I always liked how the Savvy had rigid mounts at the frame and the isolation at the transmission. Getting that to work out cleanly without robbing clearance is no small feat.
Nothing I need, everything I want (2005 TJR, impact orange)
- Thread starter psrivats
- Start date
I always liked how the Savvy had rigid mounts at the frame and the isolation at the transmission. Getting that to work out cleanly without robbing clearance is no small feat.
This one is a bit more tedious than normal. There is not enough front to back space between the front of the Atlas and the back of the Rubicrawler to bolt up the trans mount adapter and then the OEM transmission mount because the holes overlap. The adapter bolts up into the bottom of the RC like stock, but the transmission mount goes over studs and then nuts hold it up to the adapter. Had to get creative with countersinking some flat heads and welding them in to turn them into studs sticking down.
I think we need to start a petition to get Blaine to consider changing the name from BMB to WMB (W for white) because "black magic" has connotation of using superpowers for evil and selfish uses .. and what Blaine does is the opposite. He uses his powers to make something exemplary not for himself, but for others. Case in point (and grab a chair and your favorite drink), the transmission mount and the cross member he's built for my orange jeep.
I am not even exaggerating here when I say that looking at the final finished items you just have a "How the F was that done?" question. Without him showing some intermediate photos, me going, "You got 'splainin' to do" and him humoring my curiosity, I most certainly would be left scratching my head. Or worse, not even notice or appreciate just how much thought and energy that went into the work. Stuff like this what makes me really smile because more than just the technical parts, and despite the lack of explicit and intentional beautification/ornamentation, there is a certain "form follows function" charm to Blaine's work (in contrast to "form follows precedent") here that is just really nice to see.
I will start with the transmission mount. Given the nature of most normal auto shops, and how little they understand (or care) even the seemingly normal stuff, Blaine wanted to design a mount to bolt up to the Rubicrawler and accept a stock transmission mount with zero changes to the stock mount, The idea is that any shop doing maintenance can readily change the mount in the future when required. However, this was not trivial to accomplish. Blaine explained the challenge very clearly in this post -
The clever solution he came up with is a 2-part mount, comprising of a base (that attaches to the rubicrawler), and then another mount bolting to the base (which accepts the OEM trans mount). Below is how all of it goes together ...
First is the transmission mount adapter base that attaches to the rubicrawler.. the sides are 1/4” x 2” to stop any chance of failure. It bolts up to the trans mount location on the Rubicrawler, like in the photo below. Notice there are 4 holes, 2 for OEM bolts and 2 for countersunk flatheads. First, the 2 regular bolts install to locate and hold it up but not tightened down.
Then the flatheads are put in, and fully tightened ..
Then OEM bolts are removed.
Ahead of time, Blaine had already custom designed an adapter that attaches to the base in the above photos. The adapter has studs with countersinks on the top side and flat head screws stuck in flush, and then tig welded around the edge on top so the screws cannot spin. The OEM transmission mount will mate to this adapter, and once the nuts on the studs are tightened, they will pull studs down into the countersink (so the welds only have to prevent spinning until the nuts are tight).
Below photo shows how the adapter attaches to the base. The connection between the base plate and adapter plate is made very strong, with 4 bolts through the sides (pink arrows) and the two OEM bolts that were removed earlier after installing the base.
Notice the fitment of everything .. and there is a very nice element of long range thinking here that will become clear shortly if you cannot spot it yet. I certainly did not till Blaine told me .. I will wait for @sab or @Mike_H to perhaps spot and comment before revealing it
With all that White Magic™ done ... the transmission mount bolts up to the adapter just like OEM.
Now ... ask yourself this question - How was this design process done? From adapter mount down, or from transmission mount up?
I am not even exaggerating here when I say that looking at the final finished items you just have a "How the F was that done?" question. Without him showing some intermediate photos, me going, "You got 'splainin' to do" and him humoring my curiosity, I most certainly would be left scratching my head. Or worse, not even notice or appreciate just how much thought and energy that went into the work. Stuff like this what makes me really smile because more than just the technical parts, and despite the lack of explicit and intentional beautification/ornamentation, there is a certain "form follows function" charm to Blaine's work (in contrast to "form follows precedent") here that is just really nice to see.
