drive shaft angles etc?

I've been playing around with some design changes to my composite AE86 corolla since I have a miata parts car.I'd like use the suspension bits from the miata to graft to the corolla,part of the change includes which driveline to use and more importantly where to put it. 1st option would be to relocate my current turbo'd 4ag back to clear the front mounted rack of the miata and simply build a new driveshaft to mate to the miata rear end. 2nd option would be to take my 4ag and hook it to an mr2 trans and mid mount it. 3rd option would be to go to a bike powered set-up and plunk it in the passenger floor,this could be done 2 ways as well.I could transverse mount it and run a chain drive,this means $$$$ chain drive diff which I'm not able to afford.I could turn the engine north/south and drive off the countershaft with easily obtainable drives meant for kit cars-if I did this the engine needs to moved over towards the passenger door quite aways as the bike engines lean quite a bit and I'd never get the drive sprocket in line with the rear diff. Long winded explanation but my prefered option is the last,any ideas if having the driveshaft that far off center up front would cause vibrations?.Hate to go thru all the trouble and then run into a major problem. May be a dumb question but could a CV shaft be built instead of a universal jointed driveshaft?.

Thanks for any ideas,experiences or opinions offered.

All you would need to run a CV is the appropriate flanges on your diff input and trans output. CVs are much better than u joints when you get to increased angularity for a few reasons, in your case packaging would probably be the most important of those. Another option is a double cardan joint, which allows for lots of angle and is very robust, but it's a bit trickier to package with common parts. This might help:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_joint
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Constant-velocity_joint

Do you have any idea what kind of angle you'd need it to tolerate? That will directly affect what your options are. 10° is no biggie for lots of off the shelf stuff, 40° is going to take some expen$ive $tuff.

Another option is to use a bike(ish) engine that packages better. Have you looked at snowmobiles, jet skis, etc.? Some of those have pretty light, powerful engines too...usually related to their motorcycle cousins from the same family (Yamaha, Honda, etc.). Some even have divorced engines and transmissions, which would allow more options with your engine/trans locations and options.

Bryce

I have no idea, but I can't wait to see it.

I think you should do what ever will result in the slowest car. How about a 2.5 iron duke mounted well ahead of the front axel.

Bike engines work better in a RHD configuration. Is that a plausible option? I can probably help source a RHD Miata steering rack if you want, but you'll have to move the mounting points on the subframe. Easy enough.

I'm thinking option 2 sounds pretty good - a lot of it should be fairly easy, too. What would option 1 do to your shifter position? How far would you have to move the engine - and could you simply find a new oil pan to deal with the different rack location? The rearward shift in the engine position would have some other benefits of course.

I don't know anything about AE86s other than they're good for delivering tofu.

Thats some good answers quick.

Goals are to get as light as possible,my iron block 4ag with the supra transmission and custom steel adapter plate all add up-makes some good power but the cars still too nose heavy.Moving the engine back is the easiest way to attack it as the shifter is plenty forward as is,lightens the front but does bugger all for weight overall. Same kinda thing with moving the engine to the rear,still a heavyish engine so even with a front mounted fuel cell it'll now be rear heavy(I've driven a couple MR2's,not sure I like the pendulam effect of the rear weight at transitions). Going to a bike engine will drop about 250lbs pretty easy I think,more importantly it'll do a great job of centralizing the main mass of the car so fighting the left side heavy would be a thing of the past.It's easy enough to do paddle shifters and electric shift,-11,000 + rpm shifting with the hands on the wheel is appealing to me. Not sure about the amount of angle,I'm kind picturing angling the engine so the shaft would be square to the engine but angled to the diff.

In reply to Keith:

More thinking on the subject and maybe your right about going right hand drive-suppose I could get used to it.Wonder how many times I'd go to the wrong side of the car to get in before I remembered? How hard would a rhd rack be to obtain?,cost?.

I intend to not use the original crossmebers anyways since I'd like to do custom A-arms and relocated pivots so the rack mounts no problem.

I can check with my contacts in the UK for a Miata rack. Power or manual? I have an unpowered RHD Escort rack in my garage.

You can use a rear steer rack flipped upside down with a front-steer spindle to convert to RHD as well, if my brain is working correctly.

In reply to Keith:

Non power would be best,my head hurts trying to comprehend the flipping rack statement.:)

I'm I missing something or wouldn't the drive be on the bottom(or at least angle sharply down) and plenty awkward to hook to the steering column?.

Depends on how the rack is mounted to the car. In many cases, they're tubular so you can rotate them. Or, if you're building the subframe, you simply design your brackets to hold the rack as you want it!

In reply to Keith:

Thanks Keith,I'll keep working through potencial problems as best I can before I start down the road of no return.Need to get the summer out of the car before any real changes occur,also have to find and build my wifes new ice racer as well-so many projects so little time.