My 1966 Beetle rebuild

[supercub]

Today I drove the VW for the first time this year. Still running good. It might be a little slower with the new tires, but it was hard to tell because it was really windy this afternoon and I was driving into a lot of headwinds in open areas. I'm not totally ready to put it into daily service yet though because my apartment complex is still very salty, and they are showing a chance of snow later this week, so who knows what the highway department will do. VW weather isn't too far off!

[supercub]

The VW is out! March turned out to be a real bummer weather-wise. It snowed at least once a week with a couple of 8-9 inch accumulations. Naturally they spread tons of salt. Friday it rained really hard for a quite a while, then snowed a little bit Saturday morning, but it didn't stick. Roads looked good after it dried, so I swapped the Grand Marquis for the VW, hopefully for the rest of the season. We usually get some freak snowstorm in April though. Today I took the car on a 100-mile round trip down to Illinois to hike at Glacial Park. I walked down around the marshes at the park and saw tons of different birds and a few deer. Spring is finally here.

The VW at Glacial Park.

[cdennisg]

How did it feel out there on the open road with the big tires?
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[supercub]

[supercub]

A minor issue cropped up with the larger tires. The left front fender had some old damage to the leading end of the wheel opening, especially near the bottom. The damage caused no issues with the old tires, so I never addressed it. With the new tires though if I'm taking a right turn and hit a bump, the tire rubs against the bent section of the wheel opening. I went to work a bit early to do some quick hammering to get the fender more into shape. Looks a bit rough, but so does the rest of the car. I'll probably shoot some paint on the area at some point. No more tire rubbing though so all is well. I also changed the gear lube in the transaxle and adjusted the clutch after lubricating the pivot arm on the trans.

Old damage.

Repaired. Good enough.

Much better clearance at the front.

[supercub]

I checked the alignment this morning, specifically the rear toe after reading a bit on here about the need for a little toe out on the rear wheels. I wouldn't say the car handles poorly, but it has felt a bit unsure and requires a decent amount of back and forth on the steering wheel to keep it where it needs to be. Everything's tight in the front end. The shop I work at has an alignment rack, so I put the VW up on it. The rear toe was exactly 0 degrees. How I managed that by sheer guesswork years ago, I don't know. I adjusted it to .21 degrees total toe-out in the rear and then added a touch more toe-in on the front wheels. Camber was in speck on both front wheels and caster was almost even at 3.9 degrees on one side and 3.8 degrees on the other. The car definitely tracks better after the adjustments. The weather forecast is calling for 1-3 inches of snow tomorrow so the VW will be sitting out the next couple of days. Hopefully they won't salt but I don't want to chance it.

[cdennisg]

Rear axle alignment on a swing axle car is such a weird thing to wrap your head around. I have always gone for dead zero at regular ride height, but I can certainly understand the want for a just a touch of toe out. As that whole thing swings in its arc up and down over bumps and dips, the toe is constantly changing along with camber.
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[Q-Dog]

I always understood the rear toe out setting was to compensate for when the rubber torsion bushings compress under acceleration?
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Brian

'69 Dune Buggy
'69 Beetle Convertible
'70 Beetle

[cdennisg]

[supercub]

Today I pulled the steering wheel off to try to lube the upper steering column bearing. It has been quite rumbly and creaky for a couple years now. After I got retaining clip and spring off from in front of the bearing, it didn't look so great. There was a lot of fine metal dust and rust powder around the bearing, and it has a bit of up-down and side to side play. I cleaned the crud off and mushed some grease down into the bearing with a small flathead screwdriver. I temporarily popped the steering wheel back on and spun it back and forth a bit to work the grease in and then repeated the process a few times. It is much smoother now and the rumbling/creaking is gone, though for how long I don't know. I actually have a replacement column bearing but don't feel like pulling the column out right now. I completely overlooked this bearing when I rebuilt the car and I'll bet it's been dry for the last 30 years.

[supercub]

The winds of Iowa killed my VW. I made my trip to Kansas and back. The last day of the trip I could tell the engine was not happy. The usual ticking of the valves sounded off and I knew #3 exhaust was getting too tight. I'll detail the trip in a future post, but all did not go well, and I made the entire return trip in one day; 1000 miles straight through. An absolutely brutal headwind for the bulk of the drive meant I was at full throttle for about 80% of the time with lots of high rpm third gear pulls on even the slightest incline. I apologized to the VW for putting it through such abuse and promised the car I'd do nice things for it when we got home. Because the VW is a true champion, it made it all the way. I changed the oil the next morning and checked the valves. Just as I suspected #3 exhaust was at almost zero clearance. No metal in the oil or the screen or sump plate. Yesterday I drove down to Illinois to go walking at Glacial Park. Returning home, once again the valves sounded off. Checked this morning and #3 exhaust is tight again, not as bad as after the big trip, but it's hammering its seat or stretching or something. Unfortunately, I think the engine is at the end. Time for a rebuild or maybe a bigger engine. The odometer reading when I parked it is 69533. Thats 97,391 miles with no engine work outside of routine maintenance. Not bad for an engine I built in a shed 11 years ago. This engine has made two trips to California, a trip to New Hampshire, several rounds of the central Great Plains, lots of day trips to state parks across southern Wisconsin, and many thousands of miles of contending with much faster modern cars in the daily commute. It's had a good life.

