12 vdc vs 24 vdc-- 12 vdc wins

[Jones]

Since my 404.1 is no where near stock, I decided to go with easier to find electrical components. Finding a 24 volt headlight at your local parts house can be hard on you and your wallet.
Lurking under and behind the air compressor and power steering pump is the 24 volt generator.
Cleaned out, the cavity will now take a MOPAR alternator with room to spare, mocked up-- to be attached.
The alternator bracket was a piece of 4" angle and some scrap 3/16 plate and 3/4" round stock.
Two spacers go on the original studs and set the bracket out, giving it three point contact when you count the raised boss on the pan rail.



Update: Bracket painted and installed. Alternator installed. Next is a belt tensioning arm.

 

[Mogman]

What about the starter? I have never seen a 404.1 with power steering but for mine that I added Air-O-Matic steering to

 

[Jones]

The power train is a civilian motor out of a early 70s 300 SEL (MB's attempt at fuel injection replaced with a Unimog intake w/ single Zenith carb).
It's married to the Unimog bellhousing. The flywheel and crank were balanced so I can run the beefier Unimog flywheel, clutch and pressure plate.
Other little changes also had to be made; distributor location was moved from 300 SEL to Unimog configuration.
Because the MB fuel injection setup needed an electric fuel pump, there's no provision for a mechanical pump anywhere on the block, not even an unmachined boss. Solution: add electric pump and a fuel pressure regulator set to 2psi so the pump doesn't push fuel past the float and needle in the carb.

Starter off the 300 SEL was wrong from the get go so I looked into having the Unimog starter rewound, pricey but I figured it's a one time deal-- not something I have to have done everytime I change the oil.
In the meantime, a starter shop near me did some research and found an industrial application starter that looks right and is more reasonably priced.

As you may already know, a lot of people say this engine swap can't be done. For them, I employed the bumblebee's method of problem solving;
Any aeronaughtical engineer will tell you that the bumblebee is incapable of flight; that its wings don't have enough lift to get its body off the ground. However, no one has taken the time to explain this to the bumblebee so It goes flying blithely along, unaware that it's achieving the impossible.
Another ace up my sleeve is that I'm 80 and in 60 of those years as a machinist, fabricator, shade tree engineer, I've managed to pick up a trick or two.
My signature pretty much says it all.

 

[Jones]

Starter replacement.
After lots of checking dimensions and applications, I found a starter that's almost a drop-in. Turns out a starter for a bunch of '81 through '89 BMW models
will work. 12 v permanent motor with gear reduction. = more torque. Smaller and only about half the weight of the stock 24 v starter.
Because the nose is slightly smaller diameter on the new starter, I made an adapter to take up the space between hole in the bell housing and the starter bendix housing.
The flange keeps the adapter from falling through into the bell housing then on into the flywheel/pressure plate/clutch.


Other modifications are a pair of reinforcing plates that bolt on under the fenders.
"NO STEP" stenciled on and asking people not to use the fenders as a step turned out to be pointless so I just made these out of 1/4" thick plate.
Both sides coated with rubberized undercat so rust shouldn't be a problem.


Going with synthetic rope for the winch meant getting rid of the roller fairlead. Got this hawse fairlead whittled out of some 1" plate.
Except for having it hard chrome plated, it's ready to be bolted on.