I am in the middle of swapping a 96 ej22 into my new project a 99 OBW MT that had the god awful 2.5D in it. Everything is going well, I luckily had an egr 2.2 manifold to install on my motor so I can do the egr fix, but I have ran into a minor problem. The 96 motor is a phase 1 block and the transmission is a phase 2 block. The phase 1 transmission housing had a stud for the lower starter mount, but the phase 2 has a bolt going into the engine block. Now that I have the ej22 in I can't bolt down the lower starter bolt, do I need to drill and tap the block or tap the transmission housing or will it be okay with one bolt holding it in?

I last did this a couple years ago by tapping the transmission hole to M12x1.75 and got a bolt from lowes about 1.5" long. Had to slightly enlarge the hole in the starter, but it worked great.

 

If you have a helicoil kit you can helicoil the hole in the trans for an M10x1.5 bolt.

 

I've seen people cut the head off an M10 bolt, stick it in the hole with JB weld and let it dry, then use a nut and flat washer.

 

Just about anything will work just to hold the starter as long as the upper bolt is there. It doesn't have to be super he-man strong.

Nice, that's what I thought, I wish I had tapped it while the engine was out. Oh well I'm not going through that again, I think I'll try tapping the transmission hole.

Its easy. Aluminum is soft, and the tap wont be taking all that much material out anyway.

There's nothing to drill into in the 4-bolt block. The casting doesn't include a pad to drill/tap that hole into.

 

For what it's worth, there's no torque translated through that bottom bolt (or the top, for that matter), all the torque from the starter is put into the mounting flange. The bolt just keeps it in place.

I've driven 3 ej22 swapped cars and all of them have been missing that bottom starter bolt with absolutely no issues. It's kind of a hot topic, but as long as you have the mating surfaces clean, make sure the starter is perfectly seated and the top bolt is tight, you're gonna be fine without a bottom.

 

Otherwise you have to put a timesert or something like that into the hole in the transmission for a bolt.

x2. Just be sure that it's nested in there right and that one starter bolt is good and tight and just drive it.