Process of rebuild, replacing heads, new exhaust & misc 1977 FI

[SGKent]

[Abscate]

[SGKent]

[orwell84]

[SGKent]

well I am too old, fat and worn out to be crawling around under a bus.

Didn't like the sound of the valve train with the swivel adjusters. We had a discussion about them earlier in this thread. Started the process of replacing them with standard adjustment screws. So far have only done one rocker shaft under the car - cold, tedious and cramped on that side of the garage. The valve tips show uneven wear - on the exhaust valve the swivel is hitting the tip evenly, and on the intake tip the swivel left a mark where it is hitting the valve tip with the edge of the swivel sitting in the middle of the valve tip - with a line of wear. If it continued it would eventually wear a groove across the center of the tip. I didn't take a photo but a drawing of the wear is below for anyone thinking of swivels. The engine only has about an hour on it so I consider the wear from the swivel excessive.

Decided to leave the solid spacer style between rocker arms instead of springs like the solid lifters came. Porsche used a third support tower on their engines. The solid spacer is a close to that as possible.

Will go out in a bit and finish side 1 -2. Still have #2 on that side to do, and then put the pushrod tube wire back. I hate messing with that wire, especially while lying under the car.


The mark on the I represents how the swivel is contacting and wearing the intake tip, and the E is the even shading across the whole tip. Basically I think that the exhaust swivel is slowly spinning the exhaust, but the intake is not being spun.

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“Most people don’t know what they’re doing, and a lot of them are really good at it.” - George Carlin

[airschooled]

Do you have the T4store shim kit to adjust the rocker a few thou to one side or the other? By your drawing, the rocker arm is arcing right through the radius of the valve stem, unlike the proper exhaust valve markings you’ve got. The last kit I got with them came with a plethora of shims to get perfect side play AND alignment.

Robbie
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Learn how your vintage VW works. And why it doesn't!
One-on-one tech help for your Volkswagen:
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[SGKent]

it wasn't that. I found the issue. Junk swivels.

When they are made there is a small lip at the outside of some of them on the edge. On some it is worse than others. You can feel it with a finger nail. The fix would be to either not use them, or sand them in a figure eight pattern on like 3000 grit wet and dry paper until that lip is gone, then work the edge too so it has a radius and not a sharp edge. I missed that building the engine, and just used them. That is also why some are so much harder to adjust than others. There are two heights that hit the feeler gauge - the edge ridge and the center.

As far as I am concerned for now I am done with them. I'll keep them as spares.
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“Most people don’t know what they’re doing, and a lot of them are really good at it.” - George Carlin

[SGKent]

done with both sides. PITA with those pushrod retaining wires, especially the one behind the EGR filter. Sounds so much sweeter without the swivels. Next time I use a set I will polish them first. 4 of the 8 are irregular upon inspection, 4 are acceptable. That weird sound is gone too. Idles smoother and the cylinders balance really well. Did a smoke test too, and no leaks. Will tune it again, and then take it out for a drive tomorrow to see how it runs.
_________________
“Most people don’t know what they’re doing, and a lot of them are really good at it.” - George Carlin

[RWK]

If you haven't already in your build, you can also improve the rocker assemblies by adding grooves in the ex. rocker arm oil feed holes to align them with the oil grooves in the shafts, only the intake rocker oil feed holes align with the shaft grooves, this directs more oil to tips also, I discovered this while making new shafts to replace worn og ones. Regarding spacers, IMHO, some rockers I checked both early and late, sides are not square with bore, some upwards of .005, making precision shimming/spacers difficult, why VW used the springs and shims, also why you see the wear spots on the side of the arms only partially around.
Pic of rocker in V block shows witness mark after removing .005, it was shiny there before grinding, green area is og. unworn thrust surface.
Check your rockers carefully!! lapping the sides of already out of square arms
will be still be out of square!