I will start with the transmission mount. Given the nature of most normal auto shops, and how little they understand (or care) even the seemingly normal stuff, Blaine wanted to design a mount to bolt up to the Rubicrawler and accept a stock transmission mount with zero changes to the stock mount, The idea is that any shop doing maintenance can readily change the mount in the future when required. However, this was not trivial to accomplish. Blaine explained the challenge very clearly in this post -
The clever solution he came up with is a 2-part mount, comprising of a base (that attaches to the rubicrawler), and then another mount bolting to the base (which accepts the OEM trans mount). Below is how all of it goes together ...
First is the transmission mount adapter base that attaches to the rubicrawler.. the sides are 1/4” x 2” to stop any chance of failure. It bolts up to the trans mount location on the Rubicrawler, like in the photo below. Notice there are 4 holes, 2 for OEM bolts and 2 for countersunk flatheads. First, the 2 regular bolts install to locate and hold it up but not tightened down.
Then the flatheads are put in, and fully tightened ..
Then OEM bolts are removed.
Ahead of time, Blaine had already custom designed an adapter that attaches to the base in the above photos. The adapter has studs with countersinks on the top side and flat head screws stuck in flush, and then tig welded around the edge on top so the screws cannot spin. The OEM transmission mount will mate to this adapter, and once the nuts on the studs are tightened, they will pull studs down into the countersink (so the welds only have to prevent spinning until the nuts are tight).
Below photo shows how the adapter attaches to the base. The connection between the base plate and adapter plate is made very strong, with 4 bolts through the sides (pink arrows) and the two OEM bolts that were removed earlier after installing the base.
Notice the fitment of everything .. and there is a very nice element of long range thinking here that will become clear shortly if you cannot spot it yet. I certainly did not till Blaine told me .. I will wait for @sab or @Mike_H to perhaps spot and comment before revealing it
With all that White Magic™ done ... the transmission mount bolts up to the adapter just like OEM.
Now ... ask yourself this question - How was this design process done? From adapter mount down, or from transmission mount up?
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Oh, sure - put me on the spot. I'm not a trained seal that performs on demand - especially before coffee!
I'm not seeing Mr. Blaine's strateegery... Mike_H, all the pressure's on you now, my friend. 
That's an ingenious way of solving the problem of overlapping mounting holes.
I think we need to start a petition to get Blaine to consider changing the name from BMB to WMB (W for white) because "black magic" has connotation of using superpowers for evil and selfish uses .. and what Blaine does is the opposite. He uses his powers to make something exemplary not for himself, but for others. Case in point (and grab a chair and your favorite drink), the transmission mount and the cross member he's built for my orange jeep.
I am not even exaggerating here when I say that looking at the final finished items you just have a "How the F was that done?" question. Without him showing some intermediate photos, me going, "You got 'splainin' to do" and him humoring my curiosity, I most certainly would be left scratching my head. Or worse, not even notice or appreciate just how much thought and energy that went into the work. Stuff like this what makes me really smile because more than just the technical parts, and despite the lack of explicit and intentional beautification/ornamentation, there is a certain "form follows function" charm to Blaine's work (in contrast to "form follows precedent") here that is just really nice to see.
I will start with the transmission mount. Given the nature of most normal auto shops, and how little they understand (or care) even the seemingly normal stuff, Blaine wanted to design a mount to bolt up to the Rubicrawler and accept a stock transmission mount with zero changes to the stock mount, The idea is that any shop doing maintenance can readily change the mount in the future when required. However, this was not trivial to accomplish. Blaine explained the challenge very clearly in this post -
The clever solution he came up with is a 2-part mount, comprising of a base (that attaches to the rubicrawler), and then another mount bolting to the base (which accepts the OEM trans mount). Below is how all of it goes together ...
