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Just so you dont think I spent my whole weekend playing with cheap miatas.
I started my morning by pulling out the old motor. No hoist required, just unbolt and lift. Sonic came by and cleaned up/removed all the wiring and other bits so we can start to plan the front end fabrication.
Then we pulled out the implements of destruction and started making way for the new engine bay.
Interesting suspension, like a Model T spring.
Dan
914Driver wrote:Interesting suspension, like a Model T spring.
Dan
Ahhh, yes indeed, transverse leaf front and rear. Although we like to think of it as like the corvette rather than the model T, makes the car feel sportier :)
It is going away soon.
get the obligatory shot of somebody standing on the ground in the trunk 
Oh and is that a hole in the firewall or just an uncharacteristically clean bit?
Transverse springs front and rear? That would be Corvette suspension. Depends on whether your glass is half full, or half empty !!!
Tetzuoe wrote:get the obligatory shot of somebody standing on the ground in the trunk
Oh and is that a hole in the firewall or just an uncharacteristically clean bit?
Get your tetanus shot updated and I'll take your picture in there sunday.
Thats a hole where the heater duct used to go into the car. It was handy for passing tools back and forth while we were working in there.
Ok, finally I've towed things here, towed things there and my driveway looks like the local u pull it. But all the major players are now in place for the build to begin in earnest.
So I present everyone with a little equation to solve.
Wartburg + Porsche transaxle + VW suspension + whatever that is on the end providing motivation?
Tim Baxter wrote:Wartburg + Porsche transaxle + VW suspension + whatever that is on the end providing motivation?
Oooh, I wasnt trying to make a game of it but this could be fun. You have 2 out of 4 right :) That thing on the end is a Subaru Legacy.
Subaru engine on VW transaxle, 944 suspension, in Wartburg chassis! Did I win? 
MrJoshua wrote:Subaru engine on VW transaxle, 944 suspension, in Wartburg chassis! Did I win?
Indeed that is the correct sequence for the most part.
There shall be an unholy marriage of the VW rear tosion, transaxle, suspension and the center "spine" to the Wartburg frame.
The 944 front suspension is getting grafted to the front frame and the 944 rear disk brakes will be adapted to the VW trailing arms in the rear. Subie 2.2 motor strapped to the VW transaxle completes the mix.
I shall bub the Patrick Warburg.
What about just using the 944 trailing arms instead of the beetle parts? Track moves out 1~2" per side and thus gives you a reason to install teh secks:
BOX FLARES!!!!!!!
Wait a minute. Am I the only one outraged at the desecration of this fine example of automotive engineering from the GDR's illustrious past? Have you no sense of history? This car deserves nothing more than than a comprehensive and faithful restoration to its former glory. Instead, you tear at the very fabric of its being by butchering it. Have you no respect?
If you don't come to your senses and stop the senseless slaughter of an irreplaceable piece of history I will mobilize the Wartburg faithful world wide to rise up and......what? Nobody else cares? Oh. Carry on, then.
If you don't come to your senses and stop the senseless slaughter of an irreplaceable piece of history I will mobilize the Wartburg faithful world wide to rise up and......what? Nobody else cares? Oh. Carry on, then.
I may be one of the only people in the country who felt a little sorrow at cutting into her.
I did make the offer that anyone who thought it was worth more as a restored example could feel free to throw cash at me, Im easily swayed :)
orphancars wrote:What about just using the 944 trailing arms instead of the beetle parts? Track moves out 1~2" per side and thus gives you a reason to install teh secks:
BOX FLARES!!!!!!!
Mostly because we dont have the 944 trailing arms, they are being reused on the 944 which gave us its "leftover" bits.
But....VW rear track is about 4 inches wider than Wartburg rear track, + width of porsch wheels and the rear wheel spacers used on the 944.
There will be flares, I think everyone would be dissapointed in me if I didnt flare another commie car.
this aught to be one interesting warbeetorscharu.
hurry up with that subie I cant find scrap metal anywhere 
JThw8 wrote:There will be flares, I think everyone would be dissapointed in me if I didnt flare another commie car.
Edited so that everyone can post this quote up.
