Hey, welcome to this tutorial. A couple of you were as puzzled as I was about how to do this mod, and despite what anyone may tell you, I would not recommend it for the faint of heart. Still a lot of fun, but not quite your average bolt on, as you will see.
WARNING/ADVISORY: I STRONGLY recommend you have a dude help you (thanks goes to DaleNixon for helping to bring you this how-to and for picking my engine up off the driveway), and you have two jacks handy, at least one floor jack. Make sure weather is good or your environment is secure, and have all those tools you need ready to begin with. I would say you need: Full set of metric sockets with a variety of drivers, torque wrench, needle nose pliers, balls, and a soda. Save beer for later.
On with the show.
So this is my engine bay. I should preface this how-to and explain I already have the TRZ dogbone installed, and it was a snap. I also have my CPE Nano installed, nice piece. Happy engine bay. Sun is shining. Time to rumble!
Here we are with the battery cover off. I am going to assume you are totally new at this, as that's how I feel whenever I start anything, so I apologize for redundancies. The battery cover just snaps off easy with a couple of tabs. Just keep it safe. You can see the red power cable running to my amp.
Use a 10mm socket to loosen the negative terminal, and wrap that sucker up in a plastic bag and tape it. Later on when you're thrashing around in the bay this won't accidentally short anything. This is good advice for anytime you're disconnecting battery.
Removing the battery is pretty easy. You just unscrew the bar holding it down (more 10mm), disconnect positive terminal, make sure you're clear wire-wise, and out it comes. Don't drop it. It will explode.
Now that the battery box is clear, you can see three bolts holding it down. This is an addition to wires clipped to the box, and the ECU and its harnesses. There's also the little tab of metal coming off the main ECU harness, and the mounts for the Nano SRI. Patiently start to remove all this...
The front cover of the battery tray is held on by two little tabs. You can squeeze and remove. The front wall slides out on rails, make sure to clear wires out.
The cover over the ECU wire harnesses similarly is removed with tab squeezes. Patiently remove. The harnesses themselves can be removed by slipping a flat nose screwdriver between the white pull bar and the housing, where a little tab is. Be patient. Go slow.
Once the tab is depressed, the white handles just lift up, and the harness slides right out.
Use needle nose to remove all the wire holders.
Another wire holder under the battery box: use your remote vision/clairyvoyance ability on this one. Just squeeze with eyes shut.
The main battery bolts can come out now. 10mm socket on an extended socket wrench. Easy.
The removed tray. Don't throw it away, that's where the ECU is.
And here we are, heart of the matter time. The tripod (which is what DaleNixon and I assume it is, and I will continue to call it) sits over the actual mount, which you can't see yet. You can see the "10" bolt holding your engine in place. Make friends with it now - you'll hate it later.
Remove all the final bits connected to the tripod, there aren't many. That metal bracket attached to the white plastic slides out after you depress a tab. You'll see it.
Now is a good time to fiddle with inlets and intakes. DaleNixon noticed my SRI hose wasn't totally secure on the turbe inlet, so we tightened that up. He also mentioned my inlet is s***. Thanks man. So what you need to do here, and recognize that now is a good time to do inlets if you got em. Plan accordingly.
A view from the front of the car of what we're doing.
Careful.
Okay, the tripod lifts right out after you undo 2 10mm bolts towards the driver side, and the four main 17mm bolts. These crack pretty easy, easier than lug nuts. Unscrew. Behold, the removed tripod. Don't throw it away.
Now you see the actual transmission mount. DaleNixon said this was s*** too, upon close inspection. So we removed it. Here's how:
REMOVE YOUR UNDERCARRIAGE COVER. We didn't at first, at lived to regret it. Here, DaleNixon is pointing to a spot on the transmission where you can use a floorjack to hold the engine up. I would recommend in hindsight picking a spot more plum under the center. There's a little round piece under the engine where it looks like a screw goes in, but doesn't. That seems good, though there are other spots. Pick a stategic spot, and set the engine's weight on the floorjack. Have a scissorjack ready. Gut check time. Notice DaleNixon's red MS3 in the background, pining from afar for some attention.
