J's V8 Conversion - Pic Heavy

[J-Meiser]

I'm a patient man

 

I will bear that fact in mind

[J-Meiser]

It's in !! Now the real work begins .

 

 

It was also great to have Nellie1966 come by today with his sweet sounding (and looking) 1UZ-converted Supra ; great guy, we had an ace chat and seeing his Supra definitely gave me some food for thought .

[HadeS]

Looking good.

 

Keep going mate.

[nellie1966]

Well done J, it was great meeting you.

Hope i didn't hold you up to much.

Give me a shout if need anything that could help.

[J-Meiser]

Looking good.

 

Keep going mate.

 

Thank you, will do

 

Well done J, it was great meeting you.

Hope i didn't hold you up to much.

Give me a shout if need anything that could help.

 

Likewise! Actually, your timing was spot on, as that gave my wife and her parents time to sort out our daughter, have a reprieve and get some lunch . Once you left, I had a 5 minute break before we started on moving the 1UZ out of the garden and getting it ready to into the Supra . I may well do so in the not too distant future; I'll drop you a text or a PM, if that's ok?

[J-Meiser]

I won’t dwell on how I got the 2JZ out, as that has been covered many times before, however I will advise the following:

 

• Remove the driver’s side engine mount as that will catch the steering box.
  
• Raise the front of the Supra quite high, by placing the jack and a block of wood underneath the front cross member, that way you can raise and lower the front as required.
  
• Lowering the front whilst raising the engine will make life a lot easier.
  
• A LOT of (auto) gearbox fluid will leak out of the end, once the engine is tilted steeply enough, despite draining out the fluid beforehand. Have a large bowl ready beneath the end of the gearbox, ready to catch the excess and let it drain for a while.
  

 

As long as all goes well, here’s what you should be looking at:

 

 

 

In my opinion, lowering in the 1UZ was more tricky than lifting out the 2JZ; if I was to do it again, I would definitely remove the front bumper, as that would allow the hoist to get much closer to the bay; I was up against the number plate and worried that I was going to do damage to something . Getting the 1UZ in, it was a case of raising the front whilst lowering the engine and I would advise the following:

 

• Remove both engine mounts and secure them onto the cross member, as then you won’t have to worry about them catching whilst you’re manoeuvring the engine/gearbox.
  
• Have a second jack with a block of wood to raise the end of gearbox, that will allow the engine/gearbox to slide into position easier.
  

 

 

Once it was in, I secured the gearbox using the gearbox mount, using the second jack to help lift the gearbox into position and then bolting in the engine mounts.

 

I'll get some of my more recent activity posted shortly .

[Delboy52]

Flying along mate

[J-Meiser]

Over the past few days I have managed to get a few bits done, but not quite as much as I wanted to .

 

Tuesday was the first time I was able get back out onto the Supra since swapping the engines on Saturday and I couldn’t do any of the underneath stuff as the weather wasn’t playing ball . So, I was consigned to garage and mooched about doing whatever I could.

 

During a break in the rain, I cut the ends off the 2JZ-GE loom as I am going to need them to complete my adaptor.

 

 

I didn’t take many pictures as I was busy seeing what fitted and what didn’t; by the time I remembered to take some I was nearly ready to wrap up and head indoors. However, here’s what I managed to achieve and a couple of accompanying pictures :

 

• Shortened the heater hose going to the heater matrix as it was far too long.
  
• Fitted the ignitors to the passenger side of the bay.
  
• Started wiring up the loom to the fuse box. I swapped the main live/positive cable on the 1UZ loom with the one from the 2JZ, as that cable fitted to the fuse box in a better way than the one that came with the 1UZ loom.
  
• Discovered that the Supra accelerator cable is both far too long and too short to be of any use :/ and cruise control cable is a bit too long and doesn’t have the correct end on it to fit . I kept the cruise control motor and cable from my Soarer, but I didn’t retain the accelerator cable, so I’ll see if I can do anything with the cruise control bits from the Soarer over the next few days but the accelerator cable, hmmm… (I am open to suggestions! ).
  
