PICS! Econo Car conversion to Kubota Diesel. 1997 Geo Metro, Kubota D1005 3 cylinder

[cRiPpLe_rOoStEr]

Originally Posted by kimer6

Rooster, I like to diesel power everything.

Gotta agree with you on that. I'm extremely favorable to Diesel, but more interested in alternative fuels.

I have a 21 foot fishing boat that I turned from an inboard to a Mercruiser Bravo One stern drive with a Chevy 6.5 turbo diesel that I adapted.

Sounds nice. Fried fish is one of my favorite dishes

[kimer6]

[QUOTE=cRiPpLe_rOoStEr;504961]Gotta agree with you on that. I'm extremely favorable to Diesel, but more interested in alternative fuels.

My science project was to run an Onan 3KW diesel generator on multiple fuels including peanut oil, corn oil, filtered fry oil, etc. I got carried away and ran it on heated strained bacon grease. I could envision starting a diesel on regular diesel fuel, then after residual heat is available to heat the bacon grease, fat, lard, switch to the other bio fuel and run. Then switch to plain diesel fuel for 10 minutes to purge the lines of stuff that solidifies when cold.

The used fry oil made the garage smell like Mexican food.


Fried Fish..... When I take the boat out ( like yesterday, took the 28 foot diesel Tollycraft out to charge batteries) the sonar usually shows tons of fish. Every time I put a line in the water, they go away. What am I doing wrong?

[planejob]

Originally Posted by kimer6

I need to learn how to post photo albums. Well, maybe next week. Here's my steel adapter plate. The dowels are permanent fixtures. Any Geo transmission will bolt right up and be aligned like a factory engine. The starter even has dowels.

Does your starter pinion reach the flywheel without issue? Studying on mine I realized the starter is set back a half inch (well, .460") than the stock position in relation to the flywheel.

[kimer6]

Yes, my starter reaches the flywheel. But I used a flywheel from a 4 cylinder Suzuki Swift and its larger clutch and flipped the Kubota starter upside down and used it. They have the same tooth pitch.

[kimer6]

Here's the engagement of the starter from an old video I found.

[planejob]

Well, I can firm that the Geo starter DOES NOT spin the flywheel. It just does not reach.

Here's a better shot of the rubber plug in the oil dipstick hole.


So I had to switch over to the Kubota starter. Based on the orientation of the mounting holes I had to drill and tap the adapter plate, rather than bolt through it. The kubots starter is a bit smaller than the Geo's so I had to rotate the starter a bit, too.

The threaded hole at about 5 o'clock is the the new mounting hole for the Kubota geared starter.

Hey! Check this out!!! I drilled the new oil dipstick hole... finally. I used a shop vac to pull as much of the debris from the top and I plan to pull the oil pan and clean it out also while modding it for ground clearance.

[kimer6]

Very good job! Your cleverness is required on this project. Your starter engages now, right? I store my Geo outside now, covered, but the moisture is taking its toll these days.

Here are some photos. The starter is visible along with the throttle cable.
The other one shows the modified thermostat housing.

The car was white but the front end was crushed. I found a nice red Metro with the front end completely stripped of everything at Pick-N-Pull. Rather than drive 40 miles home for tools, I wrapped a rag around a hack saw blade and cut the front end completely off somewhere around the crank pulley/engine center line. What a job! Then I welded the whole thing to replace the crushed front end.

Also note that for some odd reason I mounted the coolant temperature sensor in the little bypass line from the water pump to the thermostat housing. I was getting in a hurry so it may have been a short cut.

[planejob]

Ok, I'm stuck.

The engine is D1005-E3B. (Link to the spec sheet). My oil filter is mounted vertically, on the left side of the pulley (when viewed head on). It's directly in the way of CV axle. Kimer6 has relocated his filter. I just can't figure out how to make it work and I'm worried that I'll accidentally bypass the whole filter, or block the route.

Kimer, any suggestions?

Anybody have any thoughts on how to route the oil, and make a block off plate?


Stream of consciousness update (you think reading these are annoying, try thinking like this) : I pulled the oil pan off and cleaned out the chips from the new dipstick hole I drilled. Interesting, there is no oil pan gasket and according to two of the Kubota dealers in town they just use silicone, so I just use silicone, too. The pan is clean and installed.

I tried to install the dipstick and I foolishly pushed too hard on a dry o-ring and broke it. The hole is the correct size, it was totally an operator error. I stopped at Oreilly Auto Parts earlier today and bought a few things: oil, oil filter, and fan belt. I stopped by Lowe's and acquired a handful of metric bolts to help with the fitting of parts.

I re-installed the alternator only to realize that the dipstick tub must be installed first and that will have to wait until I get a new o-ring tomorrow. Alternator came back off.

I did get the clutch and pressure plate re-re-installed, and bolted the tranny on to the engine. I pulled the drain and fill plugs on the tranny and cleaned them- It's ready for filling once installed.

The Kubota geared starter is installed in it's newly carved out home. It reaches out the correct length to fully engage the flywheel.

It was a good night. Tomorrow I need to get a shorter fan belt (did I mention the new one is too long?) a new o-ring and 2.5qts of syncromesh fluid for the tranny.

[kimer6]

While the engine is out, you might want to take a clean wire and flashlight and poke through the holes under the front oil filter block off plate to explore where they really go. One goes all the way through across the block to the other filter location.


The thing to remember is that dirty oil enters the outer ring of the filter and clean oil comes out of the center hollow bolt and enters the engine.

It has been a long time since I did my swap and I promptly forgot the oil path details. I may have been dog tired looking cross eyed at my engine late one night. But something made me turn this little piece that goes under the oil filter center bolt so I could sleep at night knowing clean oil flows when I turn the key.

I may be all wrong about the necessity of that plate.

I believe that I swapped the block off plate to the rear...(axle)....side without problem.

Kubota engineers should be spanked if one cannot simply swap the block off plate and relocate the oil filter.

[planejob]

Today I focused on getting the car rolling and cleaning up the engine bay. I removed a bunch of the gasoline ignition components, emissions vacuum lines, and auto tranny brackets.

I found this GREAT reference for converting an automatic Geo Metro to a manual Geo Metro. "airwerks" over on Team Swift posted some really useful pictures.

I did break the auto CV axles down. It's a chore to get the wheel side CV to break apart, especially without a blue wrench. I ended up with 2 axle stubs that fit perfectly (duh, removed and replaced) in the wheel hubs and allow me to roll the car around without destroying the wheel bearings! winning.

I got the dipstick tube o-ring replaced, installed the tube, and bolted the bracket down. Bolting the bracket down was the hardest part as the little hole was filled with an insect's nest and I lacked the correct size tap to clean it out completely.

I took a quick trip back to Oreilly's and traded the 15385 belt for a 15380 belt. The qaurter of an inch allowed me to get a reasonable, but not too tight, tension set on the alternator without maxing out the adjustment-slider-bracket-thingy. Do modern day belts still stretch after installation?

I spent about an hour studying on the oil passages. I'm still not sure what the correct answer is, but that picture of the custom turned block off plate has me intrigued.

Pictures coming.