TheSamba.com :: View topic

Sat Feb 25, 2017 12:38 pm

Oh we care. Some may not appreciate you efforts. But some do.
I like the way you have been documenting your tear down and look forward to your rebuild and all of it's challenges. There's always challenges.

I have only rebuilt (basically hung parts) 1 ACVW engine some 20+ years ago. I enjoyed the process and look forward to doing one in the future with much better attention to the finite details involved in building a long lasting engine.

Please keep up the great writing and pic posts as your engine progresses.

Good Luck.

Sat Feb 25, 2017 1:19 pm

I enjoy your thread! Looking forward to see more!

Sat Feb 25, 2017 1:24 pm

You removed the clutch pressure plate the right way.

Most times one can carefully use two large screwdrivers to lever off a flywheel.

8-dowel flywheels only go back on one way, the holes are not evenly spaced.

Sun Feb 26, 2017 5:02 pm

...and now the rest of the story.

The little flywheel dowels are good and tight. One comes out fairly easy (featured in the picture below as a reward for his loyalty). The others, however, require the firm encouragement of vice-grip pliers. The last one stubbornly demands a steady, but light, tap-tap-tap of a carpenter's claw hammer on the side of the vice-grips as I lean back with my foot on the case and a steady pull. But it comes slowly out (funny guy).

The main seal pops right out with a seal puller but be careful to catch the hook in the seal and not drag it across the soft magnesium block (this is me talking to myself as I try not to trash my case before I have a chance to get it to a machinist to find out whether or not my case is trash).

Then out come the flywheel shims...

There are, according to Bently, two springed plungers for oil pressure and oil cooler by-pass under some huge soft screws on the bottom of the case. DO NOT use an under-sized screwdriver Bently says (according to the Samba rules that is Bently shouting at me by the way). Finally, a legitimate use for my ridiculous red handled clown screwdriver! \:D/ I tapped on the handle of the screw driver with my hammer to relieve pressure on the tight threads while turning the screw driver and the screws rotated out without any deformation of the soft head. The plungers are easy to get out with a telescoping magnet.

Here's where the orange book really came in handy... I read it a few days ago and saw that there is a special spring retainer that can hold the cam followers in place while you lift off the right side of the case. They are dirt cheap. And I learned that you have to put the cam followers back exactly where they came from because they develop a wear pattern that mates with the particular cam lobe they are married to. I would have been dropping these out all over the place.

Can you feel the tension rise? Lets loosen the bolts! First the big ones in the middle, then all the little ones around the edge. Little bit at a time in a diagonal pattern... because that's always a good thing.

Oooooo... time for the case splitter. I put it in the oil pump hole (figured this part out myself. :D Its the on'y place it fits). Then turned the nut to press it out, and it works like butter.

Now will you just look at that!!! I kept going downstairs to peek at it all night... and the next morning too. 8) 8) 8) 8)

Mon Mar 06, 2017 6:46 pm

Cleaning, cleaning, cleaning. Ba humbug. :sleeping:

But here's a shot of the crank gears coming right off with the HF 3 prong universal puller that I had used on the flywheel. Worked great and the whole set of pullers cost less than the special crank gear puller that's out there.

Here's all the pieces ready for inspection... I wonder, what will I be able to save??? :-k

The answer, I believe, is little to nothing. First, here's a shot of the crank, which looks goofed-up to me.

Check this out - three of my rods are VW but one of them is some JBL odd man out. So no core exchange on this set!

Then there is the balancing... OR LACK THEREOF. The the lightest one is this

But the heavyweight odd ball is this

WTF is that? This motor probably shook itself to death. Poor thing.

The cam looks really good, but its a pre-70 three rivet rather than the 4 rivet that belongs in this case. Just need to match the oil pump properly if it specs out, because this 72 would ordinarily take a later style pump or something. The lifters (dubbers call them cam followers? Bently) have been ground before, so I'll need a set of those. The machine shop guy actually told me that part but I say it with smooth confidence and people think I know something about it.

Here's a pic of the case after purple de-greaser, power wash, repeat 3x, pour gas all over everything, more de-greaser, power wash, repeat, you get the picture. This was not just full of sludge, I know what that is. This was full of sticky black jelly that was like that green slime toy they had out when I was a kid but probably got pulled for causing cancer or something. This obscene snake-oil additive undoubtedly promised increased compression and the end of all leaks. When the last of it released its grip from the case it wriggled down the gutter, slipped into the sewer and surfaced through the floor drain a few houses down to crawl into the tail pipe of my neighbor's car to breed.

So the case, crank and cam are safely in the hands of the machinist for evaluation and (hopefully) revival. He said the heads looked good, and newer, so I brought those home to have something to play with.

