Engine swapping in a UBS55 Bighorn

BlairH · Post by **BlairH** » Mon Oct 09, 2006 8:19 pm

Gidday,

I recently swapped a diesel Camry for a 1990 LWB UBS55 Bighorn Irmscher S. It has an exceptionally straight tidy body and interior. I have a 1989 SWB Bighorn Irmscher S which has a great 2.8 in it but a shabby body - right hand chasis rail is 15mm shorter due to owning an Audi in the middle of nowhere at about 1am.

I want to put the engine out of my SWB into the LWB, and just want to know if ano=yone knows of any pitfalls in doing this swap. Is there anything anyone recommends I do or dont do?

Is it a straight forward swap? It looks a little more complex than the 2WD conversions I have been involved in in the past.

Any info anyone can give me would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks in advance

Blair

billyvanboheman · Post by **billyvanboheman** » Mon Oct 09, 2006 8:32 pm

I take it the LWB is a petrol???

BlairH · Post by **BlairH** » Tue Oct 10, 2006 7:53 am

Sorry I should have specified in my original post - the LWB has a 2.8 intercooled turbo as well, but it has very poor compression and one would be forgiven for calling the fire brigade to report a fire when it starts! I have never seen a vehicle smoke like that before!

Basically Im hoping its a case of pull one engine out and slide the other one in there. But being 4x4 and with all the other little gadgets in the engine bay etc Im guessing its not going to be as easy as the 2wd navara I did last week!

SupraLux · Post by **SupraLux** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 8:42 am

Its going to be a pretty straight forward swap, but you're going to hate it... you need to either frop the front subframe assemblies right off or remove the sumps from the engines to get them out from memory... everything is very tight and hard to get to... might be best to use a 9" angle grinder to remove the good engine if you don't intend to keep that truck for anything - just make sure you have a week at least where you don't need either truck, sleep or sanity

Good luck with the swap

Steve

BlairH · Post by **BlairH** » Wed Oct 11, 2006 5:40 pm

Thanks for that, I was hoping it would be fairly easy but not to worry, the challenge will make it all the more worth while.I would like to keep my donor truck fairly mobile because Im thinking of a future engine conversion to make it a non road going mud basher or similar.