• I faffed around for ages with my gas bonnet struts but I couldn’t fathom how to fit them properly, in the end I gave up and decided that I would tackle them at a later date.
  

 

That was it for Tuesday, so I took a couple of pictures at the end of my session and left it there.

 

 

 

 

On Wednesday, I was determined to make some headway! The weather wasn’t too bad, but I didn’t feel like taking a risk, so I was confined to the garage once again. I started off with wrapping up the ends of the loom in a plastic bag to make it easier to feed through into in cabin.

 

 

However, this actually made things more difficult, so after unwrapping it again, I fed the ECU connector into the aperture first, followed by the loom-to-chassis-loom connectors and with some persuasion, they went through!

 

Once they were through, I had second thoughts about the way I had connected the Supra bay loom to the alternator and decided to clear out any excess wiring. I then moved onto the vacuum connection at the rear of the inlet manifold.

 

 

Now that it is redundant, I needed to block it off, so I recycled the one-way valve and the bit of pipe that was used for that same connector but inverted their direction so no air gets in. I would like to find a more permanent solution, so once again, I am open to suggestions !

 

 

I decided to test-fit the Soarer’s stock inlet tract, so I dug the components out from the back of my garage and prepared to fit them. I had to move the MAF sensor from my decrepit remains of an air box to the one that I bought from Fruity_South last year .

 

 

 

 

I believe that the air feed from under the headlight extends a little too far into the bay, as I could not get the air box and MAF sensor to fit onto the resonator’s flexible hose. Has anyone fitted one the stock air box from a 1UZ into a Supra bay? If so, how did you do it? I’d rather not cut anything if I don’t have to, but if needs be then I will.

 

After trying numerous times, I figured I would look at it again with fresh eyes on another day, so I removed the air box, fastened down the charcoal canister and wrapped up there.

 

[J-Meiser]

On Thursday my time was rather limited, so the only opportunity I had to do anything was an hour window at lunchtime and I filled it by securing the ECU for the 1UZ into the passenger foot well. I moved the securing brackets over from the 2JZ ECU, then tried fitting the 1UZ in exactly the same position the 2JZ’s ECU was in and it was a perfect fit!

 

 

 

Both ECU are virtually identical in terms of look, dimensions, connections and bracket holes so I suppose that it’s logical that replacing one with the other would be a doddle .

 

I need to fiddle with the loom to connect it up to the ECU, but I need to push the Supra out of the garage for that; all being well, I may get to do it in the next few days .

Edited May 23, 2015 by J-Meiser (see edit history)

[David P]

I can't see from the pics if the exhaust manifolds are on the engine?

[JackyBoi]

Are you gonna be running a full decat exhaust system?

[J-Meiser]

I can't see from the pics if the exhaust manifolds are on the engine?

 

They are there . I put the engine in with them on and I decided to retain the stock heat shields, they worked fine before and I saw no reason to remove them.

 

 

Are you gonna be running a full decat exhaust system?

 

Yes I will be . The down pipes are 2.5" in diameter (I believe, I measured them AGES ago) but I can't recall what the rest of the system is . I'll take some pics and measurements before I install it

[J-Meiser]

I haven’t been able to do that much recently, but I have managed to do a couple of bits that I have been itching to get sorted .

 

I secured the ECU, attached the connector and made sure that the remaining loom connections survived the “re-entry” unscathed.

 

 

Next, I wanted to tackle the fuel lines as I was getting sick of the overwhelming smell of petrol whenever I opened the garage and car door(s) . Undoing the straight nut into the filter (coming from the fuel tank) was a real nuisance, but it did eventually come out (has anyone else had trouble undoing the feed nut?) and the banjo bolt going into the fuel rail came out without issue.

 

I had a play with where I could relocate the filter to, as I had no plans to discard the Charcoal Canister and as a result, space was limited.

 

 

Once I’d sorted a location for the fuel filter, I got my trusty tape measure, a piece of string and started planning where I was going to run my new lines and measure how long they would need to be. Armed with everything I (hoped I) needed, I got new fuel lines made up from a local company here in Peterborough and they made them up while I waited, which was handy . They were able to reuse all of the OEM fixings and they didn’t cost an arm and a leg either !

