Engine mounts

Engine mounts done. At first it appeared that they were going to be a little tricky to access:



They were actually surprisingly easy to unbolt- I used a gearwrench on 5 of the 6 nuts and bolts.

It's pretty cool that I can just jack up the engine using the oil pan. I stuck a thick piece of plywood in between just to help distribute the weight a little.

I got the engine to a point that I couldn't jack any farther without cramming the fan into its shroud. I decided not to cut any corners and removed the fan shroud.




I installed the front two first.



The 4 rear donuts went on fairly easily as well.



Although this job was pretty simple and it never hurts to have new mounts, I think I could have gotten away without replacing them. Only two of the donuts looked like they were crushed.

As I've been isolating all the bumps and squeaks, I've noticed that the axle housings aren't very far from the bumpstops on the frame at all.



That's only 2 or 3 inches of travel before the suspension bottoms out! I think this is happening often, although it's hard to tell. So I dabbed a little bit of grease on each of the axle housings and took the '40 for a quick beer run. I stopped several times during the short trip to see if the bumpstops had smeared the grease. They had not. This was only through the neighborhood, remember.

I pulled up on the curb at the beer store, and that was enough to make 'em touch.



Notice the springs in this older photo- they have almost no bend to them at all. Suspension is going to make a huge difference.