Here's a picture of me cleaning VW heads in the snow. Its not as much fun as you would think really. Seems aluminum gets quite cold and does a number on your hands despite the latex gloves. It's more a game of hand to eye coordination because the fingers feel like they are four inches thick and are not providing much feedback other than screaming at you that you are a moron.

All told, hours this weekend were devoted to cleaning the carbon from not only the heads, but also cleaning the valves to a nice sheen. (scotch brite pad, wd-40, soft brass brush, monk-like meditation that enlightened me to just buy a set of heads next time).

I got to know each and every valve as an individual. I stopped just short of naming them. And thank goodness because then I read that the valves stretch or some nonsense and they should be replaced at intervals anyway. #-o So I ordered them up with some fresh springs and await their arrival! 8)

Thu Mar 09, 2017 6:36 pm

Hey my new valves came in and they are from Italy!!! That seems cool. German car, in America, with a case from Mexico and valves from Italy. Also, they seem much sturdier than whatever was in there. I have the stock diameter. Here is a picture comparing the exhaust valves. The new valve is on the right. See how much thicker the valve head is? It's the same deal for the intakes as well. I don't know a thing about it but figure thicker must be better?

Fri Mar 10, 2017 5:56 am

Buggeee wrote: Hey my new valves came in and they are from Italy!!! That seems cool. German car, in America, with a case from Mexico and valves from Italy. Also, they seem much sturdier than whatever was in there. I have the stock diameter. Here is a picture comparing the exhaust valves. The new valve is on the right. See how much thicker the valve head is? It's the same deal for the intakes as well. I don't know a thing about it but figure thicker must be better?

Are the new ones sodium filled? Verify they are the same length, diameter, etc.

Mon Mar 13, 2017 4:10 pm

Bashr52 wrote:
Are the new ones sodium filled? Verify they are the same length, diameter, etc.

Hey Bashr, my HF micrometer satisfies me that the new valves are the same diameter and length. And they fit great in the guides. As for sodium filled, I would be pleaseanly surprised as I only spent 40 bucks on the whole set of intake and exhaust. Here's a picture of the box if that tells anyone something.

With or without the sodium... They are going in! So to introduce the valves to their new home there is some lapping to do. Here are my supplies - some lapping compound (purple tube) and a lapping tool (wood handled suction cup stick) from Autozone, and some machine oil I had around.

I watched some Youtubers doing this on Chevys and such to get an idea of various ways. I popped the valve on the suction cup and put a small bead of compound around the edge. I put some oil on the valve stem and slid it into place being VERY careful about not getting ANY lapping compound anywhere, especially in the guides. Its like sand and jelly and would ruin the guides.

Then I spun the valve back and forth quickly but lightly. Then up a bit to pull in some the jelly from the edge and spinning again, quickly but lightly.

It was like starting a camp fire with a stick and some dry grass (which I have never done, by the way. Although I have started a camp fire with magnesium shavings and striking steel on iron to make sparks with a dollar gidget from Harbor Freight, impressing everyone who was 9 and under). So, basically a palm on each sit of the stick, sliding them back and forth to make it spin.

The compound has multiple sizes of grit within it. At first the sound and feel is a quite disturbing grinding crackle, crackle, crackle. Then, as the larger grit gets pushed out and the metal smooths it becomes a soft shhh, shhhh, shhh, kind of like a light sand papery sound. When you pull up to draw in the jelly it goes back to crackle then shhh again. I did this about a quick back and fourth five or six times, rotate the valve, back and forth, rotate the valve x 4 to be inexact. That was more than plenty. It is surprising how quick this worked. Some Youtubers were putting a drill on it and spinning that way. My advice , coming from someone who has no basis whatsoever to be offering advice on the subject, is OMG DO NOT USE A DRILL FOR THIS. You will destroy your stuff, this is so quick by hand.

So here is a pic of one of them done, with a light grey strip around the edge of the valve that mates to a similar strip around the inside of the valve seat.

I now pronounce you Valve and Seat. Because my valves are somewhat shy, they will not be trading partners and will be dedicated to their unique seat from here on out, as the mating surface is unique to each set. The pictured one is by far the widest strip. The others were varying degrees of narrower. It is my understanding that you just have to get a smooth strip that makes it around full circle but the wider it gets the less pressure per square micro millimeter - so this is a less is more situation to some degree.

P.S. Thoughtfully handle and clean that compound like its toxic, because it will destroy the valve guides, cylinder lining, you name it. I did one valve at a time, changed shop towels and gloves frequently with each step, and carefully wiped out everything fully and repeatedly with fresh towels, etc.

Mon Mar 13, 2017 4:29 pm

Looks good.

Tim

Mon Mar 13, 2017 4:38 pm

What happens if some of the compound gets into the guide or elsewhere? There must be some way of cleaning w/out causing damage...right..?