 

 

I started fitting the lines and it became apparent that if I reused the original bracket instead of the one that came with the new filter, I could position the filter in a much better way, run the lines in a better way and I could have ordered shorter pipe lengths as I now have a generous amount of excess pipe to “hide” . Never mind!

 

Here it is fitted in its new home and an engine bay shot, because I like engine bay shots .

 

 

 

I tried numerous ways to see if I could re-use the Supra’s accelerator cable and cruise control setup with the 1UZ but it’s not going to happen . Had I known, I would have removed the accelerator cable from my Soarer before I scrapped it, but I didn’t so I have had to buy another one and I managed to get one from eBay.

 

I did keep hold of the cruise control setup from my Soarer and thought about using that one instead, but the engine bay loom wires for the connector won’t reach where the Soarer’s actuator would have to sit, without cutting and extending them. Also, upon closer inspection, the cables on both the Supra and the Soarer actuators are the same length; swapping them would be pointless . After a hunt on eBay (again), I now have a LS400 cruise control actuator setup on its way to me, as the motor mounts in a similar position to the Supra one and the cable is much shorter, so I will probably just use the cable, but we’ll see.

 

I’ll post some pictures of the cruise control actuators/setups and accelerator cable when I get the chance .

Edited May 30, 2015 by J-Meiser (see edit history)

[nellie1966]

well done J coming along nicely.

 

Give me a shout if you need to have a look at mine again for reference.

[Hammer]

Great thread mate. Just read through it and you have done really well and documented the work so well, good job. Love the idea of a V8 in the Supra, it will sound awesome. Subscribed.

[Kendo11]

Great thread mate. Just read through it and you have done really well and documented the work so well, good job. Love the idea of a V8 in the Supra, it will sound awesome. Subscribed.

As above, I've wanted to v8 my na more than turbo it for a while.

 

Brilliant, informative thread.

[Axl]

Looking good

[J-Meiser]

well done J coming along nicely.

 

Give me a shout if you need to have a look at mine again for reference.

 

Thank you very much ! If you don't mind doing so, I might take you up on that soon, as I'm curious about a couple of wires

 

Great thread mate. Just read through it and you have done really well and documented the work so well, good job. Love the idea of a V8 in the Supra, it will sound awesome. Subscribed.

 

As above, I've wanted to v8 my na more than turbo it for a while.

 

Brilliant, informative thread.

 

Looking good

 

Thank you very much for the comments, guys; I do appreciate them and I'm glad you're liking it so far. I do apologise if some of the things I put in seem a bit obvious at times, but I'm trying to get as much info in as possible so that if anyone else is considering doing this conversion in the future, they can get an idea of the nitty-gritty, fine detail stuff that's not always apparent when you first think about doing this conversion.

[Kendo11]

Don't apologise mate, keep up the level of detail it's really very much appreciated

[J-Meiser]

As the weather has not been great (terrible, to be precise), I decided to make a start on my adapter.

 

 

I spent most of Sunday afternoon on it and by the end of the “session”, it just looked like a mass of wires with random black piping . However, I was confident that it would work out in the end .

 

On Monday, my Soarer accelerator cable was delivered, but as more rain was on the way and my LS400 cruise control actuator was still en route, I opted to tackle the power steering circuit. Unfortunately, due to the aforementioned rain, I was confined to the garage again . It’s not the end of the world, as I do have enough room to get down the sides and to the back of garage (once the Supra has been pushed forwards a bit) but I can’t get underneath and that can be a tad frustrating at times.

 

Anyways, I didn’t take any pictures I’m afraid, as nothing I did was particularly exciting or picture-worthy, but here’s a brief rundown of what I managed to achieve:

 

• Completed the power steering circuit by using a mixture of Supra and Soarer power steering pipes.
  
• Connected the power steering solenoid to the loom.
  
• Fitted the final vacuum hoses that ran to/from the inlet tract to/from the power steering banjo bolt.
  
• Fitted the pipe for the auto ‘box cooler lines to/from the radiator.
  

