Thanks for the kind words everyone. I've been brainstorming the last couple of days on how I'm going to do this. A lot of ideas have come to mind already. Another reminder (to myself) that it's best not to jump into things too quick or I'll lose out on all the great ideas this valuable mind continues to churn out if only I'll give it time --
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KubotainNH: I've come to conclude that the modifications will consist of making the wiring work together (not that hard), addition of a fuel return line to fuel tank (fuel injection requires circulating fuel), adding a fuel transfer pump, making a little room in the frame rails and fabricating a new engine mounting plate, installing a new pulley and electric PTO assembly as the new block has a slightly larger diameter shaft and then after all is OK, make the hood work. The belt interface (as opposed to a bellhousing/shaft) is very forgiving and it's merely a matter of setting engine at correct location (otherwise, I'll need to get different length belts, don't know how hard that'll be to locate) and finally getting new engine set up to run.
IXLR8: I paid around $1k for this motor. The list price of new ones are $3,656.00 but I've also seen brand new ones floating around from various vendors for around $1700 that apparently were OEM'ed for Husqvarna turf care products and could be had if desired, in quantity. I've also seen them as high as $3200 so you do need to check around. I wouldn't be suprised to see someone snatch up the rest of these and charge a lot more to repower some older tractors with blown engines but otherwise good working condition. I had mulled the new vs. old thing but decided that since my tractor is already 10 years old, putting a used engine in @ 1/2 the cost was more practical. The other thing that steered me this direction was that this was a working demo already pre-wired and connections labeled. Was told that the new ones have no documentation/instructions with it and no tech support so I shyed away from that. If it works the way I envision, I won't hesitate however to recommend this swap.
jcims: Good interesting link but 4 wheel drive, Two 600hp motors for a total of 1200hp in the size of a small japanese economy car and ONLY 10.96 in the quarter, well, I'm not overly impressed.
