Manx power engine

[parmaynu]

Does anyone know the spec of the 85bhp engine that Meyers used to,offer in the late 60’s?

[oprn]

Do you think it was a VW engine or was it a Corvair? The early Corvair base engine was 85 hp.

[isucorvair]

Base Corvair Engine was 80hp.

Corvairs came in:
80, 84, 95, 102, 110, 140, 150, 180, from the factory, depending on the year, and options...


Eric P.
DeWitt, IA
Corvairs, and Meyer Manx build in (slow) process

[Dale M.]

Probably any 1700-1800cc motor with mild cam and decent carburation can get you 85 HP with little effort...

Dale
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“Fear The Government That Wants To Take Your Guns" - Thomas Jefferson.

"Kellison Sand Piper Roadster" For Street & Show.
"Joe Pody Sandrover" Buggy with 2180 for Autocross (Sold)
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All suggestions and advice are purely my own opinion. You are free to ignore them if you wish ...

[calebmelvin]

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Caleb
'68 Tagged Manx | My Wanted Ads
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[calebmelvin]

They had a range of options:

"Our Stage I big bore kit will give your 1192 cc VW a husky 1352 cc displacement"

"Our Stage VI kit combines the best of everything to turn a calm old 1300 cc VW into a roaring, 100 horsepower, 1700 cc monster!"

"Our MANXPOWER 75 and 85 hp VW engines ... have 1562 cc displacement."

"our MANXPOWER STAGE IV...moves your 1192 cc VW to 1562 cc and raises it from 36 to 75 horsepower"

Most of them started with a 40hp motor, or in some cases a 1300/1500 and built up from there.
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Caleb
'68 Tagged Manx | My Wanted Ads
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[calebmelvin]

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Caleb
'68 Tagged Manx | My Wanted Ads
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[oprn]

There you go! I was not aware that they were building engines. The HP figures look a bit optimistic for the day but possible I suppose. Dual port heads were out in the type 3s but not the type 1s yet.

[didget69]

Marketing hype on the HP numbers.

bnc
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I never found the need to impress people with any mechanic certifications, trophies or track wins... unless it was for Mom to post on the refrigerator door.

[calebmelvin]

[calebmelvin]

Also, Remaster still exists! They are building aviation motors built on the VW platform: http://revmasteraviation.com

Here is some history of their motors:

Revmaster engines were originally converted from Volkswagen auto engines to aircraft engines by Revmaster Aviation of Hesperia, California (formerly of Riverside, California and Chino, California). Revmaster is one of the earliest VW converters that is still active and was founded by Joe Horvath in 1959 to serve auto and dune buggy owners. In 1968, they began building engines for the homebuilt light-aircraft market and have continued ever since. The firm also has developed and markets their own injector carburetor under the RevFlow brand name. These carburetors range in size from 28mm to 44mm by twos and provide altitude compensation features. They are presently extending their development of VW engines by work on their R-3000 model, which is based in principle, only, on existing VW auto engines (as all of their current production models are). All Revmaster engines are now assembled from new parts manufactured either by Revmaster or VW parts makers under contract to Revmaster. Another new development by Revmaster is the AD-200-C Light Sport Aircraft (LSA) canard. The information here has been obtained from the references below and the Revmaster Aviation Website. The only non-VW engine converted by Revmaster was the 602 cc Citroën into the Revmaster R-800 described next.

http://www.enginehistory.org/Piston/HOAE/Revmaster...jmc22eik30

I am thinking the Manxpower motors are a variation on these:

O-97 - - {3.366 / 2.717 / 96.7} / {85.5 / 69 / 1585}

Same stroke as O-112.

4cyl; Revmaster R-1600D; N/Ahp@N/A rpm; 1968-1980; Wt = N/A.
VW Type 1; carbureted engine with dual ignition.
AProgHBW71.
Applications: None found.

4cyl; Revmaster R-1600S; N/Ahp@N/A rpm; 1968-1980; Wt = N/A.
VW Type 1; carbureted engine with single ignition.
AProgHBW71.
Applications: None found.
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Caleb
'68 Tagged Manx | My Wanted Ads
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[calebmelvin]

[calebmelvin]

And here is the Manxpower 75 marketing sheet if anyone is interested. I am totally building one of these!

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Caleb
'68 Tagged Manx | My Wanted Ads
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[Rome]

Excellent to try to duplicate the build specs.

Note:
1. The basic engine was a 1200cc 40-hp. The 82mm big-bore P/C that Revmaster/Manx used back then are no longer available. Instead, if you are building the engine off a 40hp, you can use the 83mm P/C which along with the 74mm crank, gets you 1602cc.
2. The 74mm cranks now available have connecting rod journals for the later 69mm stroke rods. To fit your 40hp rods you need to narrow the big ends slightly. Main bearings fit 40hp rods as well as those from later 69mm-stroke engines.
3. The current 74mm crank is designed for the later, 12V style O-ring type crankshaft instead of the original one for the 40hp. It's usually 8-doweled so that you need your flywheel to match.

