Before bolting the engine and trans together, I decided to pull the heads off and clean up the top end. I had the machine shop take off a previously-unheard-of-but promised -safe 0.030" from the heads. This bumped the compression up into low 11s. Additionally, I added a rather stout camshaft (~0.600" and ~230°@0.050" with 110° separation) and matching valve springs. This combo alone is said to make 450 - 470 hp at 6800 rpm. Truth be told, anything over 400 hp is gravy to me.
With the motor together, it was time to bolt the engine and transmission together. The pieces from Kennedy are a work of art. I felt bad knowing that I'd be the only person to ever see the craftsmanship that went into the flywheel on this adapter. Absolutely stunning!
For the clutch, I bought the SPEC "stage 3" that is supposedly good to 500hp. However, this comes with a solid clutch disc since the Porsche M96 engine uses a dual mass flywheel. Martinsink was fortunate enough to have his clutch disc replaced with a sprung hub, but I wasn't as sharp and didn't realize this was an option. I decided to roll the dice and try the solid disc out (spoiler, it's fine. A sprung hub would be easier to drive, but the unsprung is totally manageable.) On a side note, buying the clutch through a third party vendor saved me almost $300 verse the option price from the kit supplier.
STEP 4 - PREPARE THE CHASSIS
This step isn't for the faint of heart. Up until now, everything could have been undone. This was the moment of no-turning back. The biggest and most nerve racking part of this process is cutting the frame channel at the bottom of the firewall. This frame channel is used for the front motor mount in the original engine configuration. To make room for the engine and accessories, this must be removed. Additionally, the firewall access panel / hole needs to be significantly enlarged to accommodate the new engine. This means that the original engine cover will never be used again.
