but first let's talk about the stinky stuff!
Space is so limited with the LS3 going into the FrankenBoxster that both the power steering pump and the water pump have to go! - there is no physical space left in the engine bay to put these guys in - much less get a drive belt to them.
So.... what can we do? Convert it to ELECTRIC!
There is actually a kit out there (that is mega-bucks!) to convert to electric, but I chose to take a tip from the EV world. There is a big community of folks that love to take cars and convert them to electric vehicles (EV). My brother Fred has done 3 cars to date; an Austin Healey Bug-eye, a MGTD replicar, and he's just finished a Porsche 944. The hot ticket in the EV world is to take the electric power steering assembly from the last Toyota MR2 series and use it as the basis to fabricate and adapt to your own application. As you'll see in the photos, it is all combined into one reasonably sized unit - pump, controller, reservoir and rubber isolation mounts. The controller electronics allow input from the vehicle's TSS sensor to vary the pressure the system generates to ensure consistent steering feel and to reduce the current drawn by the unit at higher vehicle speed.
Fabricate mounts, fabricate hoses and wire it up!
So one electric pump down, one to go!
Stayed tuned for our next blog - water pump!