[calebmelvin]

[Rome]

Caleb, I have no direct build experience with a 40hp 1200 engine, so I'm really not in a reliable position to make recommendations "from experience". Your planned engine would qualify very well as a "vintage speed" because the combination of parts were prevalent 50 yrs ago but are rarely built nowadays. There is a dedicated forum here on theSamba for such engines. I also have a 1200 40hp engine stored in the basement for an "eventual" build so I've done alot of reading in that forum. I did buy a 74mm crank a few years ago from aircooled.net, for a future build based on a later case- http://vwparts.aircooled.net/4140-Forged-Chromoly-78mm-Type-1-Crankshaft-p/002-4178vw.htm But other vendors sell similar cranks.

Since your goal is to build the engine to appear just like the Manx one, you'll need to find the Zenith carburetor (not difficult) and the matching intake manifold for the 40hp (I think that'll be more difficult). About 10 years ago a good friend bought a restored '65 Beetle with a hotrodded 40-hp based engine that had big bore cylinders, and also a larger crank- 69mm IIRC. He had the same Zenith 32 NDIX dual-throat carb. It ran very well, similar to a 60hp 1600 dual-port as we were pacing each other on the 4-lane highway.

Manxpower 85's engine had the "Rev-22" camshaft. Back then the selection of hi-po cams was much less than today. Typically there were "3/4 Street" and "Full Race" grinds. I don't know what the current equivalents would be without knowing what the cam lift and duration values were on those two. Most likely the book "How to hotrod your VW engine" by Bill Fisher would provide such data. Either way, the compression ratio of 9.5:1 from the original Manxpower engine would be uncomfortably high nowadays with the lower-quality fuel even if the full race cam was installed.

[dustymojave]

I ran a 40hp engine in my Baja Bug for many years. I used 83mm barrels and pistons with the stock 64mm crank. The p&c were big bore for a 40hp so the wrist pic locations were correct with the 40hp rods. Heads were last issue 40hp heads with stock valves with a 3-angle grind. Cam is a Norris 330 with domed grind lifters. Bosch 031 (Porsche 356 - advance all in by 1500RPM) distributor. I used a slightly modified from stock 28PICT carb. The compression ratio was 9.0:1. Full flow oil system with a self blue-printed pump. Self-made oil cooler by-pass plate machined from 1/2" aluminum plate. External Perma-Cool oil cooler up under the rear window. The header was a Four-Tuned 4-2-1 offroad header with a Four-Tuned Quiet Pack muffler. HD Fichtel & Sachs 180mm clutch and matching pressure plate. Aside from the big bore cylinders, it was built pretty much as a 1200cc offroad race engine (in the 1970s, the 1200cc buggy class was one of the most popular in the desert) would have been built in those days.

The entire package worked really well. The car made a LOT of folks with bigger engines, more carbs, even V8s look silly as it drove around them on and off road. It of course didn't make the sort of top end hp that the 1835DP in my other Baja or the one in my Hi Jumper buggy did. But it had great low end.

I pulled it in the 1990s when it had over 325K miles and 20 years on it and was getting tired. At that time it would have cost more than 2x as much to rebuild (parts and machine costs only) as it cost to upgrade to a 1600 dual port engine. So it sits forlorn collecting desert sand out back for the last 25 years.

All in all, an excellent engine. With a Zenith carb like the Manx-Power engines, it would make much better top end too, but might lose a little of that low-end grunt.
_________________
Richard
Offroading VW based cars since 1965
Tech Inspection 1963 - 2012 SCCA/SCORE/HDRA/MORE/MDR +
Retired from building Bajas, Fiberglass Buggies and Rails in the Mojave Desert. Also Sprints & Midgets, Dry Lakes, Road Race cars. All types New and Vintage
SoCalBajas Member
Kicked Cancer's A$$...1st and 2nd round...Fight ain't over yet.

[calebmelvin]

Hey guys, any idea which model Zenith and which centrifugal advance distributor was used on these?
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Caleb
'68 Tagged Manx | My Wanted Ads
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[jsturtlebuggy]

Zenith 32 NDIX with more than likely 24mm venturis. With a isolated manifold carb needed a slot milled in the base.
010 Bosch distributors where common and cheap back then. Also common was the 019 Bosch distributors. I remember seeing them in the early 70s, came in the kit called a Screamer and were painted blue.
We ran 010 in our buggies. And they came painted black like in the pictures.

If you plan on using a Zenith where you live, you going to need heat to carb and manifold. We had problems with icing where I live in California. Did not have to be freezing to do, just enough moisture in the air.
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Joseph
Fair Oaks/Orangevale, CA
Elrod Motorsports
Motion Tire Motorsports
Having fun with Dune Buggies since 1970
Into Volkswagens since 1960

[calebmelvin]