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73 Type 181
63 Type 113
63 Type 261- 428 071
62 Type 241-378 025 178 530

[SGKent]

without the machine shop you have access to, there isn't much more that I can do. I can't even get non-automotive machine shop work done in this area of 3 million people unless it is CNC, and I provide the program or pay to have one done. California drove off that whole industry of small machine shops after the old timers retired out. I called around last year and could not find one shop in this area where they had someone who knew how to set up and run a manual lathe or endmill. Several shops said they had the old equipment still around in the back room covered up, but no one had the time or knew how to use it. A good friend of mine in the Los Angeles area who spent 50 years owning a machine shop doing small work in aerospace and medical tools retired a couple years ago. He spent several years trying to find a buyer for his shop. In the end he sold it at an auction for about 5 cents on the dollar. No one wants non-CNC equipment here except the hobbyist who has the room for it, and no one wants to do low volume work. It is a dead industry here - and soon to be there as the jobs go back off shore again under the new administration. It is what it is.
_________________
“Most people don’t know what they’re doing, and a lot of them are really good at it.” - George Carlin

[airschooled]

Steve, where did you move to that has 3 million people and no small machine shops?

Send 'em down here and I'll bike them over to a handful of machine shops that never had websites and don't even have phones anymore.

Robbie
_________________
Learn how your vintage VW works. And why it doesn't!
One-on-one tech help for your Volkswagen:
www.airschooled.com

[Abscate]

Any large university will have a machine shop associated with the Chem/Physics/Engineering programs. We had to make a castellated 13 mm nit and bolt to specs from bar stock to get our key back in the Stone(d) Age

Then, God gave us the Winchester zrepeating rifle to guard us against the dinosaurs and the the Communists, and the “ others”
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.ssS!

[RalphWiggam]

[RWK]

I just used a small hand grinder to make the slot in the arm...,
The rocker arm squareness just points out problems that can be measured and corrected (blueprinting) if you are using spacers/shims, some arms are very close others not so much. They can be checked with a V-block, cut off shaft and indicator, just need some way to mount indicator, maybe mag. indicator base to V block ?, so does require more then average tools, a coarse hone stone and time can correct out of square. Obviously if you are using stock springs and shims it's irrelevant, they compensate for the occasional bad arm out of square.
_________________
73 Type 181
63 Type 113
63 Type 261- 428 071
62 Type 241-378 025 178 530

[RWK]

Yes Ralph, same with T1 arms, when they are square everything comes out perfect, full bearing all around, (as long as the spacers are correct!) stands should be checked also, more blueprinting!
_________________
73 Type 181
63 Type 113
63 Type 261- 428 071
62 Type 241-378 025 178 530

[SGKent]

new engine runs well and passed smog. There is a weird noise that my ears hear but it is not in the engine, and it is not in the clutch, and it is not external exhaust. I can't tell if it is just a sharp staccato from exhaust pulses on a 2L or it is something else. The pains of getting old - hearing goes and things sound weird. With new heater boxes, cross tube, muffler etc I may just be hearing the exhaust pulses at idle.

Results today - mixture is perfect for this engine. Just a tiny bit of O2 left which is because the alcohol in the fuel carries its own O2. If I were in a state where the fuel was not alcohol laced, then the mixture would be all the fuel and oxygen used up which is perfect stoichiometric at 15 and 25 mph. The mixture turns richer at WOT.

Also head and oil temps haven't changed one bit with the increased compression from 7.3 to 7.7. They did not go down as people suggested they would with the less deck. Also a lower weight oil did nothing to help the engine run cooler either. It runs exactly where it has always been. 200 F - 210 F oil, and 350 F heads around town. The only thing the higher compression did is speed the burn up a little. You can see it in the CO2 level being higher. That means it burns a little faster and more complete.

Smog results from 2010 to 2021

_________________
“Most people don’t know what they’re doing, and a lot of them are really good at it.” - George Carlin

[SGKent]

UPDATE: Do not use copper coat on the head to cylinder. The copper coat crystalizes into carbon, and can scratch the pistons. Also use Reinzsol on the cylinder bases. That is what VW spec'd in the tech bulletin. The VW product part number crosses to Reinzsol, and the MSDS matches.

The transmission whine mentioned earlier was the gearset and new reverse idler did not provide enough clearance between 2nd and the reverse idler so the whine was the gear and idler barely touching occasionally. Eric had to machine the idler to get the needed clearance. He said it happens most commonly on racing gears but some factory gears need the clearnancing also.
_________________
“Most people don’t know what they’re doing, and a lot of them are really good at it.” - George Carlin