Tue Mar 14, 2017 5:09 am

vamram wrote: What happens if some of the compound gets into the guide or elsewhere? There must be some way of cleaning w/out causing damage...right..?
Exactly. It just has to be thoroughly cleaned. If it gets in the guide when you slide the valve into it though, it will scratch the surface of the guide in there. Then, when you are spinning the valve back and forth to grind the valve seat, the compound that got into the guide will be grinding more unwanted scratches into that. The compound is like Vaseline mixed with sand so it is very abrasive. I think this tube is water soluble. It can all be washed out afterwards if it gets places you don't want it. Everything I read said to be super careful about not slopping it around where you don't want it, and to make sure its all gone before assembling the heads and engine. The whole process was really easy to do. Apparently this can be used to freshen up the surface of used valves and seats as well to remove minor pitting and get a good seal again. In these bugs though I am told to replace at least the exhaust valves and they are really inexpensive so I went with a complete set.

Tue Mar 14, 2017 6:20 am

Looks good, thinking about the reassembly. When building the crank back up use flywheel as a holding fixture.Do not use loctite on rod nuts, next guy will thank you, use a hot plate to heat gears on to crank,easier and does not produce seizure marks forcing from a press. Don't waste money on fancy trendy sealants which work no better than permatex. Spend the time to balance the lower end. Many boys here think they need an engine stand, you can use a vise or even a trash can or a couple of phone books with cylinder studs out. Even then the whole thing can go together on a table, it is user friendly, people have done field repairs on the side of the road like this. Use the search feature plenty of info locked away here.

Tue Mar 14, 2017 6:01 pm

Looking good, dude! And I thoroughly enjoyed reading thus far. :)

Looking forward to seeing what the machine shop has to say and seeing it go back together.

Wed Mar 15, 2017 5:38 pm

In the upper right corner of my lapping supplies picture, above somewhere, you will see a blister pack of a complete set of springs, aluminum retainers and valve keepers or retainer clips or some other word to describe the maddeningly tiny half shells that slide onto the grooves in the valve stem. The cost for this complete set? You guessed it... forty bucks. Everything for a VW costs forty bucks by the way.

Now here is where I depart from stock. So a little side track is warranted in defense of my choice to go with a set of single, hi rev springs that have 166 pounds of springy rather than the softer stock ones that will be preferred by smarter folks than I, especially when I admit that I am sticking with the stock aluminum push rods and not bothering with a Gene Berg recipe shim under each spring.

Here is my flywheel on the weight watchers scale from BJ's (It's mine, not my wife's. It shoots a current through you and uses that to calculate bone density, body fat percentage, bmi index, etc. Modern marvel of engineering in my honest opinion and it shouldn't have run for more than a week at the wholesale pricing, but I digress...).

So 12.4 pounds means its a lightened flywheel. 8) The stock ones weigh 16 or 18 but I can't remember exactly. It was what came in the boxes of stuff that were packed into this shell, and this bug will see around town neighborhood bopping much more than long highway driving so this works out just fine. The lighter flywheel makes for quicker acceleration and deceleration at the expense of smooth sustained cruising. "Twitchy" is my interpretation of the pros and cons. I learned to drive a clutch and gears on motorcycles first, so some extra wind up at take-off to avoid stalling is not going to be a problem.

Ok what does that have to do with valve springs? Twitchy acceleration means I will drift into the high end of the rpm range once in a while, even if inadvertently. I also have a house full of mini-buggers that will learn stick shifting on this poor car, because nobody makes manual transmissions anymore and this will be the only example they will ever see. So, again, you can hear the missed shifts from where you are sitting I'm sure.

Missed shifts and high rpm excursions on soft stock valve springs equals valves floating. Picture riding your bmx bike off a wood ramp on the sidewalk. Now picture your valve floating off the edge of your cam lobe as it spins by too quickly for it to keep up. The valve slams into the seat just like your bike on the sidewalk. Also the valve timing is not following the cam at that moment so problems there too, like backfiring or whatever I suppose. Not good. The stronger springs will hold the valves to the cam lobes harder so they don't float at the higher rpms (this relationship is communicated from the valves to the cam lobes through the rockers and pushrods). With stronger springs, there will be more wear on the cam lobes and lifters, but I am spending that wear in exchange for some insurance against traumatic rides off the end of the bmx ramp.

If you're building a beefcake motor with some power, people go to stronger chromoly pushrods so they won't bend under the strain. Steel pushrods don't expand at the same rate as the aluminum, though, so you have to use different valve adjustment tolerances, called "loose zero" or something, and I'm not good at math. Super duper aluminum pushrods are available, but the cost for those is eye opening. Ok so stock push rods is what I'm living with and these aren't monster double springs, or a high lift cam so don't complain and just pray for me would you?

