Building a Fast and Reliable Engine, cont'd

Here are some of my own motor combinations that have worked well for me. All cams listed are Engle brand. 1914cc, 94x69

This motor can be built with smaller cylinders but the low RPM torque will suffer slightly. 94 Cima pistons, 69 counterweighted crank, stock weight flywheel, stock rods. All balanced. 110 cam (285dur x .430lift) You can use 1.25 rockers if you want or a VZ25 cam with stock rockers. Solid shaft kit for rockers, thin-wall chromoly pushrods. 040 stock VW heads fully ported with reshaped and hemicut chambers, a competition valve job with dual springs. Compression ratio for bus, 7 to1 for bug 7.5 to 1. 1 1/2 " header with 2" turbo muffler. Dual Kadrons or 42 Webers or 36/40 Dellortos. 40 Webers can work but they need bigger 32to34 mm venturies. Also a single 36 Dellorto or a 40 Weber can work with an isolated runner manifold but they get bad mileage and they make your motor slower. 009 distributor and Bosch blue coil. This motor can be used with heater boxes if it is used mostly for around town driving. If you drive at sustained freeway speeds the heads will be cracked in no time. I really think heater boxes should only be used on an almost stock motor. This motor will make any VW a really fun car to drive. You will go from having a stock anemic slug to a car that has effortless power. This motor can also be revved fairly high and will make power well into the RPM range.

Stroking the motor

The next step as far as I'm concerned is a crank. Sure you can spend money on bigger heads and put more cam and carbs on a stock stroke motor but then you have a motor that is faster only in the high RPM range. For my money, I would build the same motor as above with a 78 or 82 crank. 600 U.S. dollars will buy you a welded stroker, the machine work you need and a set of stroke relieved stock rods. It's more complicated to put together but well worth it. It's a good idea to go with larger carbs and exhaust at this time because you will need their better breathing ability. Your new motor can be a 2006cc to a 2276cc and it will pull like a stock stroke motor never could. The RPM range will be much lower so it will start pulling sooner too.

2276, 94x82

OK, now for my favorite motor. a 94x82 (2276cc), medium state of tune. 94mm Cima pistons, 82mm welded stroker, stock relieved VW rods, 14+lb flywheel, 120 cam (295dur x .495lift w/ 1.25 rockers). Solid shaft rocker kit, 3/8 thin-wall chromoly pushrods. 8 mm chromoly headstuds. 040 stock VW head castings w/ 40x37.5 valves, fully ported (as big as you can go without welding), unshrouded chambers w/ hemicut, 8 to 1 compression, competition valve job, stainless steel valves, dual springs, titanium retainers, tapered intake guides, intake guide bosses NOT removed, intake manifolds match-ported all the way up.

48 Dellortos on IDF manifolds are my 1st choice but 48 IDFs will work fine too. IDF manifolds are a tricky thing because there are so many different types. The ones that work the best on this motor are Gene Berg, but they are a pain to install because they are shorter. I've heard CB performance makes some decent manifolds but they may be too tall. Other manufactures make manifolds that are slightly taller than the Bergs and are easier to install, but they have a tendency to break at the flanges. I use 11mm nuts with thick washers to make installation easier.

I also grind down a 1/4" drive socket and the manifold sometimes to make sure everything is clearanced before I put the manifolds on. A little bit of grease on the gaskets helps them seal and the gaskets will come off in one piece later when you remove them. I use a 1 5/8" header on this motor with a 2 1/2" turbo muffler. If you can find metal exhaust gaskets you are better off. I use a small amount of hi temp silicone on them and I use Porsche style 12mm copper locknuts to install the header and muffler and I use washers on all.

Well there you have it. This motor will never disappoint, and it will last a long time too. I still have my first motor of this type and it has been in several cars including my bus. If any of you have seen the QUAIFE test video with some moron doing donuts in a black 61 bug for 5 minutes straight, that's me (Editor's note: this video can be seen in the Audio/Video section). That's about the 3rd car that that engine went in. I overheard people talking after they saw the video "that's the end of that motor". Well it went into my bus after that and got driven 140 miles round trip from my shop to my house. I will never get rid of that motor, its way too much fun!

Here are a few things that apply to any HIPO VW motor:

36hp aftermarket fan shrouds: These shrouds do not have all the spotwelds that a stock shroud does. They have no welds on the front side to hold in the internal fins. If you put allot of miles on your motor the fins will break off and over heat one side of the motor. To fix this I squeeze silicone glue in the seams between the shroud face and the fins. You can't reach all of them but get as many as you can. This will keep the fins from vibrating and falling off.

Welded and balanced fans: Get one. Further, if you build a motor that is revving 7000 or more I use power pulleys so it doesn't throw the belt every time you rev the motor. Most high HP big cam motors will not over heat with this pulley.

Piston Rings: I replace the top chrome ring on a Cima piston with another cast iron one. They seem to seal better.

Ported heads: First of all make sure when you order your heads that they DON`T cut out the intake valve guide bosses. True head porting talent is hard to come by. You should talk to a head porter about your heads, not your VW parts supplier. I will try and get some numbers of good head porters listed in the future.

Welded strokers: Welded cranks can take a lot of HP, but there are limits. Using a smaller Porsche or Chevy rod journal, long stroke cranks with allot of compression is a bad idea. An 82mm VW journal is as far as I would go and these cranks have been used for decades with no problems. You must check all welded cranks for straightness and journal trueness.

Cases: Your are much better off getting a new case. If you can find a low-mileage, used case and you know how to check for cracks and warpage then it might be OK. But it's still a gamble.

Lubrication and Cooling: An additional oil cooler/fan/thermostat mounted under the rear luggage compartment next to the trans on the left side is a good idea for warmer climates. I use cast iron full flow covers for the oil pump.

Mufflers: In a recent dyno comparison between Flowmasters, Boorlas and other top brand mufflers, Walker Dynomax super turbo mufflers made the most power. The best part is they don't make your car sound like a dune buggy.