Transmission Mount

March 31, 2014 -

  A few people told me the clearance I had on that drive shaft turning by the frame was cutting it too close so I bought some more washers.  (I think I have 1/4" or maybe 3/8" clearance now.) Of course, jacking up the transmission meant I had to remove the shifter again.  And after putting in two more washers (for a total of 5 on each transmission mount bolt) the shifter no longer fit under the transmission tunnel cross bar.  This is why I think a lot of people cut this bar.  If someone reading this is going to do a midshift, just cut it from the beginning. It'll make installing your engine a piece of cake and jacking up the transmission easy as well. I felt that since I had gone to all this trouble to keep it though, I might as well go the last mile. So I filed the frame cross tube down from underneath for about 2 1/2 hours. Filing steel isn't easy. Is my car mildly stronger laterally? Yes. Was it worth it? Probably not.
  I also took off the passenger side header after having no way to tighten the rear lower inside nut.  I learned from emailing a generous builder who has came before me, that is a stud that needs to be removed and replaced with a bolt. He is actually going to mail me a few of these special bolts. Why doesn't Factory Five's manual tell you to do this? I don't know. Incidentally I got the driver's side header on by taking the engine mount off before the engine went in and tightened the header on all the studs. I could only install the engine with one header on though and thought the driver's side was the tighter space side.