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Date:         Thu, 29 Nov 2007 17:56:09 -0800
Reply-To:     neil N <musomuso@GMAIL.COM>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         neil N <musomuso@GMAIL.COM>
Subject:      Dolly for engine removal
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1

Hi all. I'm sure this has been done before, but it might bear repeating.

If you're a one man show, and have limited room to use floor jack to scoot the engine back once it's free, this may help. It also helps in that you can move the engine around more easily. FWIW, I would have removed the handle from the jack, but this just seemed totally unsafe.

Basically you make a dolly that rolls under engine when van still on ground, and has enough room between rails for floor jack to go underneath it.

I made mine this way. Your jack may be different. YMMV! Also this design is not meant for a lot of use.

With jack saddle seated, I measured height from floor to saddle. Mine turned out to be ~ 6".

Each rail of dolly:

2 pieces of 2x4 and a 3/4" piece of plywood at roughly 17" long. Attach 2 125 lb rated plastic swivel wheels. (you may want something more substantial than plastic wheels. You may also want to add a cross member at rear to ends of rails.) The wheels I bought were ~ 2.5" from bottom of wheel to top of plate. Whatever you use for material, just make sure you make it so jack will slide out once dolly is on the ground.

Deck:

I think it was 18.5" x 15" but for sure is 3/4" plywood. I sized it to support engine and IIRC, the carrier bar (aka load bar) but for sure not the exhaust header. I positioned it on rails as such.

Here's how I used mine.

With van still on the ground, I put dolly and jack under engine and jacked up dolly to support the engine. I supported the tranny, and removed the mount and plate it attaches to from frame and tranny. I removed the fasteners from the engine carrier, and lowered the engine/dolly to the ground. Then I snuck the jack back to the tranny mount point on frame, (there's room with other parts removed) jacked up the van, put some jack stands in there for safety, then I removed the bolts and nuts holding engine to tranny, wiggled the engine off the tranny, and with some fenaggling, it rolled out nicely!

I had removed some parts from the engine, so you may find there's not enough lift on your jack to make this possible. Even so, you could add wood to your jack. As it was, I had to uh, persuade the sheet metal under bumper so the tower thingy (crankcase breather??) would clear. The body on this van is scrap so I didn't care. Again, YMMV.

The best part is I can roll the engine out to my other van, get the jack under the dolly again, and with any luck lift it up level with the van and slide it in!

Heh heh.

This design is not HD, but should suffice for limited use. I'd recommend using heftier rubber wheels and adding a cross member at rear to ends of 2x4.

I'll post a pic tomorrow. It's too dark right now.

Cheers,

Neil.

-- Neil Nicholson. 1981 Air Cooled Westfalia - "Jaco" (Bustorius) http://web.mac.com/tubaneil

Engine swap beginings: http://musomuso.googlepages.com/home


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