A few cuts here and there, I've removed one of the sump ribs and the area that the starter will foul on. And it looks as if, with a bit of work, it'll fit.

I will need to time sert the block to make it happen and take approx 10mm out of it to clear the starter solonoid.

So after doing a bit of recon work in the wrecking yard without success I decided to give the wifes car a few overdue presents and then went back out to have a look at the CR. I took to the sump with a hacksaw but it was slow and painful, So I cracked out the rotary hacksaw... I don't know if you guys have used one of these bad boys before but it is basically a 'cut anything' saw blade that goes into your 4 inch grinder. After a couple of grabs I should have backed off but me being me I put my foot to the floor and had what I might call a 'near fatal incident'. The blade grabbed and went for an unshedualed walk into my stomach. I honestly thought that with the impact I was going to need an ambulance. I did my best to get out of it's way but I wasn't fast enough. To give you an idea of how close I came have a squiz at this.

The blade caught the cord as I was flexing out of it's path.




It went clean through my shirt but stopped just as it caught my skin. If the blade hadn't caught the cord I don't think I'd be typing right now. I'd most likely be in surgery.




A close shave... naturally I pressed on with the job. But instead I used a slightly less dangerous sabre saw.

will be great to see how you go revhead, will be waiting with anticipation

I was pretty impressed by the fuel economy of the Micra, I hired one from Budget in Preston (for work) drove it to Bayswater and back (71kms) and it took about 30 minutes to get to the Eastern along Hoddle, so the traffic wasn't good, coming back was alright. I could only get 4.11L of fuel in it at the servo next door before I returned it. That's what 5.78 L/100km with 20 minutes bumping in traffic.

I dont know how you got "gearset" from "input shaft" in my post? but it was to show that the HR15/16 engines share the same boxes and therefore if you look at the parent sister Renault they also use the same boxes and engines yet label them differently. The point is if they make a north/south rwd config we could be in luck if not then its a big challenge with all FWD alloy engines Nissan released.

to get in the U2ltr IP class you need a 75mm destroke cr12 same for Ma12s
required but the m10et comes with all the turbo gear needed to same money.
Available at jap wreckers locally sometimes and lighter again with 8 valve
hemi style head. Then theres the MA09ERT supercharged turbo 930cc perfect
for other states where under 1600cc IP classes are raced unlike in Vic.

Heres a link to show the Ma engine starter has the same position issue
http://blogs.yahoo.co.jp/garages600/58174371.html

Either way its an great project and love to see the chess moves keep it up.

The conrods and pistons are something else that I want to investigate as I would love to destroke it to 1150cc for an under 2L compeditor. The motor is available in Japan as a CR10DE and a CR12DE. Not available in Australia but I dare say it will be somewhere.

I'not going to worry about the mounts until I get to it. You're right that the spacings are far apart but the sump also has a mounting boss or 2 each side and it is relatively small for an engine. In fact. The CR14 is nearly 15mm overall shorter in crank length than the A series.

I should point out that I am aiming at mounting this into a 1000 but I'm sure a 1200 shouldn't be too far from different.

And don't those conrod caps look so much like A series ones?

Will have to be very creative to make a set of mountings too. There's holes but they are oddly placed and on the exhaust side very far apart. Not impossible though.

Well yesterday I did hit my first starter motor snag. Although I have always intended to cut away some of the die cast sump as you may have noticed by the blue texta marks, but once I removed the sump and fitted up the backing plate I found that becaust the engine uses a through bolt at tha A series starter position, the solonoid of the starter fouls on the block.




Now at this stage I'm not worried about this snag. One option is to shorten the alloy boss on the block and tap it for a time sert (like a helicoil only better) and hopefully goin my access there. But as it is a structural part of the block I want to avoid cutting into any needed material. If this turns out to be the case then I'll explore the possibility of either a different gearbox like a CA or evenwelding a new boss onto the bell housing. Most likely another box as the whole idea of this project is to make it affordable and easy enough that anybody could potentially have a crack at it.

So I'm off to the wreckers today to have a crack at finding a flywheel. And I might start grinding the sump too.

One of the things that concerns me at the moment is the clearance around the main caps. As you can see it has a crank girdle incorperated into the main caps. From the sump measurements it does seem that i may have to raise the engine by 1cm possibly, those ribs at the rear are hollow and are strengthening for the sump as it applies some of the torque through it. I will be disposing of most of the lower section of the sump and retaining as much as possible.

As for the sump bowl position chris, it's nearly perfect. But it is about 2cm back from where it needs to be. My first thought was to cut and weld an alloy winged sump bowl to it but that may pose a problem as 3 of the sump bolts are removed from under the pressed tin bowl. Still not an impossible ask to get past. I already have a few ideas on that one too.