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1UZ-FE Tuning and Mods Adaptronic, porting, air intake and more.

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Unread 04-11-2009, 08:17 PM
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Default Making a Custom Bellhousing

I just mean to help people realize what they might be getting into. Being prepared is important.
There are a couple people that are selling bellhousings for that application - or at least they are saying that they can sell them. I haven't seen one in use yet. Maybe there is one being used? I don't know.

Making a bellhousing from two = money spent on two bellhousings to make one.

You need some special tools and need to know how to use them to make one bellhousing from two. To make them mate up correctly takes a lot of measuring and double checking and thinking ahead. The fabrication of this is much more difficult.

Making one from steel = hard to find center cone but simple fabrication and easy welding.

If you can just find yourself a steel center section large enough to enclose the standard clutch and flywheel you will have the hardest part done. They are expensive as I have only seen whole bellhousings for sale. I don't know where to get just the center section. Then you just make a small plate in the shape of your transmission and then a big plate for your engine. Weld them to the cone center section and you're in business with a must stronger piece.

Both methods - Cutting the aluminum pieces to fit them together will take a few hours. Having the steel pieces cut out will be cheap and take just a few minutes by a machine.
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Unread 04-11-2009, 08:33 PM
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If someone is making a bellhousing for you that they stand behind I would buy it. Making one is extremely difficult to get perfect.

You can make a steel bellhousing much easier. There are tons of people in all areas that can water cut or plasma cut out the steel plates you need for the front and back. Then the center section is just a matter of finding one with a diameter large enough to enclose your clutch/flywheel. If you can do a little CAD for the end plates that would be good. The labor to have them made would probably run $200-300 if you took them templates or took them your engine and transmission. Then they would but them out for probably $100. The steel will probably cost you at least $100 for the front and back plate. The center section/cone will be $300-$400 new - but maybe $150-200 for a used one. You might want to find someone with some fab experience to do the welding and measuring to put it together. This can be high or low of course. Depends on where you find the person. Make friends with some people that fab or like to make trucks - welding and construction will be much cheaper. A steel one would be as strong as you would ever need.

Aluminum - You would need to buy each of the bellhousings - however much that would be.. $300? Then cutting them is tricky and time consuming. Once cut they need to be milled perfectly flat and some material removed depending on your measurements. Welding them together will take a very expensive welder and someone that really knows how to use it. This is the hard part and much more expensive than steel.

Either process will require you to have the engine set up next to the transmission connected with the clutch and flywheel installed between them. Then you will have to do the measuring. It's much much easier to measure and cut the steel pieces to make the bellhousing. You could leave the engine and transmission set up in the garage and then make a bunch of markings and take notes. Then you could take it to a welder to have him weld them together according to your markings. Tack weld them and take em back to your engine to fit them together to make sure the bellhousing is what you want before he welds them together for good.

Chances are that the welder will not want to bring his welder to you... especially the aluminum welder. But I don't know if you can do the welding or what your space is like that you want to do your fabrication in. I'm just talking.
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