Unscrew the bolt off the mount. It comes out surprisingly easy. The old mount pops right out, and looks like:
When it comes out though, expect your engine to shift, like so. When mine shifted, we were kind of looking at it, wondering if maybe we had just gone too far with this whole modding thing. Well, I was anyway. DaleNixon was excited it was my car and not his at this point.
Install the new tranny mount, and hand screw the four nuts a little bit, without worrying about the main bolt yet. Now, for the art. Hopefully you aren't as askew as we were, but no matter what, this part sucks a bit. Use the floor jack, and see if jack pushes the engine where it needs to go. If it does, great. If not, use the scissor jack in front of or behind the floor jack. Depending on position, it will move the engine forwards or backwards. You will start to see the holes align.
Not quite:
Even better:
Pretty good:
Here we are screwing it down. Don't let the sequence fool you, the hardest part was lining up the engine. Once we did have it lined up, we had raised the engine so much the car had lifted, and this put strange pressures on the mount from below. The bottom line is while screwing the main bolt in, it would reach a point and freeze. This is bad, and we would always remove the bolt, and fiddle with the jacks. Finally, we got it right. The bolt takes WORK to get it, make no mistake, but the resistance shouldn't be too much to continue.
Here it is, snug. The two washers that came with the bolt didn't want to come off easy, so I figured I'd leave them. The main washer is spreading the weight of the engine over the whole bushing. Good thing. Also, don't screw down the four auxiliary bolts until you reattach the tripod. You'll want that to secure your SRI, if nothing else. It holds better with it anyway - reinstall it. Here's the final product.
Another view:
IMPRESSIONS/CONSQUENCES/VERDICT:
This mod is Chuck Norris on a methamphetamine bender, in the name of a just God.
I thought just the dogbone let the beast out of the bag; not so. There is NO engine movement. None. Which means there are a LOT of vibes, which make the car feel great in my opinion. All sorts of amazing noises will emanate while the clutch pedal is released. Big vibes, big engine noise, big performance. Whatever benefits in traction and power the RMM gives, this ratchets up the whole thing a notch. My shifting is perhaps improved most of all, esp. with redline MT-90 and the dogbone. VERY precise, very quick and easy to slip into gear. Still noisy going into 2nd gear when she's cold, but there's no more resistance. Not for those with sand in their vageegees, I think this one is a definite winner for me. I'm tired now, I'll post a review thread elsewhere.
Peace.
WARNING/ADVISORY: I STRONGLY recommend you have a dude help you (thanks goes to DaleNixon for helping to bring you this how-to and for picking my engine up off the driveway), and you have two jacks handy, at least one floor jack. Make sure weather is good or your environment is secure, and have all those tools you need ready to begin with. I would say you need: Full set of metric sockets with a variety of drivers, torque wrench, needle nose pliers, balls, and a soda. Save beer for later.
On with the show.
So this is my engine bay. I should preface this how-to and explain I already have the TRZ dogbone installed, and it was a snap. I also have my CPE Nano installed, nice piece. Happy engine bay. Sun is shining. Time to rumble!
Here we are with the battery cover off. I am going to assume you are totally new at this, as that's how I feel whenever I start anything, so I apologize for redundancies. The battery cover just snaps off easy with a couple of tabs. Just keep it safe. You can see the red power cable running to my amp.
Use a 10mm socket to loosen the negative terminal, and wrap that sucker up in a plastic bag and tape it. Later on when you're thrashing around in the bay this won't accidentally short anything. This is good advice for anytime you're disconnecting battery.
Removing the battery is pretty easy. You just unscrew the bar holding it down (more 10mm), disconnect positive terminal, make sure you're clear wire-wise, and out it comes. Don't drop it. It will explode.
Now that the battery box is clear, you can see three bolts holding it down. This is an addition to wires clipped to the box, and the ECU and its harnesses. There's also the little tab of metal coming off the main ECU harness, and the mounts for the Nano SRI. Patiently start to remove all this...
The front cover of the battery tray is held on by two little tabs. You can squeeze and remove. The front wall slides out on rails, make sure to clear wires out.
The cover over the ECU wire harnesses similarly is removed with tab squeezes. Patiently remove. The harnesses themselves can be removed by slipping a flat nose screwdriver between the white pull bar and the housing, where a little tab is. Be patient. Go slow.
Once the tab is depressed, the white handles just lift up, and the harness slides right out.
Use needle nose to remove all the wire holders.
