ive been thinking about this for a while

[Will]

V-drives are pretty expensive, and I would not bet on them surviving long in a vehicle.

I think you should go high-tech. I saw a couple wrecked Odysseys on Ebay.

What I would do, buy a whole vehicle that had been rear-ended, take everything off and put it inside the bed of your lowered truck. It would look like an Indy Car motor when you raised the tonneau. These are easily capable of 300hp without any work at all. I'm having trouble finding a picture of the motor without the big cover, but it's a cool looking motor. The intake is aluminum tubing which would polish up nice. Another good thing about it is they have the best automatic tranny in a vehicle--it doesn't use planetaries, it uses countershafts and such like a manual tranny. And you would get something like a 4.63:1 rear end in the transaxle with a very loose converter and a huge overdrive. It would be very quick in a Ranger. The main thing is how to lock the steering up because I would use the suspension too, towers and everything--which you would have to build like they did in the picture.

 

[wrecking-crew]

ok......now im confused. im not used to hearing so many technical words. my brain hurts

 

[littleme13]

what you want is a ford 460 mated to a c6 4x4 trans bolted to a np205 with a clocking ring. mount it backwards in the bed. the front output will become the rear. twin stick the 205 to allow for rear wheel drive only. clock the 205 to sit as low as possiable. then match the rearend by shortening one side and lengthening the other(custom shafts will be needed. for the front, mate a viscus coupler to the rear output and run a driveshaft to the front end. yes the 205 is heavy but it puts enough weight in the middle to give the front end more grip.

 

[rurouni20xx]

both of those ideas are interesting i like the reverse transfer 460 idea, but instead of custom shafts id simply put a 4wd front end in the rear and run torsion rods from the steering hubs that the tierod ends went in to the front to help stabilize the rear end. that or you could have the first ford quadra steer...lol. the front wheel drive to rwd powerplant is interesting as well. i have a question, was the awd twin engine thing done years ago on the suzuki escudo pikes peak rally car? it had two turbo 6 cylinders one in front and one in rear, that made for an awesome awd rally car, if we were looking for awd would that work?

 

[wrecking-crew]

what you want is a ford 460 mated to a c6 4x4 trans bolted to a np205 with a clocking ring. mount it backwards in the bed. the front output will become the rear. twin stick the 205 to allow for rear wheel drive only. clock the 205 to sit as low as possiable. then match the rearend by shortening one side and lengthening the other(custom shafts will be needed. for the front, mate a viscus coupler to the rear output and run a driveshaft to the front end. yes the 205 is heavy but it puts enough weight in the middle to give the front end more grip.

yea that.

 

[Wicked_Sludge]

will, locking the steering for FWD suspension-to-RWD suspension would be as simple as converting the old tie-rods to suspension links. leave the outer tie rod end bolted to the knuckle and simply weld a hiem link in place of the inner tie rod ends. weld the hiem mount to a place on the subframe in sync with the lower control arm and call it a day.

the reverse mounted 460 idea sounds a little sketchy to me. the front transfer case output is not as strong as the rear and i dont know if i would trust it on the street on a regular basis...particularly with big-block torque levels.

another option is a mendeola transaxle. most commonly used in dune buggies and the like, its a longitudinal engine transaxle. they are way tough and highly adaptable:

 

[rurouni20xx]

beetle trans!!! i was wondering what they were called, the gearing on those is awesome, but i dont know what engines can bolt up to them...most of the ones ive seen actually were the bellhousing and such, so finding one for like a 302/351/429/460 or something may be out of the question. finding one that would tho would be awesome... isnt that the same thing they use on formula one cars?

 

[Will]

will, locking the steering for FWD suspension-to-RWD suspension would be as simple as converting the old tie-rods to suspension links. leave the outer tie rod end bolted to the knuckle and simply weld a hiem link in place of the inner tie rod ends. weld the hiem mount to a place on the subframe in sync with the lower control arm and call it a day.

How about a solid rod, bolted to the frame, replacing the rack?

 

[Wicked_Sludge]

like i said, the mendeola is highly adaptable. ive seen it bolted to everything from an LS1 to an SHO.

i dont know what F1 cars use

EDIT:

How about a solid rod, bolted to the frame, replacing the rack?

sure, as long as the rod is stabilized. you could even cut the ends off of your rack and weld them to the rod so the tie rods would attach to it using the factory inner tie rod ends.

 

[rurouni20xx]

i was digging thru car designs yrs ago (cuz i wanted to build a buggy one day in the future...) and stumbled across the f1 design, i liked the suspension setup as it would keep the shocks out of the way of mud etc, so i designed a frame similar to it via photoshop, i have the drawings at the house. i seen that tranny and it reminded me of the photos i seen of the rear suspension, i was wondering what kind of tranny it was, now that i look at it its a bug tranny basically.

this is the f1 rear suspension i was talking about and i think i see that style tranny in there, this is coupled w/ a benneton v10.

 

[littleme13]

i think the 205 will hold up fine, look at the rock crawlers that use them in the rearengine buggys i can think of one in preticular that is basicall exactly what i described but with rockwell front loader axles and 49s. i dont want to link to it due to im not sure if ill get introuble or not.

 

[Wicked_Sludge]

it would be fine for a rock crawler or mud truck that rarely sees 2wd. but for a vehicle that spends any appriciable time on the street, i just dont think it would work well.

 

[littleme13]

i c where your coming from Wicked, i wonder how long it would hold up?? have to do some digging to see if there is any real world results for it.

 

[bobbywalter]

what you want is a ford 460 mated to a c6 4x4 trans bolted to a np205 with a clocking ring. mount it backwards in the bed. the front output will become the rear. twin stick the 205 to allow for rear wheel drive only. clock the 205 to sit as low as possiable. then match the rearend by shortening one side and lengthening the other(custom shafts will be needed. for the front, mate a viscus coupler to the rear output and run a driveshaft to the front end. yes the 205 is heavy but it puts enough weight in the middle to give the front end more grip.

what? gonna use portal axles?
or just drive around in reverse?

 

[littleme13]

aaahhh thats minor stuff, there is ways around that.