Diesel engine swap
My old M715 has a tired Tornado in it. The truck has been sitting in the shed for 5 years, waiting for a engine swap.
Awhile back my Uncle called me up needing some help moving some trucks from a friend that had passed away. He had 3 old furniture moving vans that his widow just wanted gone. My uncle was just going to haul them away for scrap, but there was one that caught my eye, a 1988 Isuzu NPR diesel. Come to find out the NPR used a Isuzu 4bd1t engine, same displacement as a Cummins 4bt and similar power output. That got me to thinking about a engine for the M715. The only downside to these engines in this application is the clutch housing, it's a weird Japanese pattern. There are some 4bd1t out there with a SAE flywheel housing used in industrial and construction applications, but they are kind of rare and expensive when you find one. The trans in the NPR is a 5 speed non-OD trans with a cable shift, so I didn't want to use that.
I had a couple of Spicer 3053a lying around from a couple of duces I parted out, so I went to work trying to make the Spicer trans fit. Finally got the engine and trans coupled together over the weekend. What I ended up doing is taking one factory deuce adapter ring and drilled it out to the Isuzu pattern, bolted it up and dowelled it in place. Then I took a second deuce adaptor, bolted and dowelled it to the first ring, this gave me the exact same space from the trans bellhousing face to the flywheel as the deuce. I then redrilled the Isuzu flywheel to accept a deuce pressure plate. After that I had to make a custom pilot bushing, 40mm OD to fit the Isuzu crankshaft and 3/4" ID to fit the Spicer input shaft.
Here is a pic of the results, now to see if I can stuff this combo into the M715.
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Originally Posted by gonz
