And there you have it kids. Thats how the gearbox gets removed from the engine. Your friendly neighborhood Stooge, over and out. I'll be back tomorrow to pull the engine off the subframe and get it on an engine stand. But before I go. Here's a quick pic of the rear main seal, on the exposed back of the block. Image Unavailable, Please Login
It's very appreciated for you to take the time to post this information even if you call a caliper a mic J/k Too bad this was not a 355 (I'd be watching every minute) But really, great of you to post such detail!
This is above and beyond. I suspect our engine mounts as they are weeping slightly and we have developed a slight drive-line lash. Looking forward to how you inspect yours when you pull the engine from the sub-frame. Dave
Alright let's get the engine off the subframe. The only thing holding it to the subframe at this point are the motor mounts. So removed the nuts on each side connecting the engine support brackets to the mounts. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Next the bracket for holding the shift cables to the side of the block needed to come. I learned this when the engine wasn't coming all the way off the motor mount bolts. It would get about half way up then stop. I knew I had everything disconnected, and I could figure out why it wasn't lifting all the way off. Until I had a good look around a found that the cable bracket was hitting on the bottom of the motor mount flange welded to the subframe (pictured to the right of it). So remember to remove that bracket before you try pulling the engine off the mounts. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Okay NOW I can lift the engine off the subframe. I supported it was straps, attached them to a cherry picker, and lifted it off the subframe. I put the straps around the engine support brackets, on either side. If you do this, as soon as it get's off the motor mounts slide a bolt throughout the bracket hole. This is so the straps don;t slide off the bracket. The other thing you'll want is some hands on the engine to make sure it stays balanced, and doesn't tip, and crash on the ground. That would not be good. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Then I rolled the subframe out of the way so I could get the engine on the stand. I bolted it to the engine stand using the top 4 bolts that hold it to the gearbox. Image Unavailable, Please Login
When I was under the car, prepping the engine to get dropped, I forgot to drain the coolant out of the block. This is the drain plug for draining the engine block. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Now that I have the engine on a stand I'll drain the block. Using a 19mm wrench unscrew the plug, and let the coolant drain out. There is also another drain plug on the other side just above the oil cooler line. I used this one because I didn't want coolant all over the oil line. The coolant gets all over the place, so be sure to have a big piece of plastic, or something, underneath to try and catch the coolant. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Now over to the other side to disconnect the oil cooler line from the block. You can see the other coolant drain plug, I was just talking about, right above the piping. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Here is what the inside of that bolt looks like. Hollow with some holes in it for the oil to be able to run into the pipe. Image Unavailable, Please Login
We can see here that the connection on the end of the pipe is round, so the oil has a place to flow around the hollow bolt, and into pipe running to the oil cooler. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Now back over to the other side to remove the line running to the oil tank. I'm gonna take a break. I'll be back later to pull the front cover off the timing chain. Image Unavailable, Please Login
To get the front cover off I'm gonna need to the remove the lower cam pulley. Speaking of lower cam pulley, that is the main reason for me pulling the engine off the subframe. When I was checking all the bearings, I found that the pulley was loose. It wasn't the ring nut because that was on good and tight. The only thing it could be was the bearing. Since I didn't have the ring nut socket so I borrowed one. When I hit it with the impact wrench it came right off. Be careful when doing this because the ring nut is made from what appears to aluminum. I used the lowest setting on the impact wrench. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Now that the pulley is off, and to get the inner bearing race to slide off the pulley shaft, the woodruff key needs to be removed from the slot in the shaft. That and by the looks of all that oil around the cover bearing la new seal is needed.. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
But before the front cover can come off the oil sump pan needs to be removed from the bottom of the engine. The Ferrari engineer that designed this engine decided to have the front cover bolts run through the bottom of the oil pan. So you MUST remove the pan to get the timing chain cover off. So the task of removing all the 13mm nuts around the bottom of the engine begins. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
After I got all the nuts off around the rim of the sump pan I needed to get under the engine. These two little bolts hold the bottom of the rear main seal cover to the sump pan, and need to be removed. They are at the bottom back of the engine. Image Unavailable, Please Login
Then the 9 nuts holding the cover to the block get removed, and the timing chain cover gets slid off exposing the timing chain. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login
Here is what the back side of the timing chain cover looks like. The oil pump chain tensioner stays attached to the back of the cover. Image Unavailable, Please Login
The oil pump tensioner pad is pretty chewed up, and will need changing. Sorry for the blurry pic. Image Unavailable, Please Login
How about an inspection of the tensioner pad for the timing chain, which runs the lower cam pulley. Hmmmm, looks like the chain is dug into that pretty good. I'll remove it for a closer look. Image Unavailable, Please Login
The 2 bolts holding the tensioner housing to the block get removed. You'll notice I have already removed the oil pump chain from the sprocket. It just lifts right off, nothing special about it. Image Unavailable, Please Login
I couldn't compress the tensioner because of how it's designed, and the chain was dug into the pad, so I couldn't slide it off. With a little twist I got the pad to rotate down and off the chain. Then wiggled it out of the hole in the block and removed it. Image Unavailable, Please Login Image Unavailable, Please Login