Well folks, the snow is still getting deeper but I dont care! the 8.3 cummins is officially bolted into the 77 Newell!
Spent a good part of yesterday just cleaning up wiring and hoses etc. cleaned up the original front motormount/ crossmember and driiled our hole for the center rubber mount. Today I had to cut the two vertical plates out of the frame and relocated them 1/2" on each side wider than the original to accommodate the 8.3 mounts, welded the plates all back in, rolled the engine into place and bolted it up. The driveshaft worked out nicely we used one half from the original and the other is the 6 speed allison, lucky the splines matched up perfectly. Also the length worked out. I tell you it is like this engine was made to fit!! Next will be the rad, it will take some fabricating to fit it in, i had to cut the right side floor out as well as the rear support to fit this bad boy in there, were going to dry fit it in make sure all the hoses and such line up nice then install the mounts that came with the donor bus, I will have to re-structure the rear support after the rad is mounted in and Im happy where its new home will be. Im sure that will be a whole day project.
