HOW TO: ATX Swap / Replacement WITH PICS

[illinipo]

hahaha no nawz dude, my cams and tune cleared the bank! Its gonna be an autocross machine for years to come

[Dcl2049]

Hah, I hear you. Welcome to the disease.

[Burnin_ruberv8]

Now that's called Do-It-Yourself!! looool

[avengerc4]

damn!!! Nice write up!

[Lil PZEV]

Added to the how-to archive. Nice job!

[EnixIV]

Well I just did my own swap, and boy was it a pain in the rear end! The dealership not having parts was my biggest problem, so all in all it took about 6 days to complete. Woulda taken 4 if I had the parts I needed, but the axle seals took me almost all day due to the transmission still being in the car and not having access to a tool that was the exact perfect size to push the passenger side seal in with it mounted in the car :(

DId it all by myself too, but Im in the military and we have access to a hobby shop with almost all the tools I needed...

I will never do this again, next time I'm paying someone to do the swap as it cost me about 250 bucks parts and bay space time all together, not too mention 6 days of my life lol.

NIce write up though, would have done one but camera broke and I'm glad you already gave everyone something to go off of :)

[uncle tail]

the lug wrench to free the DS axle is a stroke of genius, like you said, popped right out.

[TerryB]

Digging this up from the archives. Anyone know how much fluid is lost from an auto tranny when the axles are pulled ? I may attempt an axle change this weekend.

[S1N1STER]

Bringing this thread back from the grave!. I found this site thanks to this post and Google search. I'm in the process of pulling the transmission out of my wifes '04 Focus Se w/ the 2.0 DOHC. It decided to take a poo after about 100K miles... pulled the pan and it was full of metal shavings and chunks of metal.

The pics/info has helped out a lot. I have a Ford Technical Information Systems disc for the Focus that details a transmission removal step by step but seeing 'real world' photo's has been of great assistance. This is the first FWD vehicle I've ever messed with so definitely a learning experience! I'm up to the point where I need to find a brace to attach the motor to while the transmission is being removed. I have yet to find one though :(.

It's pretty darn hard to find a low mileage replacement transmission for this thing! I 'think' I've found one from a junkyard in VA but have yet to see it in person to access what inside the pan looks like. If anyone has suggestions for other places to search beside E-bay or Craiglist, that'd be awesome.

Again, thanks to the OP for the write-up! I would take pics of my swap but I'm doing it solo and trying to bust this out ASAP.

I may have to hang around this forum a bit and see what else I could tinker w/ on this 4 banger

[amc49]

I'd be leery of using the 3 point engine support shown in the pics. They work great on other Fords but that radiator support is thin sheetmetal reinforced with plastic. It will give way and crack underneath if enough weight put on it. Note how the OP remarked about the support starting to give way. Look at the underside of one and you'll see why. I've got a support like that one that I used on a Contour which has all metal radiator support. If/when I do one of my Focus, I will probably be removing enough parts (grille?) to be able to lean the front support against the main crossmember under bumper cover, that's plenty stout.

When tearing down that far it's kinda silly not to change the engine rear main seal while you're there.