Unimog 404 engine swap

[GreenGiant]

I've seen some pretty tempting deals on clean, used 404 Unimogs on the internet. I'm a little concerned that a 2.2 litre gas engine in a 6,000 lb plus truck might be a tad performance deficient. What other engines have been substituted with success? A larger Mercedes diesel,such as an OM617 comes to mind. Perhaps a powerful and easily obtained American V8 would suffice. Any ideas? I was just imagining a wicked 'Mog with a built Chrysler 440...2 four barrels...maybe a blower...big tires..running over one of those sissified fake H2 Hummers. What kind of monster 'Mog could be built using one of those $7500 specials and a welder?

[therrera]

I put a Ford straight six in my welding rig using a third party adapter. The swap took a lot of tinkering, but it worked. The added horsepower gave my rig the ability to hold speed on the road regardless of grade. Before I would have to drop down to fourth (second in normal street use) when climbing a grade on the freeway. Now I can leave it in 6th all the way. There is NO speed increase with such a swap as the MOG is geared so low that what you get is more torque, power.

Hope this answers some of your question.

-Tony-

[coachgeo]

therrera - 2/4/2004 3:27 AM

I put a Ford straight six in my welding rig using a third party adapter. The swap took a lot of tinkering, but it worked. ...-Tony-

The third party adapter is no longer available unless someone bought out the guy in Canada that made them. Last I heard that is not the case.

Therrera can you start a thread on your rig. I've seen lots of questions about the ford transplant but could not provide any answers.

PS Mine has the 617 turbo installed.

[coachgeo]

GreenGiant - 7/13/2003 6:46 PM

I've seen some pretty tempting deals on clean, used 404 Unimogs on the internet. I'm a little concerned that a 2.2 litre gas engine in a 6,000 lb plus truck might be a tad performance deficient. What other engines have been substituted with success? A larger Mercedes diesel,such as an OM617 comes to mind. Perhaps a powerful and easily obtained American V8 would suffice. Any ideas? I was just imagining a wicked 'Mog with a built Chrysler 440...2 four barrels...maybe a blower...big tires..running over one of those sissified fake H2 Hummers. What kind of monster 'Mog could be built using one of those $7500 specials and a welder?

If your not highway driving then the 2.2 is fine. It is made for offroading. That is why nearly every military in the world used the UNIMOG. If you want highway you can bump it up a little. butttt..
The tranny then limits you. Think TRACTOR.

Mog tranny is low geared and putting high HP thru it destroys it and keeps the the axles pushing the envelope of design. More bound to fail that way. Little more HP and wise pedal ussage seems to work fairly well though. Mine has hte Turbo 617 MB you mentioned swapped into it. (125hp vs 80something horse). There is a kit to do this but it is spendy. (aprox. $2500 USD) 617 has to be rotated slightly to shoe horn it into the 404. V8 wont fit without major modifications to body. (as in scrap the body and retrofit something else.

If you swap trannies too you have to retrofit the whole suspension cause it is part of the drive line. Torque tubes (enclosed drive shafts) are the third link in the Unimogs three link suspension. It aint no normal machine. You have to completely throw out convintional thinking when it comes to tweaking a mog.

Might I suggest you comb the archives here and the archives over at Pirate4x4.com. Lots of answers to these questions. .