**Unlocking the ECU: A Major Milestone in the Money Pit's Engine Swap**
I'm excited to report that we've finally unlocked the ECU with the code supplied by Panic, a crucial step towards getting our engine up and running. Now that this hurdle has been cleared, we're ready to load a map and perform some calibration. With any luck, we should be able to get this thing started soon.
As Zach works on calibrating the ECU, I'll be installing the shiny trumpets for the ITBs – a major upgrade that's going to make our engine sound amazing. And while I'm at it, I wish I had painted the bay earlier; it would've added an extra layer of polish to this build.
Zach's got the engine in place, and we're just waiting for the right moment to fire her up. We know what we've accomplished so far – months of research, countless conversations with experts, and a whole lot of sweat equity have gone into making this project a reality.
**The Engine is Ready...**
We've taken out the old engine, spent hours researching, and even before that, talking to people who've done this swap before. We've got relationships built on this project, and now it's time to bring it all together. The engine is in place, and we're just waiting for the right moment to try and start her.
**The First Attempt...**
We're trying to start the engine for the first time, with fingers crossed that everything will go smoothly. We've wired it up, cleaned out the gas tank, and put on the choke – but there's still a lot of uncertainty in the air. Our collective nervousness is palpable as we wait to see if this thing will actually come to life.
**Adjusting Timing...**
We're running into some issues with timing, which means we need to adjust it carefully. This isn't a simple swap – we're putting a front-wheel drive engine in a rear-wheel drive car, so there are plenty of complexities at play. But we're confident that our research and experience will guide us through this process.
**A Successful Start...**
After some tinkering with the timing, we've finally managed to get the engine started! It's a thrilling moment – and a huge relief after all the hard work we've put in. Now it's time to make sure everything is running smoothly and efficiently.
**What's Next?**
We're not done yet – there are still plenty of things to tweak and fine-tune before this car is ready for the roads. But we're excited about what's next, and we can't wait to see how fast we can get this thing moving when we put our new engine to good use.
**Thanks for Watching!**
If you've made it through this entire article, thanks for sticking with us! We hope you've learned a thing or two about the process of swapping an engine into a car – and if you have any questions or comments, please don't hesitate to reach out.
WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: en- Great, you've donewhat few have attempted,you've pulled your engine out of your carand now you're in the sameboat as my boy, Pumphrey.You got a big gapinghole in your engine baywith nothing in it.Well, today we're gonna talkabout putting something in that holethat hopefully has alittle more power, baby.- So obviously putting an engine inand getting it to work is a lot harderthan just taking one out.So today, both Jobe and I are gonna begetting our knucks greasy.We're gonna talk aboutengine swaps in general,we're gonna talk about why I chosethis particular engine for this car.And then at the end,hopefully we can provethat our research and due diligenceis gonna pay off when it starts.(engine vrooms)- I'm Zach, that'sJames, this is Money Pitand the 86 shall live again.- Welcome back to the channel.Go ahead and smash that Like button.(thunder strikes)- A big thanks to Raid: Shadow Legendsfor sponsoring today's video.Raid is a top cross-platform RPG gamethat guides you through exciting battlesagainst noble kings and dark wizards,all while navigatingthrough warring factionsand uncovering hidden prophecies.Speaking of dark wizards,eh, you like it?You know, I can also do this.Raid also announced some huge updatescoming later this month.They're releasing a new batch of epicand legendary champions,which look amazing,and they're including anew doom tower rotationwith two new tough bosses,so be on the lookout for that.Your character could gofrom looking like thisto dominating battles looking like this.Now that's an upgrade.When you want to getahead in starting Raid,all you have to do is hitthe link in the descriptionor scan my QR codeand you'll get yourfree epic champion Jotunwho is amazing for the Doom Tower,and in your inbox you'llfind 100,000 silver,50 germs and the three ancient shards.So you can summon awesome championsas soon as you get in game.Now let's go swap this engine.