Another wire holder under the battery box: use your remote vision/clairyvoyance ability on this one. Just squeeze with eyes shut.
The main battery bolts can come out now. 10mm socket on an extended socket wrench. Easy.
The removed tray. Don't throw it away, that's where the ECU is.
And here we are, heart of the matter time. The tripod (which is what DaleNixon and I assume it is, and I will continue to call it) sits over the actual mount, which you can't see yet. You can see the "10" bolt holding your engine in place. Make friends with it now - you'll hate it later.
Remove all the final bits connected to the tripod, there aren't many. That metal bracket attached to the white plastic slides out after you depress a tab. You'll see it.
Now is a good time to fiddle with inlets and intakes. DaleNixon noticed my SRI hose wasn't totally secure on the turbe inlet, so we tightened that up. He also mentioned my inlet is s***. Thanks man. So what you need to do here, and recognize that now is a good time to do inlets if you got em. Plan accordingly.
A view from the front of the car of what we're doing.
Careful.
Okay, the tripod lifts right out after you undo 2 10mm bolts towards the driver side, and the four main 17mm bolts. These crack pretty easy, easier than lug nuts. Unscrew. Behold, the removed tripod. Don't throw it away.
Now you see the actual transmission mount. DaleNixon said this was s*** too, upon close inspection. So we removed it. Here's how:
REMOVE YOUR UNDERCARRIAGE COVER. We didn't at first, at lived to regret it. Here, DaleNixon is pointing to a spot on the transmission where you can use a floorjack to hold the engine up. I would recommend in hindsight picking a spot more plum under the center. There's a little round piece under the engine where it looks like a screw goes in, but doesn't. That seems good, though there are other spots. Pick a stategic spot, and set the engine's weight on the floorjack. Have a scissorjack ready. Gut check time. Notice DaleNixon's red MS3 in the background, pining from afar for some attention.
Unscrew the bolt off the mount. It comes out surprisingly easy. The old mount pops right out, and looks like:
When it comes out though, expect your engine to shift, like so. When mine shifted, we were kind of looking at it, wondering if maybe we had just gone too far with this whole modding thing. Well, I was anyway. DaleNixon was excited it was my car and not his at this point.
Install the new tranny mount, and hand screw the four nuts a little bit, without worrying about the main bolt yet. Now, for the art. Hopefully you aren't as askew as we were, but no matter what, this part sucks a bit. Use the floor jack, and see if jack pushes the engine where it needs to go. If it does, great. If not, use the scissor jack in front of or behind the floor jack. Depending on position, it will move the engine forwards or backwards. You will start to see the holes align.
Not quite:
Even better:
Pretty good:
Here we are screwing it down. Don't let the sequence fool you, the hardest part was lining up the engine. Once we did have it lined up, we had raised the engine so much the car had lifted, and this put strange pressures on the mount from below. The bottom line is while screwing the main bolt in, it would reach a point and freeze. This is bad, and we would always remove the bolt, and fiddle with the jacks. Finally, we got it right. The bolt takes WORK to get it, make no mistake, but the resistance shouldn't be too much to continue.
Here it is, snug. The two washers that came with the bolt didn't want to come off easy, so I figured I'd leave them. The main washer is spreading the weight of the engine over the whole bushing. Good thing. Also, don't screw down the four auxiliary bolts until you reattach the tripod. You'll want that to secure your SRI, if nothing else. It holds better with it anyway - reinstall it. Here's the final product.
Another view:
IMPRESSIONS/CONSQUENCES/VERDICT:
This mod is Chuck Norris on a methamphetamine bender, in the name of a just God.
I thought just the dogbone let the beast out of the bag; not so. There is NO engine movement. None. Which means there are a LOT of vibes, which make the car feel great in my opinion. All sorts of amazing noises will emanate while the clutch pedal is released. Big vibes, big engine noise, big performance. Whatever benefits in traction and power the RMM gives, this ratchets up the whole thing a notch. My shifting is perhaps improved most of all, esp. with redline MT-90 and the dogbone. VERY precise, very quick and easy to slip into gear. Still noisy going into 2nd gear when she's cold, but there's no more resistance. Not for those with sand in their vageegees, I think this one is a definite winner for me. I'm tired now, I'll post a review thread elsewhere.
Peace.
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