Yikes! I bought a '74 Super!!

[scrivyscriv]

Looks like a failed tank coating
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Robert in Memphis
Dünkelgrügen 1967 Java Green bug thread
Engine rebuild thread
If you're ever in the Memphis area, you are welcome to stop by for advice and help.

[vamram]

[heimlich]

I had a new tank in my car right before I painted it. I let it sit empty. Rust developed inside. Then that clogged my fuel filter. It happened over and over. I dropped a new fuel tank in and went on.
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[vamram]

Quick update - still haven't pulled the tank, as winter has hit w/temps 20s-30s and no garage...

But I did empty it out, replace the soft lines, installed new filters in the path to the pump, and disassembled and soaked the carb in one of those parts cleaner gallon cans. So far, 100 trouble-free miles, including 30 at 70mph on the highway yesterday. You'll recall down in Miami I couldn't do 10 w/out the carb blockage and fuel starvation kicking in.

I also changed the oil yesterday as I wanted to see if the FL Fiasco left traces of obvious internal damage. Much to my surprise, it was completely clean. Nothing on the magnetic drain plug. I picked up one tiny flake of silver on a paper filter I ran the oil thru as it drained, but that's it. I did forget to check if it was magnetic or not. I also removed the oil screen and split open the oil filter. Nothing, Nada, completely clean. Makes me hopeful that I didn't do any internal damage to the motor.

Interestingly, oil temps are running a lot cooler now even after yesterday's highway run. I suppose there are a combo of reasons for that - the cold weather, fuel flow not getting blocked, and removing the shims from the rocker arms to allow more opening of the valves, particularly the exhaust (i'm completely guessing there)...? I know this is a temporary "fix" - ultimately I have to set the rocker geometry properly and custom cut push rods.
_________________
"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition
to put moral chains upon their own appetites. -Edmund Burke
“If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”
Stop Russian-Soviet Aggression!!

'74 Super 9/16 - present, in refurb process.
'73 Super - 6/18 - Present - Daily Driver!
'75 Super Le Grande...languishing since 2022.
Click to view image
Save the Supers!!

[kpf]

Sounds like great progress so far. Congratulations!
_________________
1971 Super Beetle

[Buggeee]

All's well that ends well!
_________________
Big Time 1988 Vanagon Westy
Release the Krankenwagen! 1966 Sportsmobile Camper
Dr. Kompressor 72 Super Duper
61 Turkis Pile (adopted out)

[vamram]

Car's good around town, but I can force more clogs if I take it on the highway at 75 MPH for a good run. Tank will come out w/the warmer weather. In the meantime, it's good just cruising around town.

That said, I hear a knock around the oil pump area. Or maybe this whole thing is occupying way more space in my head than it should. Do you guys hear anything....?

Link

_________________
"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition
to put moral chains upon their own appetites. -Edmund Burke
“If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”
Stop Russian-Soviet Aggression!!

'74 Super 9/16 - present, in refurb process.
'73 Super - 6/18 - Present - Daily Driver!
'75 Super Le Grande...languishing since 2022.
Click to view image
Save the Supers!!

[vamram]

Finally diving into the motor again. I'll be removing and inspecting the heads and Ps and cylinders, inspecting the rods and bearings, then replacing the old factory cam with a cb2280, new lifters and cam bearings. Then I'll reset the compression to get it below 8, and following Brian's new sticky on valve geometry to try and get it right this time.https://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewtopic.php?t=802292.

The motor monkey caught in the act. That's my "garage!"

Hopefully I won't find anything disastrous like spun crankshaft bearings....
_________________
"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition
to put moral chains upon their own appetites. -Edmund Burke
“If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”
Stop Russian-Soviet Aggression!!

'74 Super 9/16 - present, in refurb process.
'73 Super - 6/18 - Present - Daily Driver!
'75 Super Le Grande...languishing since 2022.
Click to view image
Save the Supers!!

[vamram]

Got the #1-2 head and cylinders off today. CCs were at 60, not 41 as I thought when I first built the motor. I remeasured (over and over) the deck height which varied from .78 to .82. So the recalculated compression ratio comes out to 7.2 to 7.4.