(horse neighs)- All right, so before we goget in our knuckles greasy,we got to talk about a few things.First off, why you'reeven pulling an engineout of your car?- I don't know anymore,I don't remember why we did this.- I honestly kind of am in the same boat,but there are a handful of reasonsand we can kind of boil it down.Sometimes things break and youneed to take the engine out,so that you can fix it.And sometimes you justwanna replace the enginewith the same one, just a new fresh one,but sometimes, sometimesyou wanna replace the enginewith a different engine,and there's a handfulof ways you can kind ofgo down that road.So there's kind of a spectrum to swapsand some of them are kind of easy,some of them are in the middle,and some are pretty hard.First, if you're gonna beswapping an engine into a chassisthat was designed by themanufacturer to go there,well, it's not gonna be that hard.Then you can kind of getinto more difficult swapswhere you're putting an engine into a carthat was never designed to go there.Think like an LS swap in a Miata.Now there's a lot ofsupport for that stuff,so you can usually find theparts to do what you wanna do,but it is gonna be a littlebit trickier and more custom.And then at the full difficultend of the swap spectrumis full custom stuff thatnobody has done before.Think Ryan Tuerck and his 4586.(man laughs)(car vrooms)(indistinct)- Yes.- So depending on whereyou land on that spectrumwill kind of dictate whether or notyour swap is gonna be easy or hard.Now my man in the field, James Pumphrey,is gonna update us onhow our swaps gonna go.Pumphrey, over to you.- This is a fifth generation 4A-GE engine,so it's a newer version of theengine that came in my car.These were made from like 1995 to 2000and came in a bunch of Corollas in Japanand some other places around the world.It's referred to as a BlackTop because the valve covercomes from the factory painted black.So why did I want a newerversion of my old engine?Well, independent throttlebodies add more power,sound very cool.Also this is a two liter,so compared to the 1.6 literthat we took out of it,so a little bit more displacement,a little bit more power.The tricky thing about puttingthis motor into that caris that Corollas in 1995 to2004 were front-wheel drive.So this motor was meant to fit in a carthis way, this would be the front.We are putting it in a carthis way, so this is the back. (laughs)Basically we're putting ahamburger and a hotdog bun.(man laughs)You know what I'm saying? (laughs)And that caused a few issues.One of them being the distributorwas on the back of the motorand would either hit the firewalland make timing the engine pretty hard.It's just like a space issue.So to combat that, we got acoil on plug conversion kit,no more distributor.Awesome.For that same reason,we got this really trickcoolant relocation kitto clear up some roomon the back of the motor.Also it's very important tojust do basic maintenanceon the engine before you put it in.So we threw a whole bunch offresh gaskets at this thingto make it fresh.No leaks, leaks is for geeks.So luckily a ton of peoplehave done this swap,so there's tons ofresources on the internet.We've done a ton (laughs) of research,we've talked to a lot ofreally qualified guys,guys who've done thisswap a million times.So hopefully all of thework that we put into itbefore today will pay off today.I hope.- All right, the time is now.I'm gonna put this thing in.Always up.- This reminds me of mydays on the railroad.- That's funny.- Okay, youcome, come down a skosh.We're gonna have tokind of slowly come downand push in kind of at once, so.(upbeat music)- Well, so we've got a coupleinches of tilt left here,so we're gonna try to max that out.Okay, yeah, we're justgonna need to manhandle it.If you just push down, sothat clears, I'll drop.You ready?(upbeat music)- It's not cleared, but clearing.- Okay, now I'm gonna bringthe whole thing down to touch.- And push forward, yougotta push that puppy.It's working.Look, how strong you are.- I'm a strong boy,I'm a man.- Huh!Okay, so the progress is good.We've gotten the engineand transmission into thegeneral area they need to go.And that's really the trickiest part,you saw how much we had to tilt itand battle with that toget it in, but it's in.Now the trick is actually justlining up the engine mountswith their spot on the sub-frame.