fiat 850 engin swap how do i do it??

reaally wanna put a sr20 t in my fiat ,but dont no how, mid mount or front mount dont knowplz help.

Abarth made a version with a Fiat twin cam engine. You might want to google it to get a few ideas.

Sr20? That is going to be a scary fiat.. they weigh next to nothing to begin with

That sounds like an absurd amount of engine for a car that size/weight. I mean, I like absurdity of that variety as much as anybody, but...

What do you want to use it for? Street? Autocross? Drags?

How are your fabrication skills/tools/resources?

What's transaxle/transmission availability for that engine? I'm not sure it'll fit transversely in the rear; might be too wide... That's between you and a tape measure.

I bet you've put some thought into this, so what do you have so far? If you want to put it in the middle, it looks like you're building at least a rear subframe. To put it in the front... An entire chassis, I would think, and I still think you're going to have some packaging issues. Would you have to push the firewall and driver back to get the engine behind the front wheels? I don't know if there's room for an engine between them...

Check out Ditchdigger's 850 Berlina for something awesome without having to hack it to bits and start over...

I agree that it would be kinda too much engine for that car and a bit scary. It wouldn't be a swap, it would be building a whole new car. While that can be a fun project too, I think many people would benefit by putting down the torch and plasma cutter and looking at projects like Ditchdigger's fiat (IMO one of the more impressive builds on here) to see what can be done by improving whats there rather than trying to start over completely and never finishing anything.

850's with PBS engine conversions to fit the 124 engine wind up being moderately fast cars with extremely poor handling. Putting that modern Nissan engine in there (provided you ever could make it work, and I doubt that) would result in a truly terrifying vehicle, and not in a good way.

Sell the 850 and try that with a 124 instead. There's a long list of reasons why the Nissan engine won't work, and the fact the 850 engine spins the wrong way is only one of them.

Spinning the wrong way shouldn't be that much of an issue though, should it? Any modern-ish 2L engine is going to make mincemeat of the original transmission in no time at all anyway.

That said, I'm also in the bad idea camp unless you want to build a silhouette car with something like a properly engineering spaceframe underneath and the Fiat body on top. But in that case, why not go the whole hog and make molds from the Fiat and clad the frame in fiberglass?

a Silhouette car could be cool.. looks like a stock fiat on the outside.. but goes like a bat out of hell.

I bet an Sr20 in a 124 would be very cool too.. or an X1/9

The key to an engine swap in an 850 is to use a VW transmission. Once that is in with the help of kennedy engineering you can bolt pretty much anything to it. But what would actually be a good choice? Rotary? Hell no. Way too heavy and with a 6 gallon tank you ain't getting far with one. Aircooled VW? It is done a lot but mostly for drag cars. The one that piques my interest is the G13B.

The stock motor weighs ~150lbs ( i will place it on a scale tonite when I pull the new motor off the stand....by hand)

The stock motor does respond well to boost I can tell you that!

Rotary too heavy? What sort of rotary were you looking at, out of curiosity?

Good point re the tank, though...

Fiat does know how to build engines.. even their smallest were rev happy and much more powerful for their size.. and with proper tuning, giant killers. Look at what Abarth did over the years

I drove a Fiat 850 Spider to a 3rd. place out of 7 Spridgets in an autocross. They are peppy and decent hanling little cars.

ransom wrote: Check out Ditchdigger's 850 Berlina for something awesome without having to hack it to bits and start over...

Whoa. Hadn't seen that one yet. I voted him up..

Actually this

http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/reader-rides/820/

Is my proper readers ride page. It was accidentally marked as sold so I started a new one and then Tom was able to bring the old one back.

BoxheadTim wrote: Rotary too heavy? What sort of rotary were you looking at, out of curiosity? Good point re the tank, though...

All the info I was able to find had complete 13B's listed at around 300lbs.

Watching with great interest.

My co-worker was given (GIVEN!!!) a 1967 Fiat 850 Spyder. So far he's had to put some new ignition stuff, and a caliper locked up on em, but overall he's enjoyed it.

Its in barn-find condition, although it was driven often until a year ago. He's got a 25 mile commute and wants to drive it some to save some fuel in his explorer. I told him to forget that, since it will probably break down given it's age. I didn't mention anything about it being Italian.

I'll be sure to pass along that 850 Berlina to him, that thing is killer! Vote up!

A covered headlight spider for free! Damn other peoples luck. Those things are trading for real money these days.

They are a pretty damn buzzy at 55mph but they get eerily quiet past that. The stock 2bbl carb is pretty much a lump of crap and it will struggle to do better than 40mpg. With megasquirt I hit 60mpg with much better performance. The single barrel weber 30ICF will give 50+ mpg at the sacrifice of 7-8hp up top.

the idea is to chuck out the rear seats and build a subfame to support rear suspensension out of an e36 bmw and fit the motor facing forwards. would be used for oval track racing. the only problem i see is gearshift linkage. suspension in thefront might be a hassle aswell seeing as the wheels are going to lift for sqaut.

A turbo three cylinder from a Chevy Sprint might work in there - nice and light, reasonable power.

Why not get an X1/9 and mount the engine transverse? Or some datsun thing and mount it in the front? I still cant see that turning out as a usable car.

Initial question, again. What are you going to do with it?

Wait! Rear seats? Are you talking about a coupe or sedan? If you were planning on destroying a spider and oval tracking it I would be all for it but if it is one of the others I gotta beg you to stop. There are only around 24 sedans left in the US and maybe 100 coupes. These are rare cars that will be worth something soon.

If you must hack one up make a list of what you are removing so that it might help keep others on the road.

Be aware guys, it appears he's from South Africa, the only place crazier that Oz!!

Oh! ok then. Never mind.

ditchdigger wrote: Actually this http://grassrootsmotorsports.com/reader-rides/820/ Is my proper readers ride page. It was accidentally marked as sold so I started a new one and then Tom was able to bring the old one back.

Voted up on that one as well. Nice build!