Talk much? Sorry. Here's a picture of a spring. I'm installing them with the flatter side down (right side in the pic) against the soft head and the less finished side with the sharper part (left side in the pic) facing up to be held safely in the retainer.

Here is a pic of me putting the o-rings on the rocker arm studs (deleted in later model heads so I don't know what they are for anyway). This is not necessary at this time, and won't be necessary until the heads are installed later, but it does give me an excuse to open the one-million part gasket set so I can loose some of the things that are in it.

Next I crumpled up some trash bags that were nearby and shoved them under the heads so the valves would be held in place when I put the heads down. Don't forget to put assembly lube on the valve stems before sliding them into place, they're new to this. Also, I put some light oil on the valves and seats so they wouldn't oxidize while the motor is sitting around.

I posed for this shot of using the bench mounted valve spring compressor to install the valve springs. It's not mounted to a bench but rather sitting loose on my basement floor. So in reality I had to basically sit on it while using three of my free hands to put the retainer in place and the little tiny clam shells you see littering the floor there. Those are tapered so they must be installed wider side up, and fit into the grooves in the valve stem, which is opposite of how they like to flop around in there. Have a tiny screwdriver handy to poke at them with and the assembly lube will help them stick in place so you can release the spring, allowing the retainer to rise up around them, holding it all together by tension.

And... Ta Daaa....

I stared at these for a while and then I went to bed with a smile on my face. :D

Wed Mar 15, 2017 5:52 pm

Nice work, I'm really liking this thread. Your writing style (at least for me) makes for a very enjoyable yet informative read!

Wed Mar 15, 2017 5:56 pm

Here is a little gratuitous note about checking the valve guides. The valve stem is not necessarily firm in those. There is the tiniest perception of play, but oil has to go in there and that is why it feels that way. When you slide the valve out, press the tip of your finger on the back end of the guide. You will feel the little bit of suck, or vacuum, created by the valve stem leaving the guide, and then you will know it is ok. If it doesn't suck, it sucks. There you have it straight from someone who is fakin' it. That's the basic idea I got from the machinist anyway. :bug_orange:

Also, I am glad you Samba peeps let me go on like this. People in the real world kind of glaze over if I start buggin out. :wink:

Thu Mar 16, 2017 4:42 am

If your retainers realty are aluminum, I wouldn't use them. IF you want something lighter (which you really don't need on a stock setup anyway) go titanium. Other than that, stick to steel...

Thu Mar 16, 2017 5:55 am

Bashr52 wrote: If your retainers realty are aluminum, I wouldn't use them. IF you want something lighter (which you really don't need on a stock setup anyway) go titanium. Other than that, stick to steel...
Thank you Bashr. Nice that people read this and also chime in if something odd jumps out at them!

I don't need anything lighter, these aluminum retainers are simply what came in the package with the springs and keepers. At your prompting here I ran a quick search and found a thread discussing them.

https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=259488

Seems they can "pull through" even with a stock motor? Supposed to watch for wear at short intervals? I'm not keen on any of that and aluminum retainers don't provide me with a benefit in this application. Looks like I'll be sitting on the bench-unmounted valve compressor again. I should just mount that thing and have a talking point in my work area for coffee discussions on Holidays.

So I saved the stock steel retainers that I took out. Ill just swap those back in? I would imagine they don't really wear much and the new little keepers that came with the springs are probably universal no? :-k

Ignorance is bliss until you're sitting on the side of the road wondering what that loud clanking sound was. Thanks again.

Thu Mar 16, 2017 5:44 pm

The end of the world has been delayed. The aluminum valve retainers have been swapped out in favor of the original steel ones. In the process, however, I learned that precaution has to be taken with the bench mount valve spring compressor. See these metal blocks on the base of it? They hold the head from sliding around when you compress the valve spring.

But those are sharp corners on there. Here is a picture of the little nick it left in the compression area of my head. See just above the exhaust valve in the picture.

There is a matching nick above the other exhaust valve, and again on the other head in both spots because I did not notice until after I finished them both. There is no doubt in my mind that the mounting of this tool to my bench may have helped to avoid this. :roll: Still, to do it again I would use a cotton towel or something more protective to stuff under the valves rather than kitchen garbage bags. Hopefully this message in a bottle that is the Samba helps someone avoid this minor frustration.

I guess I'll have to clean up these nicks with some sandpaper or something before I install the heads, but that is for a later day. For today, the valve retainers are steel again and I can relax.

Oh, and I've been holding out. The case and some other things are back from the machinist and I have some good news there. But first I have to load my rocker arm pics so things go in order. Plus, I have to wash out the metal dust or whatever from the case before I get to play with it. It will be 41 degrees far. on Saturday, a perfect day to play in the driveway with the power washer (man I can't wait for summer!).

Thanks again Bashr, very cool heads-up there.

Thu Mar 16, 2017 10:05 pm

Hope the heads are okay!