technical question on engine removal

When removing a 2.0 turbo engine do I need to remove the transfer case. Can I just unbolt the transmission and the engine mounts?
Thanks

The engine removal process is slightly different between 1g and 2g, since the motor mount placement is different. ;) But in general you need to drop the transfer to get the tranny down before removing the block. I have heard of people with 2Gs leaving the tranny in though since 3 of the 4 mounts are on the tranny (1g has 3 of the 4 on the motor, so the tranny has to be out). You also need to get to the rear bolt (12mm head) that goes the opposite direction of all the other. Through the block, threaded into the tranny. Its above the Tcase. If you just remove the 5 tcase bolts, and drop it to the ground without letting the driveshaft slip out, all of the fluid will stay inside. Install is the reverse of removal. It only takes 5 minutes to drop the tcase, probably less time than it took me to type this reply :grinno:

Good luck.

I have taken the 5 transfer case bolts out and it doesn't want to budge. My manual shows two different pics of transfer cases, one with an extra bolt. Mine doesn't have the extra bolt but something is holding it on there. Are there also bolts that hold the engine to the transmission that you cannot get to unless this is dropped? And do I understand properly that the tranny has to come out to on my 1G?
Thanks

The shaft going into the tcase can stick in there pretty good. You need to pry the tcase off without breaking the tranny casting. I twisted that shaft once inside the tcase. I wont tell you the horror story of getting that thing off ;) There is a bolt above the tcase you need to get at, as I already said in my last post. And yes, as I said earlier, the tranny should come out before pulling the motor. I suppose you could leave it in with a jack or something under it. But I dont see the point, the only thing keeping you from remeving it at that point would be the axles (they slide out), reverse light switch plug, speedo cable, and the shift cables (cotter pins). I've never heard of anyone with a 1g pulling the motor with the tranny still in the car. I've certainly never tried it myself. ;) Although I am going to try that with my own 2g car next week...

Right again! The transfer case slid off with a little work. The engine is now supported with the cherry picker but the transmission won't come off more than an inch from the block. I pulled so hard that the car went sideways on jack stands (It didn't fall over unfortunately- if it had I may have just called my insurance agent and wrote it off!). How much of a gap needs to be between the engine and the transmission for the two to slide apart? Am I being an idiot? I'm tempted to bolt the transmission back together and pull it all but I am so close I hate to do the extra work. Any comments? Thanks

Right again! The transfer case slid off with a little work. The engine is now supported with the cherry picker but the transmission won't come off more than an inch from the block. I pulled so hard that the car went sideways on jack stands (It didn't fall over unfortunately- if it had I may have just called my insurance agent and wrote it off!). How much of a gap needs to be between the engine and the transmission for the two to slide apart? Am I being an idiot? I'm tempted to bolt the transmission back together and pull it all but I am so close I hate to do the extra work. Any comments? Thanks

Its a ton easier to remove the tranny WITH the engine attached , than to try to seperate the 2 first. To effectively seperate the tranny from the engine , you'll need to have the input shaft CLEAR of the outer edge of the pressure plate , which will require a good 4" of room. There just isn't that much sideways room in a 1G engine bay. Every instruction manual I've ever seen for DSM's says that the engine and tranny be removed together. I don't know about 2G's , but I would suspect they are the same.

On a 2g, the end case of the tranny is under the frame on the pass side. I dont see how you could easily remove them together. The tranny will come off. The key is to have the angle of the motor right. Try lowering the motor so the tranny can slide out further. We usually drop 1g trannies in 1 hour or less. ;) But poeple do remove them together on 1Gs...

You can get the tranny out of a 1G, it just takes alot of moving around to get the angle just right. Getting it back in makes taking it off look easy. Its alot easier to take the engine and tranny out together. I unfortunately know that because I burnt the rings on my evo III 4g63 and got stuck putting in a POS JDM, then I had to take the tranny back off because I tried to put my centerforce on the stock JDM flywheel (thanks for helping me figure that out by the way).

I finally got that engine out of there and wanted to say thanks to the people that gave me pointers. I did take the engine and tranny out together. I should have done it that way first in the best interest of saving time, but it's out. Fortunately for me I can still look foward to some fun when I put the engine back in there. Thanks Again!