I think the head looks fine. Valves seat and hold liquid w/out any leaks.

Cylinders have a bit of carbon on the tops, totally normal.

Weather permitting, I'll split the case tomorrow. Of course, I should've removed the clutch and flywheel before placing it on the stand. Oh well.
_________________
"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition
to put moral chains upon their own appetites. -Edmund Burke
“If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”
Stop Russian-Soviet Aggression!!

'74 Super 9/16 - present, in refurb process.
'73 Super - 6/18 - Present - Daily Driver!
'75 Super Le Grande...languishing since 2022.
Click to view image
Save the Supers!!

[Rome]

Your compression ratio data does not quite add up. Using CB Performance's engine calculator, 0.080" average DH and 60 cc chambers with the 85.5 mm stock bore, it shows CR of only 6.5:1. Even if you have 88 mm pistons, the CR would only be 6.8:1. I can't remember what size cylinders/pistons you have in this engine, but your head's chambers appear to be bored for something larger than the stock 85.5's- the chamber edge comes very close to the head stud holes.

Were there any shims under the cylinders for increasing the DH?

Wishing you success with splitting the case and careful observation of the components to determine the issue.

If you plan on keeping the cam and the lifters for a future engine, you should label each lifter with its location so that upon reassembly, the wear patterns of the lifter face to the cam lobes are matched. Do you have the simple tool to keep the 4 lifters in the case half as you lift it half up and apart? You can use wooden clothespins...

[vamram]

Rome, I'll inspect all of the parts I remove and the ones I don't. I do have the little metal retainer clips for the lifters. Here's what my calculation comes from:

.78 in mm for the deck height translates to 0.03070866 in inches. From what I've read elsewhere, this should be closer to .040-.050. That would mean adding cylinder shims or head spacers, but that would lower the compression to 7.4 or less.

I used one of those steel deck plates to measure the DH. I bolted it on, got the piston to TDC, then used a digital caliper to measure the thickness of the plate, then the caliper's tail to measure down to the top of the piston. Then I subtracted the first measurement from 2nd to get the DH. I took that reading multiple times.

I think the head looks ok. I was expecting to see ugliness after the way it heated up on me on my last Miami road trip. So far, so good.

I have .006 play on both rods side-to-side. Not excessive from what I've read, but...?

_________________
"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition
to put moral chains upon their own appetites. -Edmund Burke
“If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”
Stop Russian-Soviet Aggression!!

'74 Super 9/16 - present, in refurb process.
'73 Super - 6/18 - Present - Daily Driver!
'75 Super Le Grande...languishing since 2022.
Click to view image
Save the Supers!!

[Rome]

Aha. My mistake- I misinterpreted your ".78 to .82" when I responded.

[Buggeee]

[vamram]

I replaced the camshaft w/a CB 2280 and new lifters, assembled the small block and the 1-2 P&Cs and heads, set the valve geometry (close...) on that side. Next I went to the 3-4 side, and discovered this after cleaning off carbon from the combustion area of #4 - looks like the cylinder is delaminating.

I'm told this happened likely from overheating when it was fuel starved on my FL trip (or at least that's when it failed) and that it's possible the piston or cylinder might be warped after that. There may be damage to the other cylinders and pistons that are impossible to see w/the naked eye. Warping? Rings that look normal but may be closer to failure...? So....looks like new P&Cs are in order. I suppose I could just replace the #4, but then WHAT IF...there's subtle damage to the others I'm not qualified to see....? I'll end up back on the side of the road in no time.

I also removed the tank to replace it w/a clean original I picked up at a show yesterday. Looking inside of it, to be honest, I can not make out where the flaky crap that ruined my fuel pump, filters and clogged up my needle valve was coming from. Doesn't look any worse than the "problem" tank that was in there.

I also found that the u-joint has no boots! Oy.

_________________
"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition
to put moral chains upon their own appetites. -Edmund Burke
“If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”
Stop Russian-Soviet Aggression!!

'74 Super 9/16 - present, in refurb process.
'73 Super - 6/18 - Present - Daily Driver!
'75 Super Le Grande...languishing since 2022.
Click to view image
Save the Supers!!

