CONVERTING 871 ENGINE IN AMT CALIFORNIA HAULER TO A 871T

[JARRNO88]

  I just bought a AMT PETERBILT 359 CALIFORNIA HAULER reissue and I am starting to collect a lot of reference photos etc. off of the web before I start building it.  I see that it has a DETROIT 871 engine in it and I would like to convert the engine to a 871T .  From the photos of the  DETROIT 871T That I have seen it shows that A turbocharger will be placed on top of the engine and the air compressor gets mounted on the rear of the engine instead of being driven by a belt.  I was  wondering if anyone else has done this, and if there is enough room  between the rear of the engine and the firewall on the 359  to do this. If I don't have the room I won't waste a lot of time looking up information about the 871T and I will just build it with the engine that came with the kit.  thanks,

                                                                                                               JARRNO88

[DRIPTROIT 71]

If I'm not mistaken, in the old 359 kit the compressor is belt driven off of the rear accessory drive. I don't think that I would change any of that. The simplest conversion would be to get the manifolds, pipes, turbo set up and probably blower out of the AMT Aerodyne cab KW. The reissued Papa Truck would be a good source. If you can't source those parts, you would have to scratch build them. Scratch building the manifolds may prove a little tricky. I've never personally converted one exactly this way, but it shouldn't be much trouble. I've made a homemade rear turbo set up on one, but you won't have room for that.

Hope this helps,

Brian

[plastic trucker]

I think Double Take Replicas has the parts to convert it to a turbo.

[TheSDTrucker]

As far as the air compressor, it doesn't seem to matter. I've seen a lot of air compressors on the 71 series that are mounted on the rear gear drive of the engine. I don't think I've ever really seen a belt driven compressor on one but I do know they exist. I know a lot of them had a rear mounted belt driven alternator. I'm putting an 8v71T in my AMT Freightliner, but I used a 92 series as a base and changed some of the features to make it look like an 8v71T rather than an 8v92T.