First is the transmission mount adapter base that attaches to the rubicrawler.. the sides are 1/4” x 2” to stop any chance of failure. It bolts up to the trans mount location on the Rubicrawler, like in the photo below. Notice there are 4 holes, 2 for OEM bolts and 2 for countersunk flatheads. First, the 2 regular bolts install to locate and hold it up but not tightened down.
View attachment 555460
Then the flatheads are put in, and fully tightened ..
View attachment 555461
Then OEM bolts are removed.
Ahead of time, Blaine had already custom designed an adapter that attaches to the base in the above photos. The adapter has studs with countersinks on the top side and flat head screws stuck in flush, and then tig welded around the edge on top so the screws cannot spin. The OEM transmission mount will mate to this adapter, and once the nuts on the studs are tightened, they will pull studs down into the countersink (so the welds only have to prevent spinning until the nuts are tight).
Below photo shows how the adapter attaches to the base. The connection between the base plate and adapter plate is made very strong, with 4 bolts through the sides (pink arrows) and the two OEM bolts that were removed earlier after installing the base.
Notice the fitment of everything .. and there is a very nice element of long range thinking here that will become clear shortly if you cannot spot it yet. I certainly did not till Blaine told me .. I will wait for @sab or @Mike_H to perhaps spot and comment before revealing it
View attachment 555465
With all that White Magic™ done ... the transmission mount bolts up to the adapter just like OEM.
View attachment 555457
Now ... ask yourself this question - How was this design process done? From adapter mount down, or from transmission mount up?
Sorry to disappoint...I'm just not that smart. I can only hazard a guess about maybe marking those brackets so someone coming along later would have some clue that the two flange head nuts have to be removed to expose the flatheads...I can see some wrench jockey not knowing how its put together and getting a HUGE prybar out and popping the threaded bosses off the rubicrawler.
Regarding your last question about top down or bottom up, I'd say it was designed from the trans mount up.
I think we need to start a petition to get Blaine to consider changing the name from BMB to WMB (W for white) because "black magic" has connotation of using superpowers for evil and selfish uses .. and what Blaine does is the opposite. He uses his powers to make something exemplary not for himself, but for others. Case in point (and grab a chair and your favorite drink), the transmission mount and the cross member he's built for my orange jeep.
I am not even exaggerating here when I say that looking at the final finished items you just have a "How the F was that done?" question. Without him showing some intermediate photos, me going, "You got 'splainin' to do" and him humoring my curiosity, I most certainly would be left scratching my head. Or worse, not even notice or appreciate just how much thought and energy that went into the work. Stuff like this what makes me really smile because more than just the technical parts, and despite the lack of explicit and intentional beautification/ornamentation, there is a certain "form follows function" charm to Blaine's work (in contrast to "form follows precedent") here that is just really nice to see.
I will start with the transmission mount. Given the nature of most normal auto shops, and how little they understand (or care) even the seemingly normal stuff, Blaine wanted to design a mount to bolt up to the Rubicrawler and accept a stock transmission mount with zero changes to the stock mount, The idea is that any shop doing maintenance can readily change the mount in the future when required. However, this was not trivial to accomplish. Blaine explained the challenge very clearly in this post -
The clever solution he came up with is a 2-part mount, comprising of a base (that attaches to the rubicrawler), and then another mount bolting to the base (which accepts the OEM trans mount). Below is how all of it goes together ...
First is the transmission mount adapter base that attaches to the rubicrawler.. the sides are 1/4” x 2” to stop any chance of failure. It bolts up to the trans mount location on the Rubicrawler, like in the photo below. Notice there are 4 holes, 2 for OEM bolts and 2 for countersunk flatheads. First, the 2 regular bolts install to locate and hold it up but not tightened down.
View attachment 555460
Then the flatheads are put in, and fully tightened ..
View attachment 555461
Then OEM bolts are removed.
Ahead of time, Blaine had already custom designed an adapter that attaches to the base in the above photos. The adapter has studs with countersinks on the top side and flat head screws stuck in flush, and then tig welded around the edge on top so the screws cannot spin. The OEM transmission mount will mate to this adapter, and once the nuts on the studs are tightened, they will pull studs down into the countersink (so the welds only have to prevent spinning until the nuts are tight).
