Awesome man!

Looking forward to seeing your build come together. I am mulling over a diesel build right now, and I am going to be watching with interest!

 

Thanks Dirty Offio. This has been a long time in the making. I found a bunch of K03's, so hopefully I'll be able to pull one next week. The Jeep has been down for the past week to do the clutch. The internal slave had a small tear in the boot that was allowing clutch dust to get into the hydraulics and was gumming up the master cylinder and letting it bypass internally. The previous master siezed due to that. Now it's got an external set up and all new seals in the trans and transfer case. It should be back up and running tomorrow when I finish buttoning everything up.

For anyone interested, the dimension from the back of the Jeep 2.5L to the face of the flywheel is 1 7/16th. When I build my flywheel adapter, that's the measurement I need to keep.

Joe

 

Are you upgrading to the ax15? Or keeping the ax5?

Your flywheel distance is different between the two

Ken

 

As of right now, I'm keeping the AX5. I'm searching for a Dakota bellhousing to run the AX15. The flywheel is practically new and all the clutch parts are all brand new, so I want to try and retain as mamy stock parts as possible to keep cost down. HPI makes their VW TDI kits work with the stock AX5, and have had good luck. I have to send them an email to see realistically how well it stood up. I'm not expexting it to last forever, but it gives me a baseline to start making parts.

Joe

 

Sounds like a plan. Your kubota once turboed will put out almost twice the torque of the 2.5l. I have had a couple people ask me to make an adapter for this,basically the same as gm metric pattern.

The ax5 is basically the same as the toyota g54. The two can be swapped with bellhousing and input shaft swap.

I just worry the torque will kill them if mistreated.
Good luck on the build.

 

Yup, it's got the GM 60* V6 pattern. I was considering a T5 with the Chevy bell housing, but even my diehard Chevy fan boss said they're not that great in 4X4 applications, unless you convert a WC T5 to run a transfer case, which is apparently a massive headache. And the AX5 is similar to the W series too, if I remember correctly. There was someone on Pirate that made it work, but the only way to swap input shafts is to pull the entire trans apart, which is a bit outside my comfort zone. And then there's the problem of transfer cases. The Toyota is passenger drop while the NP231 is drivers drop. I could run a Dana 300 with an adapter clocking/flip ring, but I just pulled my case apart to reseal it and it was immaculate inside. No signs of wear or abuse.

While I admit I get a little carried away with the 2.5 now, I'm pretty careful not to beat on anything. No 5,000 rpm clutch dumps or slamming through gears like a drag racer. This is my only car, so I can't have it fail on me during the year when I'm in school, so I have to be gentle....ish. Sometimes the 20 year old in me has to show a little

Joe

 

I am not saying to swap to the toyota just stating they are basicly the same. I make a toyota already. I may make the 2.5 kit but use the stock kubota flywheel and starter.not sure yet. I have alot of things in the works and this has been back burnered for a while. I had at one point did all the drawing etc for this bellhousing

 

I getcha. I liked the Toyota trans because of the Marlin upgrade parts, and the fact that the Toyota guys beat the daylights out of those transmissions and they never break a sweat. I was thinking the input shaft swap would be like on the heavy four speeds or NV4500 where you pull the bearing retainer off and simply pop out the input shaft.

I might put in a call to Marlin and see if they make any parts for the AX5. Does anyone know what actually breaks in them, besides the fifth gear retaining clip? Everyone just says they're weak and leaves it at that. I'm just exploring different options.

Joe

 

I have read that you can chip the reverse gear with wheel spin and sudden traction. I have no experience with the ax5 though. Just one of the things i read

 

I can't help but chime in, but if I was going to have to spend $$ on any transmission or custom adapters, I vote for upgrading to a 6 speed. Based on my experiences, more gears the better with this motor. We are asking quite a lot out of a small displacement and having a 6 speed trans in my 1000 lb. heavier rig makes a HUGE difference. Seems like a no brainer if you're going to have to go any great lengths to make what you have work.