Fiat acquisition of Chrysler (in my driveway)

The engine needs to be put together as well, so that is what I started doing today. I'm using the lash adjusters from the PT cruiser as well as the rockers. They appear to be in better condition and are maybe a slight improvement in design. 
Performance cams. Exciting!

I wanted a cam gear holding tool for when I torque the sprocket bolts. I cut up some brackets from the original swap. 

Looks like it should work I made a tool. 

Next I slathered the cams with the supplied lube and got the caps ready

I tightened incrementally with just this 1/4 drive screwdriver to get the caps down. 

Things stopped being okay on my second torque pass when one of the cap bolts went to "spin infinite " mode. Grumble. I have several thread repair kits but not one that works this particular bolt. 

looks like it is time for a trip to the store. 

Thread repair happened after a hardware run. 

Worked! Next up was timing belt and blobs. I'm happy with the homemade special tool. It worked great. 

The head is milled and it seems like the marks never really line up perfectly on these engines so I used the cam holes with 1/4" drive extensions in them to set up the cams. It took me a few tries. Eventually it looked good. 
The intake sprocket had only split washers behind the nuts. I found some stainless ones that I added to match the exhaust sprocket. I'm glad I checked since the button head bolts were not fully tight on the back side of the cam gear. The reason they were not like the other side is because of  the minuscule clearance to the front mount. 
I made room with a grinder to easily clear the nuts. 

In an attempt to clean off the outside of the oil pan prior to welding around the drain fitting I set my glove on fire. RIP.

The oil pan is particularly horrible to weld around the fitting. It's dirty and porous and I don't have what it takes to try and get it properly cleaned. I could not envision successfully creating a leak free weld. It is already welded on the inside of the pan so I faked the funk. That's right. Steel Stick from JB weld. I applied a faux finish with to resemble a weld. Ha!
This is a belt and suspenders situation since the weld on the inside should be all that's needed. In case that weld has a pinhole the outer "weld" should keep it from leaking. 

Calling it a day here:

I like the faux weld!

Looking GREAT 

Today I spent a little time putting tools away. I wanted to share the second use of my cam holding tool. It can also hold the crank by the balancer to torque the bolt down. I also found a coolant temp sender for the gauge that is in the car. It has not worked with the factory output, so may as well add it in. The plan was to remove the little Allen head plug and drill and tap for the sensor. 
The Allen promptly rounded out so the new plan was to drill it out with progressively larger drill bits until the one for the tap. 

Then run in the 1/8"NPT tap. A speed handle and square drive socket fit where my tap handle did not. 

Another sensor, and it doesn't interfere with the thermostat. 

I also measured the angle that the "perfect" AN fitting would be for the oil drain. 
I have not checked to see if they exist in this angle yet. 

Yesterday I made a way to check the oil. I also broke my dipstick so another junkyard run in the future will be needed. I started by putting the water pump tube, starter and manifold on. Then with some bending I got the dipstick tube to miss everything. 
I grabbed a bicycle rack mount bracket and enlarged the holes on both ends and bent it to fit. 

I drilled and ground off the old bracket and then chopped open the new one to straddle the tube. Removed intake and melted some metals. 
 

This build is sweet! I need to go back and catch up

Off the stand. 

Rear main seal replaced. 

Flywheel installed. 

Shiny new clutch kit cleaned and installed. 

The kit came with a faux pilot bushing that fit into the crank center so nicely. I haven't seen anything like it before, but it make the disc alignment super easy. And now it lives there under this clutch set. 

Transaxle received a new throw out bearing too. Then I lifted the trans up onto the trans assembly stand I built for my 46re and got the two connected. 

I haven't found all my bell housing bolts yet but for now it's together. 
Intake on to check fit. No go. 

IAC is much in the way of trans. Well, this is why the intake is tacked and not welded out. I would really have to change things significantly to fit the IAC and plug. I took the fitting off to see if it could flip. 

Looks very symmetrical. Flipped it almost fits. 

This will work with a minor change in the orientation of the pie cuts. Chopped tacks. 

In new orientation the things all clear. I had a bad case of weld contamination on the first joint and I had to walk away for a while. After cleaning and changing tungsten it was less horrible. Still had some bad spots. Probably needed to better eliminate oil/grease than I managed to do. I am -ok- with these C- (and very visible) welds. At least it is forward progress. 
Intake back on and got the starter installed. Then called it a night. 

Good fix with the JB Weld. Getting clean welds in aluminum castings is pretty much not possible once it's had oil in it. I've had some success with a high temp oven preheat and a lot of time with a torch after grinding the area for welding. Seems like there's always one or two blowouts where some oil seeped into a porous part that you have to start over with. In any case, your fix with some JB is a great solution. 