 

 

Removing the alternator made accessing the power steering box and its bolts/connections MUCH easier. Admittedly, as I haven’t got my power steering pump in place yet, that also made life a lot easier.

 

My cruise control actuator arrived yesterday, so I decided to change both the accelerator and cruise control cables, but not before trying to finish off the loom adapter. Here’s how it looked when I stopped for lunch:

 

 

Please excuse the old Sun newspaper; it’s acting as my table protector .

 

After picking up some more butane for my soldering torch (which, I didn’t actually need in the end ), I cracked on to get it as close to finished as possible. By the time the sun came out in the afternoon, I had managed to finish soldering together every single wire I could, leaving only the ones that require engine bay connections (4 in total).

 

 

I haven’t shrunk the heat shrink around the joints yet as I would like to test the adaptor before I finalise it, but that may not be possible – I’ll see how things pan out. Now, it was onto the cables!

 

I started with the accelerator cables and I found that removing the accelerator pedal made accessing the bolts much easier and also made swapping the cables over much easier too. Bolting the pedal back in did prove to be quite fiddly, but with some patience, it did go back into place.

 

As promised, some comparison shots between the Supra and Soarer accelerator cables:

 

 

 

The Supra’s cable is the longer one to the top and although it doesn’t look like there isn’t much difference between them, the shorter, reinforcing outer wire on the Soarer cable makes a lot of difference, as does the larger adjusting nut range.

 

I only photographed the Supra and LS400 cruise control cables as the Soarer cable is the same length as the Supra one (as previously stated) and it shares the same finisher as the LS400 cable. The screws securing the cables to the motors were covered in an orange thread lock, so they were VERY reluctant to move; I had to get my locking pliers on to them before they would budge.

 

 

 

In retrospect, those pictures don't show the ends particularly well, so I'll try and take a better picture today.

 

The LS400 cable is so much shorter and is ideal if you want to retain your Supra cruise control motor. If you want to use a cruise control motor/actuator setup from a Soarer, then you won’t need to change your cable, but you will need to mount the actuator in a different location and possibly extend the connector wires in the engine bay loom – I’ve borrowed Fruity_South’s picture to illustrate where it will need to go (I hope that you don’t mind; if it’s a problem let me know and I’ll remove it):

 

 

I've retained my UK-spec Supra cruise control ECU but I do still have my Soarer's cruise control ECU as a back up. I'm hoping that I can continue to use my UK-spec ECU, but I'm not going to know for sure until the test drive...

 

Once I’d finished securing in the “new” cables, I took a couple of pics :

 

 

 

 

I may tackle the air con pipes next, but I’m not sure. Once I have some another update, I’ll post it up .

[J-Meiser]

This morning, I did go out to try and fit the air con pipes from my Soarer, but one of my pipes has gone missing and even if I had both, I have a feeling that the bends would not have matched the Supra’s . In light of this, I decided to try to get the inlet tract sorted and see if I could get the Soarer’s air box to fit.

 

Unfortunately, I could not get it to fit, no matter how many times I tried and I almost removed the headlight to see If that would provide more clearance .

 

I then got both air boxes, placed them side by side, looked at them from near-enough all angles and concluded that they have very similar dimensions with only some minor differences – but I still could not fathom why the Soarer’s air box would not fit. The rear section of the boxes that lead on to the MAF sensor/solid plastic tube are virtually identical, with the Supra’s air box having the markings for the holes for the MAF bracket and the Soarer’s air box having the marking for the air temperature sensor.

 

 

 

 

This got me thinking – could I use the Supra’s air box with the MAF sensor? That would (should) give me the best of both worlds; the air box should fit back into place perfectly and the MAF sensor would be present so that the 1UZ would not have a hissy fit because it was missing…

 

After pondering for a few minutes and doing some very rough measurements (using a screwdriver and my hand), I decided to go for it and got my hacksaw to the Supra’s air box, cutting through the plastic right where the MAF sensor needed to mount.

 

Once I’d cut through the plastic, I filed off some of the rougher edges, drilled out the holes for the MAF sensor’s mounting bracket and test fitted the bracket (from my original, decrepit air box); it didn’t fit too well the first time so I made some adjustments, made the holes slightly larger and tried again – bingo !

