Hey guys,
Just thought I'd follow up on my search for the perfect bellhousing for my VW TD/samurai conversion. I believe I have found it, and it was right under my nose. I decided to remove the rabbit bellhousing from it's trans-axle and try to mate it up to the toyota tranny I have. Well, most bellhousings have a a handful of bolts holding them on and they just fall off with their removal, as it's not an integral part of the tranny. This NOT the case with the rabbit bellhousing. I found out the hard way that removing it requires a COMPLETE DISASSEMBLY of the rabbit tranny, from the back of it to the front. I feel so sorry for my trans-axle. It died a gruesome death, slowly torn apart in the name of innovation.

This really bites, 'cause it WAS a perfectly good tranny. In retrospect, I would've liked to sold it to someone with a dead tranny, who would give me theirs as a core return that I coulda taken the bellhousing off of in good conscience. Alas, such regrets are pointless.

On the bright side, it's gonna be a lot less work to mate the bellhousing with the 'yota tranny. I don't have to find dead center at all, since the rabbit housing is solid and already has a perfect hole for the shaft. I may have to re-drill the hole if the 'yota shaft is bigger, but it will still be dead center. Also, the diff casting on the side of the trans-axle is not needed for structural stability of the housing (since the housing is a perfect bowl, and the diff is an add on to it) and can be chopped off and ground pretty, minimizing wasted space under the hood of my samurai. The only thing that worries me about that chopping is the cast is a magnesium alloy, which is volitile when shaved (sawzall accident waiting to happen maybe?). Any thoughts on this?

Don't know yet what kind of mods I'm gonna have to make to the rabbit flywheel to accomodate the 'yota input shaft/pilot bearing, etc. But I'm optomistic.

Sounds good! Don't worry too much about the magnesium, large/thick sections won't light up, has to be powdered or shaved. It does burn hot so don't leave open flames and greasy rags around the saw filings!

I'd also imagine pure oxygen from a cutting torch could get thick sections going too, don't know though.

When you say the hole lines up, do you mean the hole for the input shaft? Is there a bearing in the bell for the shaft?
Ken

Originally posted by Slowzuki
When you say the hole lines up, do you mean the hole for the input shaft? Is there a bearing in the bell for the shaft?
Ken

Yeah, there is a bearing in the hole for the shaft, but you shouldn't need this for the 'yota tranny. The only thing you would use the hole for is to find dead center.

Last night I was doin' a bit more research on this, and I noticed (with the aid of samazuki's eyes:) ), the 'yota tranny is actually subset into the bellhousing, which really complicates this setup. Further more, the rabbit flywheel and pressure plate rely on an internal shaft that sits inside of the input shaft to release the friction disk, instead of the clutch forks you find on most manual trannys. You could work around this by using Quantum flywheel and clutch, but I sure would like to find a way to use what I already have. I'm freakin' tired of gathering parts! I'm ready to get this project wrapped up.

There is also the possibility of using the 'yota bellhousing and making an adapter plate for it. The 'yota flywheel is almost the same diameter as the rabbit flywheel, and this would allow me to use the rabbit starter (hopefully). It looks more like I will have to go with a quantum flywheel/stuff. Still researchin' and scratchin' me head.

Quantum parts are getting more and more difficult to find, but they are also getting cheap! I just sold my '85 syncro...

watch that magnesium dust...its that dust plus a spark that burnt down my family business(chrome shop) we where polishing a lot of mag. racing wheels for a company and next thing you know...poof ...there go the building .
make sure you do a real good clean up after grinding ...its woth the time .
zukikid