[vamram]

Now that I got the electrical issues sorted on my daily driver '73, I can continue trying to redo this beast. I decided to go with a new set of AA thick walled 88mm P&Cs to replace the suspect ones after the overheating.

I also went with Grant rings per the recommendations of many. Compression works out to 7.9-8.0. in trying to set the valve geometry I calculated that I needed to add .40 mm shims under the rockers. Oh and I'm using a CB2280 cam and new lifters. I may have said that earlier, I don't remember. Tomorrow, the oil pump, distributor gear, fuel pump and distributor go in. Then to set the valves.

_________________
"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition
to put moral chains upon their own appetites. -Edmund Burke
“If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”
Stop Russian-Soviet Aggression!!

'74 Super 9/16 - present, in refurb process.
'73 Super - 6/18 - Present - Daily Driver!
'75 Super Le Grande...languishing since 2022.
Click to view image
Save the Supers!!

[Buggeee]

I like those red hole covers. It looks much more fun than stuffing them with blue shop towels. Are those printed? The longblock is a satisfying moment in the process. Next stop, first start!
_________________
Big Time 1988 Vanagon Westy
Release the Krankenwagen! 1966 Sportsmobile Camper
Dr. Kompressor 72 Super Duper
61 Turkis Pile (adopted out)

[vamram]

Yeah, the kid of some sales dude at jbugs printed them, now jbugs sells them on their sight. Definitely better than shop towels.
_________________
"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition
to put moral chains upon their own appetites. -Edmund Burke
“If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”
Stop Russian-Soviet Aggression!!

'74 Super 9/16 - present, in refurb process.
'73 Super - 6/18 - Present - Daily Driver!
'75 Super Le Grande...languishing since 2022.
Click to view image
Save the Supers!!

[vamram]

Getting *really* close to getting this baby back on the road. Progress made the last couple of days.

Cleaned up the surface rust in the gas tank holding bay, gave it a couple of coats of close-enough-for-rock'n'roll Rust-o-leum 2X baby blue - I mean, hopefully this area will not need to see the light of day again, as long as I own the car, right? RIGHT...???

Oh and I replaced the dash fan and cleaned out the air/wiper box. Mine had stopped working back in November. Turns out the fan was not bad, a ground wire was broken. We'll see if that's all it was when I reconnect the battery. It could be the dash switch too.

Looking good...gotta at least look good.

And in a typical case of scope creep, I "discovered" this passageway when installing the U-joint boots, which I'm like 99.999999% certain is for the accelerator cable. So of course I had to pull the cable and guide it down this while the tank was out. I don't see how on earth it would be possible to guide a new cable down this. I suppose cutting the old one and taping the end of the new one to the old one...? Oh, and of course I dropped the circlip on the ground. Luckily found it w/in 5 minutes.

It wouldn't be a full day w/out some snafus. Like accidentally disconnecting the blue braided brake hose from the line coming down from the reservoir while trying to forcibly separate the metal brake fluid tube from being so close to the u-joint. Fortunately the shower of brake fluid only hit my arm and not my face or eyes, and I was able to reconnect before little more than 1/4 of the reservoir dumped out.

And...the long block is ready for the rest of the tin. My helper wasn't around to help me remove it from the stand so that comes tomorrow. And the electrical tape around the foam seal comes off tomorrow too when I install the fan shroud.

Which hole of the head does the cooling flaps run thru...? The outer or inner one...?

_________________
"Men are qualified for civil liberty in exact proportion to their disposition
to put moral chains upon their own appetites. -Edmund Burke
“If something cannot go on forever, it will stop.”
Stop Russian-Soviet Aggression!!

'74 Super 9/16 - present, in refurb process.
'73 Super - 6/18 - Present - Daily Driver!
'75 Super Le Grande...languishing since 2022.
Click to view image
Save the Supers!!

[67rustavenger]

IIRC, the hole closer to the engine case is the one that the flap drop rod passes through to attach it to the thermostat.
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There's never enough time to do it right the first time. But there's always enough time to do it thrice.
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