Below photo shows how the adapter attaches to the base. The connection between the base plate and adapter plate is made very strong, with 4 bolts through the sides (pink arrows) and the two OEM bolts that were removed earlier after installing the base.
Notice the fitment of everything .. and there is a very nice element of long range thinking here that will become clear shortly if you cannot spot it yet. I certainly did not till Blaine told me .. I will wait for @sab or @Mike_H to perhaps spot and comment before revealing it
View attachment 555465
With all that White Magic™ done ... the transmission mount bolts up to the adapter just like OEM.
View attachment 555457
Now ... ask yourself this question - How was this design process done? From adapter mount down, or from transmission mount up?
Excellent work explaining my convoluted thought processes of arriving at a solution I was finally happy with. There are a few missteps there that I would correct on the next one. The base plate doesn't need 1/4" side rails. I was thinking it needed to be 1/4" and got lost on it needing that in the final. Reality is I could have used 1/8" for both but my vision lost focus as to what the final would look like because I was concentrating too much on solving the overlap problem and the fact that I did not fully check the material for the base plates before I cut it up. The upper one wound up being slightly bowed which was irritating me. I fixed it later by converting the rear two studs to flange bolts on top of the base plate so when the rearmost transmission mount studs have the nuts tightened onto them, it sucks both plates together.
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It is here. When we clamped the outer rails up to the inner that was built first, we put a 20 thou shim in the form of a strip of material between the inner rails and the outer to create a small gap between them before we welded. I'm going to send this stuff out for powder coat and that adds a pretty good film thickness when you get it on both sides that will butt against each other. To save myself from having to sand off the PC on at least one face or having to beat them into submission, I built in a powder coat gap. I do the same when I have powder coated corners landing on top of powder coated backers for rock rails.
Oh, sure - put me on the spot. I'm not a trained seal that performs on demand - especially before coffee!
That's an ingenious way of solving the problem of overlapping mounting holes.
I can always send you more coffee
Both of you still run circles around me!
That huge pry bar scenario isn't too far fetched from the reality of what happens in shops
source: YouTubeOddly coincidental to what I'm doing right now. In fact, I was in Machinery's Handbook a short time ago getting tolerances for hex bolts in order to have some laser nut washers made. Since I don't like to do research every time I do something, I made a spreadsheet for future reference (notice the fifth column):
psrivats, I think you're giving Mike_H and I too much credit - it would take some clairvoyance to see what Mr. Blaine did there! Great thinking ahead!
I didn't have any .010 shim stock.
I have a box of feeler gauges that have been scavenged over the years for shim stock. Cheapest way to keep a supply on hand.
I only have 2 feeler gauges and the only reason I have 2 is so I can check to see if a rotor is centered in a caliper saddle. I protect them dearly since they give me info I can not get with any other method. I won't be welding near them.I have a box of feeler gauges that have been scavenged over the years for shim stock. Cheapest way to keep a supply on hand.
And that is exactly why I have a box of them. I built a lot of motorcycle engines over the years, and they don't have hydraulic lifters. I'd fab something, use the feeler gauges as spacers, and then buy a new set because the gauge I used got molested!
I can always send you more coffee
Both of you still run circles around me!
That huge pry bar scenario isn't too far fetched from the reality of what happens in shops
You better qualify that Sri...I might know my way around a shop but when we start talking about electrons...That's my cue to tap out!
And, yeah...No way would I have gotten there about the paint gap thing. No way in heck.
I have dual, 27" monitors with plenty of resolution. Now that I know what's going on, I can see the gap at the top. Before I knew to look for it, it didn't stand out...not because you build things crooked, but precisely the opposite. I'm not expecting to find anything like that, so I'm not looking for it. Its not so obvious that it stands out to me.
It's time for the crossmember!
Here is the the finished piece - ready to drill and mount into the rig. It's a thing of beauty. This crossmember has several design elements from Blaine that are absolute treats ...