- So right down here, thereshould be a rubber piecethat goes between these, it'slike the OEM engine mount.I thought it was weirdthat it was just gonna be metal on metal.It turns out I was right, it is weird.We forgot to order a part that we needto literally bolt the engine in.So the cool thing aboutworking on cars is,you make friends doing it.We realized we need the rubberpart of the motor mount,and hit up my boy, Geo.And he was like, yeah, I have some.And I was like, can I have them?And he was like, boy, when?I was like, now if at all possible.Car friends are good friends.Thank you, Geo.- (mumbles) all the way down.Oh, beautiful.- Beautiful.- That motor is in, dude.That motor is in for thefirst time in months,we have a motor bolted in the roller.Really wishing I'vepainted the engine bay.- But look at how much are the blacktops.(James laughs)Now it's (indistinct)- Okay, so when you're puttingan engine back in the car,first thing you gotta do isbolt up the engine mount,but the second thing you gotta do...- Is bolt up the trans mount.I'm gonna hop under the car.Right now we have a jackunder the transmission,I'm gonna put the trans mount back onand then we should be like...BattleHawks sitting pretty.- Sitting good, we got the motor in.The trans is bolted in,it's late so we're gonna takea little break for the night,come back tomorrow, connectexhaust, connect drive shaft,figure out the electricalwith the Panic harness.And hopefully fire this guy up.♪ Pop-up up and down ♪♪ Stickers ♪♪ Pop-up up and down ♪♪ Stickers, stickers ♪- Now available, it tookforever to design these things,but the results are amazing.♪ Pop-up up and down ♪♪ Stickers ♪- Well, bring them right now,so go get them while youstill can, donutmedia.com.Tell him James sent you.There's actually no waythat you can do that,but maybe tell yourself under your breathwhen you hit the cart.♪ Pop-up up and down the headlights ♪♪ Pop-up up and down the headlights ♪♪ Stickers ♪♪ Pop-up ♪- Hey, welcome back, good morning.We're back in the shop,we got Pumphrey outsidecleaning some nuts and bolts.And I'm gonna go over whatwe have left to do today.There is kind of a lot of stuff,but hopefully none of it will be too hard.We gotta get the radiator back in,we gotta fill this thing full of fluids,engine oil, trans oil,we gotta get coolant in it as well.We've gotta do the shifter,exhaust, drive shaft,we gotta get the wiring harness installedand connected to all the things.So then once all that'sdone, all we gotta dois connect to our ECU, our new Link ECUand fire this thing up.No problem, right?I am currently connecting the fuel line.We got a nice new braided linewith an end fitting on one end.So getting this connected to the fuel,- I'm gonna hop under the carand put the drive shaft back on.Seem relatively right. (laughs)Welcome back to James's Lube Corner.Today we're lubing up my shaft.- Corner, baby.- You know, is it immature?Yes.Is it funny?Yes.Sorry, I don't make the rules.It's how it works.With the precision of a surgeon.- I'm putting the heatercore hoses on right now,and it's pretty tight in there.Whatever, it just...- So, well, Joel isgoofing off in the front,not really doing anything,I'm gonna put the shifter back in.Like that sucks at working on cars.How's this go?How's this go?(upbeat music)- All right, most of thebig stuff is in place.So now it's time toplay with the spaghetti.This is our old stock harness,which we could try to reuse,though we're not gonna.- Instead we're going withan aftermarket harnessmade by a company called Panic.It's made specifically to put this20 valve motor into the 86.Every one of these is handmade,and should be plug and playto get this thing started.We're also going with astandalone ECU made by Link,and Panic has gone aheadand loaded up a base tune onto the Link,so we should be able to start itwithout fudging with the laptop too much.Clean up that bay, should have painted it.- Should have painted it.- Should have painted it.- Well, let's jam that in here.(laughs)So I mean, there's a handful of thingsthat at first glance I don'treally know where they go,but the nice thing about mostof these electrical connectorsis that they're uniqueand you can't plug theminto the wrong place.So there's gonna be alittle bit of guessing,a little bit of check-in,but it's no big deal.- Satisfying.- All right, so we're downto the passenger footwell,where the stock ECU was.We've got our harnessfished through the firewall,and now I'm just gonna plug it intowhat it needs to be plugged into.We'll go straight into the Link ECU here,and then these plugs willconnect to our factory ones.Okay, plugged in there.So we've also got a built-inmap sensor on the ECU,so we're gonna have torun a vacuum referenceinto the cabin straight into the ECU,and that will let it knowwhat's going on in the engine.