#3 exhaust does not look good. Only 150 miles after the last adjustment, it was already getting tight again. Time for a rebuild or maybe a bigger engine.

[mikec4193]

I remember my father talking about running his 1957 Beetle from Lake Luzerne NY to Erlanger KY back in day when the car was maybe a year old then...he had 54 before that he drove all over Europe...he drove the wheels off of all of his Volkswagens that he owned....he was a firm believer that cars have round tires to be driven...not babied either...

Love this story...

Thanks for bringing us along

MikeC
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Dad bought his first Beetle on Dec 17, 1953.

[cdennisg]

If the oil pressure is good and crankshaft end play is within spec, consider doing just the top end. Fresh rebuilt heads, and maybe just a set of rings if piston/cylinder wear is within spec. Cleaning and measuring is free.
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[supercub]

[supercub]

[supercub]

The engine is out! First time in 11 years. It's pretty grungy underneath in spots since it has been a bit leaky for a long time. The lower two nuts were hidden under lumps of crud. The engine to body seal pretty much disintegrated in most areas while removing the engine. Some of the flywheel teeth are a bit chewed up, but that's my own fault for using a 6-volt solenoid for all this time. I don't remember what condition they were in originally though. Oh well. I'll probably pick up a 12-volt solenoid while this is all apart. Transmission mounts are getting replaced as well. Rear mounts are mush. I'll clean out the plugged manifold heat riser too. Now to take the heads off, see what's up in there, and get to fixing it.

[supercub]

The cylinder heads are off and it doesn't look good for the 3-4 side. The #3 exhaust seat is definitely hammered. The #3 exhaust valve spring sits a good 1/8" taller than the intake spring and the valve head is quite recessed into the combustion chamber. Worse though is the crack beginning to make its way from the spark plug hole to the exhaust valve. This head has already been rewelded around the spark plug hole in the past as well as several other areas in the rocker box.

I explained the situation to a local VW engine builder, and he pretty quickly assessed that the head is likely junk. I tend to agree. I've got a line on another square stud 373 1200 head with no cracks that I'm going to check out tomorrow. If that works out, I think I'm going to do a low budget refresh of this engine in hopes of riding it out through the fall and then working on building up a replacement for the future.

Plans are to swap my intake valves and springs over to the replacement head assuming guides/seats are decent enough and get 4 new exhaust valves. I'll lap in all the new valves with grinding compound. Then I'll pull the cylinders, replace the piston rings, hone the cylinder bores and lap the cylinders to the heads. I'll reassemble it with new seals and hopefully get another 10k or so out of it until a bigger and more powerful replacement is built.

That's the plan anyway.

Here are a couple pictures of the worn out cylinder head.

Valve spring height difference between intake and exhaust on #3.

#3 combustion chamber with recessed exhaust valve. Spark plug hole crack is hard to see between the two Sharpie marks. It doesn't appear to be all the way to the valve seat....yet. This head has already had lots of rewelding in the past. It's had a good run.

[supercub]

I picked up the replacement head. It was kind of crusty. Looked like it had been sitting in a shed for a few decades, but its got no combustion chamber cracks or hammered valve seats. Turns out the guy I got it from is an air-cooled VW engine builder and he had some new exhaust valves as well as exhaust guides. I disassembled and cleaned up the head. As expected, the exhaust guides were smoked. All the springs and keepers were rusty but I'm transferring over my good stuff from the bad head. Doubt the new head has ever been rebuilt because all the valves had the VW logo on them. I cleaned up the new head and replaced the exhaust guides. The guy I bought it from said to tap the old guides with a 3/8" tap, thread a bolt into it then pound it out from the back side with the old exhaust valve. That worked out great. Used a bolt that fit perfectly into the guide ID to pound the new guides in. I cleaned and reused the intake valves from my bad head as well as two new exhaust valves. Then I lapped all the valve seats. I still have to pull off my cylinders and lap them to the new head before final assembling it.

[cdennisg]

It's been along time since I did valve guides, but I recall keeping them in the freezer to shrink them a bit before install to make them slip in a little easier.
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[supercub]