If you look at the TJ frame, it angles near the skid plate ..
The cross member follows the shape of the skid. When Blaine bent the cross member and designed the flanges, he cut the ends at two angles, one to follow the angle of the frame and then the second on the end for the mounting flange so it would end up parallel to the eventual bottom flat section of the skid.
A straight edge on the ends, left side and right side , showing how even things are side to side.
He then made the matching frame side flange that is nicely welded to the frame .. and 3 bolts connect them together on each side. This pic below shows the final installation showing how everything looks at the finish, but of course, getting everything situated exactly where they needed was not trivial.
This was the process to get to the final pics above ..
The crossmember was first bolted up to the transmission mount with the mock up crossmember piece holding it up. This was used to figure out the height for the final setup, and it looked like shims totaling about 3/8” in thickness were needed to put the case up where it needs to be height wise. Blaine split that into 2 pieces each 3/16” thick, one on top of the trans mount and then one under the trans mount. These are shown with green arrows below. The reason to split the shims was the studs from the 2-part trans mount from earlier would have been too short if all the shim was at the bottom.
After the shims were welded in, the crossmember was installed to correct height again. Then the frame brackets were clamped in place, tack welded, and then drilled in place through the holes in the flange on the crossmember.
One very nice piece of detail work on the recessed holes in the crossmember. Blaine sized the holes were by fitting impact socket inside them to ensure that no special tool would be needed to remove the nuts on the transmission mount. Blaine cut pieces of tube, stuck them in the holes, welded around them and then ground them flat. Below is the end result .. the amount of work that went into making what seems simple from the outside just blows me away.
With all the care taken to make sure the heights are exactly what they needed to be, we ended up with ample space at the top of the Atlas case (yellow arrow) and no chance whatsoever of the t-case contacting the tub. You can fit your entire palm in there easily.
After finishing all this up, Blaine started on the belly skid .. and that will be a separate post since the spectacular work there deserves it's own post!
Here is the the finished piece - ready to drill and mount into the rig. It's a thing of beauty. This crossmember has several design elements from Blaine that are absolute treats ...
If you look at the TJ frame, it angles near the skid plate ..
The cross member follows the shape of the skid. When Blaine bent the cross member and designed the flanges, he cut the ends at two angles, one to follow the angle of the frame and then the second on the end for the mounting flange so it would end up parallel to the eventual bottom flat section of the skid.
A straight edge on the ends, left side and right side , showing how even things are side to side.
He then made the matching frame side flange that is nicely welded to the frame .. and 3 bolts connect them together on each side. This pic below shows the final installation showing how everything looks at the finish, but of course, getting everything situated exactly where they needed was not trivial.
This was the process to get to the final pics above ..
The crossmember was first bolted up to the transmission mount with the mock up crossmember piece holding it up. This was used to figure out the height for the final setup, and it looked like shims totaling about 3/8” in thickness were needed to put the case up where it needs to be height wise. Blaine split that into 2 pieces each 3/16” thick, one on top of the trans mount and then one under the trans mount. These are shown with green arrows below. The reason to split the shims was the studs from the 2-part trans mount from earlier would have been too short if all the shim was at the bottom.
After the shims were welded in, the crossmember was installed to correct height again. Then the frame brackets were clamped in place, tack welded, and then drilled in place through the holes in the flange on the crossmember.
One very nice piece of detail work on the recessed holes in the crossmember. Blaine sized the holes were by fitting impact socket inside them to ensure that no special tool would be needed to remove the nuts on the transmission mount. Blaine cut pieces of tube, stuck them in the holes, welded around them and then ground them flat. Below is the end result .. the amount of work that went into making what seems simple from the outside just blows me away.
With all the care taken to make sure the heights are exactly what they needed to be, we ended up with ample space at the top of the Atlas case (yellow arrow) and no chance whatsoever of the t-case contacting the tub. You can fit your entire palm in there easily.
After finishing all this up, Blaine started on the belly skid .. and that will be a separate post since the spectacular work there deserves it's own post!
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