. So, intake manifold off, applied the normal stainless gasket on the head-side, gasket in place, and applied some liquid gasket to insure a leak-free fit, seeing as the phenolic material isn't very conforming.



I re-assembled the intake manifold temporarily, and without torquing the bolts/nuts too tight in order to let the liquid gasket cure properly. The next day I removed the intake manifold, removed all the overflow liquid gasket and then re-installed it, torquing it to the appropriate values. Now, back to that fracking Clutch assembly.

Before so much as to attempting to tackle the installation of the gearbox onto the engine, I knew it'd be an absolutely recalcitrant bugger of a job - trying to wriggle a 40kg lead weight to line up a 20mm shaft into a tiny hole in the end of the crankshaft that you cannot see. I've included as many detailing words in there to attempt to cover the innate perversion that can be drawn from the process, but, anyway, *Giggedy*. All the while this was happening on a pallet, with an engine held up by a brick. Yeah. Ghetto mechanics. So, attempt #1: Lined up the clutch plate as best as I could and tightened the clutch cover only moderately to allow for movement of the clutch disc to ease alignment. An exorbitant amount of faffing about then followed suit in order to find the best way of attempting to lift the gearbox up and into the engine, ending up with me using the crawler. About an hour or so later of frantically jiggling the gearbox into the clutch cover, I finally manage to line-up the shaft and get the gearbox on. Great! Now pull it off, torque the clutch cover and get the gearbox back on.

Remove the gearbox, and the clutch disc falls. Cazzo. So, take two pretty much follows the same process, though with a lot more jiggling as I now tightened the clutch cover bolts further to not get a repeat performance. In the end I managed it, after almost attempting suicide several times, and I duly torqued the clutch cover and put the gearbox back on. Fabulous, all I need to do now was to bolt the entire assembly together!

Little did I know that the flywheel backing plate is a devious little prick and decided to be the obtrusive thing in the world. EVER. It just wouldn't line up, at all. And with the engine/gearbox assembly weighing as much as the earth, and the plate protruding just beyond the two so the weight of the assembly disallowed any adjustment, some rather primitive adjustments were attempted - grinding out, hammering it around - all to no avail. So I was left with only the chance to tighten up two bolts and leave it as is.



That is all O_o