Today I played more with the throttle body situation. I have read and confirmed that the IAC tips are different between the Neon and Jeep tb. The plugs are also not the same. I put the new Jeep bit into the old Neon one.
I currently have 4 throttle bodies: Neon mtx, Neon atx, PT n/a atx and Jeep eBay special. The Jeep tb rotates the opposite direction of the Neon but in the same direction as the PT cruiser.  I need to come up with a TPS that the Neon ECU can work with. My multimeter says that the Jeep pins are opposite for 5v and ground from the Neon and PT 

That can be solved by switching the pins in the connector. What is not working is that the resistance values are significantly different; higher in the Jeep and PT TPSs. I don't know what the answer is yet, but it might work to run the Neon TPS backwards and switch those pins? I may have to also change the mounting bolt positions. This wrong TB is a lot of work, and I don't know if it's worth it. Either way I took the cam and arm off of the ATX neon TB for possible adaption to the Jeep one. 

The PT tb donated some plastic to build a spacer that maybe should have already been used on the Jeep shaft. 

I chopped some more extra off the Jeep tb so the Neon TPS can read a good closed value. 

So rotated like this the Neon TPS and outer pins reversed, the ECU should play. 

I am sitting on this for a bit. There may be a better option. ? 

I may be missing it in a previous post, but why a non-stock throttle body? I tend to agree that adapting something with different electronics is just asking for drivability problems.

In reply to Robbie (Forum Supporter) :

Stock is fairly small for the 2.0 and even more so for the 2.4 and I just couldn't help myself I suppose. I did my first tests on the sensors uninstalled, but on the tb it looks like the PT unit (correct rotation direction) can go. (Some mods, of course). I have some part numbers to check out in case there is something else that works more easily. 

At some time in the future I plan to run this engine with the Speeduino I built and then I can define TPS ranges. But, I would like to run this engine with the Neon ecu for a bit first since I have already over complicated almost every step so far. 
A much more time intelligent solution would have been to buy the 60mm MPX tb.

More work on the TB sub-project. Basically, I made a jig to fit around the TPS actuator tab of the butterfly shaft on the PT TB when it was installed at the idle resistance setting to match the Neon one. Kind of a lot of fussing around but it ended up like this: 

The jig on the Jeep TB shows where the tab needs to be moved to show the same resistance. 

I made two cuts to almost the middle of the tab so that I could twist the tab to match the jig. 

This almost worked. I got it to go into the jig but it ended up breaking off. I did think that this might happen, so on to contingency plans. I welded the PT and the Jeep shafts together to align with scribe marks, made in the jig,on the end of the Jeep one. 

After joining, I cut off the PT shaft. It works now. 

I feel good about how it turned out. I did not like the cheapness of the bearings in the TB however. The sensor side has a notchy metal seal bearing that is thinner than any of the OEM ones (All wiper seals also) and the lever side has this roller bearing that just seems a bit cheesy. 

I decided to overcomplicate my life by modifying the casting to take the PT bearings which feel great and seem better. The idea is to build a fixture that the PT butterfly shaft can slide through to keep a cutting tool centered to enlarge the bearing hole to fit the better bearing. First I chopped the sensor side out of the Neon ATX TB. The idea is to use the TPS sensor mounting holes to attach the bearing inside the TB on the jig. 

Fun fact: The PT and Jeep TBs use a larger diameter shaft than the Neons. For my purposes this is okay since the OD of the bearings is the same. I cut a piece of scrap angle iron and mounted it to the TB mounting bolts after drilling an oversized hole to fit the throttle shaft. The shaft served as a guide to allow the three bearings to all line up. With the mounting holes done I had this:

I made a quickie jig to build my cutter. 

The Forstner bit is for wood and I be that I have previously used on aluminum also. It is 3/4" and I wanted to start with that and then slightly reduce it down for a press fit for the bearing. It did not work well. Lots of effort for barely any results. I chopped the shaft back off and reworked the jig to use a 3/4" spade bit. This was a way better tool. Much easier to reduce diameter and resharpen etc.
The spade bit got it done. I did a little section at the full size and then ground it down undersized for the rest of the bore. 

To get to final diameter I ran small beads of TIG on the cutting surfaces and filed them sharp to enlarge the bore. It ended up with a nice press fit. 

Here is a picture of the jig and cutter outside the TB. Bearings installed, shaft and butterfly in. I measured for a new spacer and cut it down form the PT donor. 

Stopped here and need to clean up; next will be making the TB open an close with the pedal in the car. 

I am not sure how interesting my TB experience is but I am having a good time putting way to much time and effort into it.