 

 

I smoothed off the edges a bit more, secured the bracket and moved on to removing the MAF sensor from my other air box (the one that’s in much better condition).

 

 

It was only 4 nuts and the sensor and gasket came away without a problem.

 

I fitted the sensor and gasket to my modified Supra air box and it fitted like a dream! I nabbed the air temperature sensor from the 2JZ wiring and fitted it back into where it used to sit, minus the wiring.

 

 

 

I tried fitting the modified air box into its original position and with a little bit of fiddling with the flexible hose, it went in like a charm !

 

 

I’m quite happy with how that turned out . I’m going to go out on a limb and say that I believe that this is the first time that this has been done/documented as being done, but I’ll happily stand corrected if this is not the case.

 

Once my new radiator turns up and gets fitted, I’ll see if I can re-use the rest of the Supra’s stock inlet tract.

Edited June 4, 2015 by J-Meiser (see edit history)

[J-Meiser]

I then moved on to the interior and stripped out the dash so I can get access to the clocks for the tacho mod. I also tried to find my original speedo converter as I now have a Thor DSC to fit, but I couldn’t find it behind the clocks or down near the ECU – does anyone have any ideas where it could be located?

 

 

 

I did make an interesting discovery this afternoon – I found (what I believe to be) the connector for the active spoiler ECU, tucked right up behind the clocks. What is it doing all the way up there??

 

 

 

I’m now waiting on a few bits, so once they arrive, I’ll do another update .

[J-Meiser]

The 4-cylinder rev counter from Delboy52 came on Saturday (thanks again ), so I made a start with swapping the boards over. Unfortunately, I didn’t take many pictures as I was a bit limited with time, so I cracked on and took the odd picture when I could.

 

 

Disassembling the instrument cluster was pretty straightforward, just numerous plastic clips, screws and patience . Once disassembled, I bent the 4 metal tabs that held the board in place and removed the board from the back of the assembly. Once removed, I compared the boards and I could see that only 1 of the screw holes lined up perfectly, so I put the screws through the holes in the board and marked out where they lined up on the back of the white plastic chassis. I drilled the holes, test fitted the board, made a few adjustments where necessary and placed the flexible circuit sheet back into position.

 

 

 

The screws that hold the boards onto the plastic chassis must make contact with the copper contacts, so I made small cuts in the circuit sheet for the screws to go through, refitted the smaller plastic flexible sheet and fitted the board and screws, making sure that the screws made contact where required and none of the circuit paths were impacted with my modifications.

 

 

Here’s the finished article!

 

 

The engine bay wiring was next on my to-do list. Again, I didn’t take many pictures as wires are not particularly exciting and I just wanted to get it done and dusted.

 

I had 3 wires to run from the fuse box area and around the bay; 2 of those wires (the igniter and air con magnetic clutch) had to run into the cabin and I had 2 wires to run from the cabin round to the alternator (IG and Alt_L, these were run along with the Alt_S wire from the fuse box area). I cut the Alt_S wire that runs into pin 2 of connector EA3 and ran that around the engine bay to the alternator.

 

 

I ran the IG and Alt_L wires from the passenger foot well, through to the engine bay and around to the alternator. For the time being, I have soldered the wires together, but once I’m happy that everything is up and running correctly, I will cut the wires and install a connector.

 

 

The only things that I need to wire up in the engine bay now, are the twin electric fans but I’m not going to do that until I get the radiator and fans into the bay, after that, I can decide where to go from there.

 

My new radiator arrived on Tuesday .

 

 

I am just waiting on some fan shroud mounting bolts to arrive from Toyota before I mount my fans to the rad and get them installed into the bay. Fingers crossed, once they’re in and the hoses are securely fastened, I can connect the new wires to the adaptor, start to put the oil/ATF/coolant in and get ready for the first start up !

[Delboy52]

Glad the tacho is going to get some proper use Looking great

[J-Meiser]

Glad the tacho is going to get some proper use Looking great

 

Thank you, it certainly shall! Stay tuned, as I have another update incoming