456M Engine out procedure

Dude, here are the steps:

1) Take car to shop
2) Mechanic takes the engine out
3) Write cheque to shop

No, really: as an amateur, spare-time, Sunday-afternoon mechanic (hey, I can do oil changes and a few other things!) I can't even begin to imagine what's involved with taking the V12 lump out of its cradle. I admire those who can pull it off on their own

 

Do you have a lift or are you doing this with the car supported on jack stands?.

I've done an engine out on my 550, and so has another Houston owner, and it's not "that" bad. In fact the worst part (for me) was getting the transaxle moved back. For me, removing the heads from the 550 with the engine in situ was more of a PITA than pulling the whole engine.

The procedure for the 550 was generally:

1. Disconnect everything (oversimplification, I know) (don't forget the engine mounts themselves!)

2. Remove exhaust manifolds & exhaust system

3. Remove torque tube mounts at bell housing, remove shifter linkage from transaxle, remove transaxle mounting bolts, and axle half shaft bolts, and slide the whole torque tube/transaxle assembly to the rear about 10cm, or until the splined drive shaft is free from the engine. Both torque tube & transaxle must be well supported when you do this! Mind the braided oil hoses from the transaxle to the oil cooler

4. Remove hood/bonnet from car

5. Lift engine out

The point where you'll probably have the most interference is getting the engine out past the cross member. I found that pulling the engine out at a slight angle where the front was elevated more than the rear seemed to help.

The 550 and 575 workshop manuals are worth obtaining and looking at, as they give fairly good, detailed procedures on how to do all this.

 

Well, I'd suggest getting the intake manifold off, and the radiator, etc. out of the way, but getting the heads off in situ is a royal PITA. Those last outboard nuts on each head are nearly impossible to get to. On the 550, they're nearly recessed behind the firewall......

 

I have not had to remove the driveline of either of my 550's but it looks just like the modern corvettes with engine, torquetube, and transaxle. I find this design particularly easy to work on and it is faster to remove the whole driveline enmasse and lift the chassis off the driveline and roll it out. This is similar to how we take the subassemblies out fo the 348/355 Ferraris. I welded this rolling driveline holder for my corvette racecar out of simple 1" square tubing. I don't know if this helps you but may give you ideas. Personally, I would be looking at dropping the whole enchillada. That also gives you easy access to get to all the other while you were in theres.
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To get the driveshaft off, like John said, you have to disconnect the half shafts, remove part of the exhaust system, and slide the transaxle back or remove it, just like you do to change a clutch.

 

For an engine out (throught the top), do you actually need to remove the exhaust manifolds while the engine is still in the car?

 

I think pulling the engine as you did is probably easier than pulling the heads with the engine in situ. I think if I ever have to do head work again, I'll just pull the engine

 

@stekkefun4 thanks sharing the pics of your successful engine removal. Would you provide more detail procedures, tips and dos and don’ts ? Really appreciate it.

 

Would you provide some detail how you attach the hoist point of the engine to lift the engine out?

 

@stekkefun4

If you had time could you walk thru the highlights....
eg
1. Did you pull the gearbox/diff backwards,
2. To do that did you pull the drive shafts out.

The more detail the better.