(upbeat music)(Zach whistles)- Oh yeah.I'm not sure of the acoustic.Everything is pretty much wired up,we ran into some hurdles withsome unidentified connectors,but the dudes at Panic were awesomeand helped us out toot sweet.So Jobe is finishing,putting the header on,we've got to figure out exhaust,but I'm gonna start puttingfluids in this thing,all of them: oil, coolant,transmission fluid.(upbeat music)- What?- This little guy, this guyhasn't had anything to drinksince he left Japan.- So we've got oil in the engine,we got most of the coolantin the cooling system,and then we need to put somegear oil in the transmission.(upbeat music)Okay, so Pumphrey got the battery in,which means the system has 12 voltsfor the first time in some time.So now it's time tohack into the mainframeand get our ECU up and running.So I just plugged into theECU for the first time,and I brought up the Link software.Now I have to unlock theECU with the unlock codethat Panic supplied us,and then we're off to the races,got to load a map, probablydo some calibration.I don't think there's too many stepsbetween here and starting.- So while Zach is calibratingthe ECU, I'm gonna put on,basically the whole reasonthat you get this engine,shiny trumpets for the ITBs. (laughs)Ah, yeah.I really wish I painted the bay.Just it would have taken five, six hours,just really wish I would've done it.Now there's an engine in there,I can't paint it now. (laughs)- I'd say this thing is ready to crank.- You never know what's gonna happen,but we know what has happened.Okay, we took the engineout of this bird months ago.I spent all that time,and even before that timeresearching, talking toexperts, making new friends.I started relationships because of this.We put the engine andwe wrestled the crane.- It's working, push forward,you gotta push that strong.You are, you're a strong boy.Okay, keep pushing.- Oh!- Okay.- Mm-hmm.- We wired it up,we cleaned up gas.- I really wish I painted the bay.- We put on thechoke that's in now.- I really wish (mumbles)We're gonna try and start it.Collective fingers crossed.Come on, Money Pit nation.- Everybody out there.- Come on, Money Pit nation.- And you can do more injust one.- We need this luck, baby.We need this luck, all right.- Y'all got us.- Did we do a good job?- Now we're worried.Well...I think we're running,I think we just need to adjust timing.- Yeah.- In a pretty, for real way,so let's get that figured out,and then this thing will run.You can see the proof.- All right, so I just went into the ECUand I attempted to adjustour base timing at idle.So hopefully it willbe a little bit closerto where we need to be,and hopefully it'll runa little bit better.(engine starts)Give it a little.Well, we gave it a little rev,then as it came back down, it shut off.I mean, not too sure beyond that,but I wanna make sure allcylinders are making heat.Rear two are a lot hotterthan the front two.What does that mean?- There is a chance thatit means we forgot to put gas in the car.- The most precious fluid of all.All right, we got some gas in there.Let's see if she actslike she wants to run now.- Let's see.- Let's find out.(engine starts)(engine vrooms)We technically got this car started,and we're one step closerto driving this thing every weekend.- Shredding the streets,and I think this thing ishonestly gonna be a load of fun.The engine is sweet.It sounds pretty cool as is,but it'll sound great once it's shredding.So as we've been kind ofharping on throughout,Pumphrey did a lot of researchat the beginning of thisand I did a little bit,which is important to makinga project go smoothly.And I think we had a lot ofI's dotted and T's crossed,but you can see that westill ran into some issues,and that's kind of how it's gonna go.- I mean, this is arelatively simple swap,but we did put a front-wheel drive enginein a rear-wheel drive car.That took a lot of little parts,little pieces to come together.The amount of research we did,the number of conversationsI had with peoplewho have done this swapbefore really helped out.And I can't wait to seehow fast we can do itthe second time when Ipulled the engine outto paint the bay.(laughs)- Well, thank you guysso much for watching.I hope you learned a thing or twowatching us slam thisengine into Pumphrey's 86.So if you did, makesure to like this videoand subscribe to the channel.And you can follow meon Instagram @Zach Jobe,follow Pumphrey @JamesPumphreyand Donut @DonutMedia.- And if you wanna seemore Money Pit episodesor just videos in generalfeaturing this caror any of the other carsyou've seen in the background,let us know, we makethese videos for you guys,and it helps to know(laughs) what you wanna see.- (laughs) Tweet us for real.(James laughs)All right, we love you.- I love you.I love you.I love you.(laughs)