Ok, now that the pieces are together some more build details. These are cut and pasted from different posts on the Lemons board so my apologies if it doesn't quite flow without the interspaced questions and commentary.
Its an interesting note for those who havent seen the Wartburg up close to realize how small it really is that a VW bug is very similar dimensionally. Slightly shorter in the overall wheelbase but the interior space is larger on the bug (no, really, I didnt belive it either) In fact if we kept the pedal cluster on the VW chassis, even with moving the wheelbase back 3 inches the pedals end up in the engine bay.
We've gone through alot of iterations of this project. The final determining factors were
a) what do we know best mechanically b) what can we get cheap
Both boxes were ticked by aircooled VW and I was actually able to get a full rolling chassis with transmission for the cost of going to pick it up.
The original plan was to weld the VW front torsion to the frame for the front suspension. But we wanted better brakes too. A friend who is building a hell of a 944 (with an LS1) wanted a radiator I had sitting on the shelf and wanted all the unused 944 bits out of his garage so a trade was made. These parts were supposed to go on my VW bus but I sold that to help pay for our misadventures with the Wartburg and free up some garage space.
So, 944 disks are a direct bolt on to the rear suspension of a VW, the front disks can be modified but we got to looking at those porsche a-arms and struts and the better adjustability and overall performance made more sense so we scrapped the VW front idea and are designing the strut towers. The design of the existing wartburg shock towers makes it much easier than it would normally be so we decided to bite the bullet on it.
Suspension sorted on to engines. VW aircooled is a quick and easy setup but the Subie is a simple(ish) conversion and better power/reliability/parts availability so we put that in our notebook. Our subie expert recommended the 2.2 for its robust nature, availability and the fact that it doesnt make so much power it will immediately grenade a VW transaxle. Early 90s subie legacies are cheap and we should be able to part out the rest of the car to more than make up for the initial cost.
We almost flipped the script entirely when we brought home the cheap miata but we decided that was kind of boring in comparison.
More... The wheelbase is being extended 3 inches (moving the rear wheels back) this should help handling slightly but the bigger reasons were
1) by doing this the shifter on the center tunnel of the VW chassis falls in just the right place 2) it moves the wheel arches out of the C-pillar to make flaring the rear fenders easier (you didnt think I was going to let this go without flares did you?)
Flipping the transaxle and modding the VW rear suspension was considered for a mid-engine layout but was ditched due to complexity and time constraints as well as the thought of having to do any major work by crawling through the rear doors and over the roll cage.
(in reply to more details on the decision to go mid engine or not) Actually flipping the trans was the easier part of the equation. With a VW transaxle you just move the ring gear to the other side, its pretty straightforward. but then the engine and the trans encroach on the torsion tubes which are the "spring" for the rear suspension so you have to modify the trailing arms to pivot on a heim joint and use coilovers for the suspension. I did alot of research on it because I think the balance would have been better but limited time and the whole accessibility issue dictated staying with the current plan.
For a very brief moment I considered just scratch building a whole new frame but the only real purpose would have been to preserve the stock frame to take the car back to stock later, its become obvious that level of preservation wont be possible. We also had concerns the factory frame might be too weak but those were quickly put aside when we saw it, rather stoutly built little car.
Tonite I figgured out the factory assembly sequence for a Wartburg. Scroll to the top of the page, see that transmission? Apparently it starts there and they build the rest of the car around it.
Everything was already disconnected and it still took me an hour and a half to get it out of its little home there.
are you sourcing 944 rear brakes or are you sticking with the vw hardware? (I think im out of spare 944 parts haha)
Tetzuoe wrote:are you sourcing 944 rear brakes or are you sticking with the vw hardware? (I think im out of spare 944 parts haha)
I assume you mean rotors and pads since you gave me the rest of the stuff.
We had planned on buying new on the rotors and pads, no point in risking anything at Lemons.
oooh right, I gave you a full set, not using any of the original calipers on the 944 (951 calipers in the rear and LS430 conversion in the front..) its all coming back to me. Just making sure they weren't still collecting dust here.
Thanks for checking :) Now if you have a set of Koni's sitting around collecting dust be sure to give me a call
