I spent a good amount of time trying various methods of attaching the engine to the hoist in order to try to find a solution that would (a) allow the gearbox to be lowered to the correct angle and (b) avoid the roll of the engine to the right hand side.
The first point was a matter of configuring the load leveller such that the lifting point was initially as far forward as possible - then when it comes to the point of tilting the engine to lower the gearbox into the transmission tunnel, the load leveller would have maximum adjustment.
The second point was more difficult to achieve. Several builders have used riggers attached to the load leveller to provide an attachment point on the left hand side of the engine without damaging the fuel rail. The method I settled on was that recommended by Chris Collins - to attach the left engine mount with bolts done up to a reasonable torque, and then thread the web of a ratchet sling through the hole. Adjusting the tension in the ratchet strap allowed the rotation of the engine to be adjusted. Although the webbing was specified to 250kg (plenty enough for this operation) I also loosely attached the load leveller to the engine mount on the same side - just as a backup in case the webbing strap failed. As it happened, this attachment did serve another useful purpose later in the installation process.
Of course the gearbox was wrapped in polythene to try to prevent any sharp edges tearing up the thermal lining in the transmission tunnel.
My friend Aidan arrived and together we hoisted the engine up high enough to clear the top cruciform and then proceeded to drop the gearbox with the load leveller. I had looped a sling around the crane and the from axle stands which allowed us to manoeuvre the chassis (rather than the crane) with some precision. We spent several minutes at this point eyeballing the long axis of the engine relative to the chassis, believing that time spent getting this as accurate as possible would be time well spent. As we lowered the engine into the bay and then started to adjust the angle, it became clear that the webbing strap was too tight and was causing the engine to roll to the right. The crane was reversed, webbing adjusted and we tried again.
The next few steps were straightforward until things began to get tight in the transmission tunnel. This happened as the gearbox was about two-thirds of the way in and it became clear that we needed to remove the polythene to make any further progress. Finally the gearbox mounting point was getting close to its final location and the sump had been lowered past the cruciform and downwards into position.
It was time to get the trolley jack under the gearbox and attempt to fit the gearbox support bracket. I had already dropped the caphead bolts into place, and so offered the plate up to the chassis rails. I hand tightened the nyloc nuts onto the bolts which held the gearbox plate in position. We further lowered the gearbox until it was on a millimetre or two above the plate. We then tried to fit the two M14 bolts through the plate into the gearbox - but the threads would not catch properly.I knew the threads were good having previously dry-fitted them, but wanted to avoid the risk of cross-threading at all costs. The solution was to remove the nyloc nuts from the plate - the loose plate then allowed the M14 bolts to be fitted (with Loctite) followed by the return of the nylocs.
The final step was to remove the webbing strap from the left hand engine mount - obviously ratchet straps are great for tightening, but not easy to release from tension. This is where having the other engine mount connected to the load leveller came into play. I was able to take the tension out of the strap by slowly unwinding the hook from the load leveller. The weight of the engine was taken through the other lifting hook onto the engine mount very quickly. With the ratchet strap removed, the engine mounts were within millimetres of the anti-vibration rubber mounts. These were installed with their bolts into the chassis and the bolts through the mounts into the engine were slackened off. The engine was lowered the last couple of millimetres until the engine mounts were resting on the rubbers.
An important point was to install the two long caphead bolts through the Engine Mounts and into the Rubbers first, and then the bolts through the Mounts into the Engine block could then be tightened gradually. This is key because the action of the tightening the Engine Mounts onto the engine bit by bit pulls the engine into the correct position.
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