Engine Teardown

The flywheel is marked

Well, I suppose that worse things have happened during this project than having to rebuild the engine, but if I count this as a learning--and therefore enjoyable--experience, then I will consider this to have been fun.  In any case, after finding the broken fuel pump guide, it was inevitable, so there's no point in thinking of it in any other way.  In fact, it will give me peace of mind, knowing that I didn't leave the engine as a question mark.  Now I know it will work.

Flywheel off the engine

The first thing I did was to remove the oil sump cover and drain out whatever oil was left in the bottom.  To my surprise and dismay, in addition to the bit of oil that I expected to see, I also saw a lot of water.  Not gallons or even quarts, but it was a pint or so.  It was clear, so it wasn't mixed in to the oil when the engine was running.  That means it got in somehow while it has been sitting outside.  I thought I had covered all the inlets, but obviously I missed something, somewhere.  Oil I want in the engine; water I do not.

The intent was to break down the engine and split the case, so the first step in this process was to remove the flywheel.  This very heavy steel disc is attached directly to the crankshaft with a very large steel nut, called the flywheel gland nut.  I have no idea why it is a gland nut, but I do know that the damn thing was in there tight.  So tight, in fact, that I just couldn't get it to budge, even with a breaker bar.  Part of the problem with loosening a very large and very tight nut is securing the engine so the whole thing doesn't flip over when the torque is applied to the nut.

A series of Rube Goldberg attempts to secure the engine and loosen the nut convinced me to do some searching/reading on The Samba (a VW fan site), where I discovered a good alternative called The Torque Dude.  Essentially this is a torque-multiplier tool that uses the teeth of the flywheel to loosen the nut with an ordinary breaker bar and a minimal amount of force.  It was $50 and worth every penny.  I removed the gland nut in less than a minute and the flywheel came off shortly after that.

Underneath the flywheel

An inspection of the flywheel showed it to be in good shape, so it can go back on the engine with a new o-ring.  The three spacers looked good, though I may replace them just because I can.  Getting the flywheel endplay correct is probably the most critical aspect of rebuilding the engine, so I bought a dial indicator to measure the endplay when I put the flywheel back on the crankshaft.  That won't be used until I get the case back together, though, and that won't happen until I get the case apart in the first place.

A few drops of oil on the main seal

With the flywheel off (and properly marked for re-installation) it was time to crack the case.  There was a tiny bit of oil accumulated at the bottom of the main oil seal, which means it may have been leaking a bit, but because the space between the case and the flywheel was relatively clean, it meant that the engine had not been abused.  In fact, the oil may simply have been from all the turning about that I've subjected the case to over the past few weeks and months.

The oil pump comes out next

Next to come out/off was the oil pump.  The cover and the two gears were a cinch, but pulling out the pump itself requires a special tool.  I did some reading/searching again and found that the oil pump would simply fall out when the case halves were separated.  Doubtful but with little choice, I proceeded to remove all the case bolts and get to cracking.

...and the case is open!

Case nuts come off...

At first, even with all the bolts out, the case wouldn't budge.  I pounded on it pretty good with a large rubber mallet (as per instructions, mind you) and still nothing.  The oil pump came out, as predicted, but the case halves themselves were still less than a centimeter apart.

Then I discovered the last bolt.  The last two, actually.

With those pesky bits of hardware removed, the case came apart with no trouble at all.  A couple of whacks with the mallet and voila, the two halves were side-by-side on my table.  The camshaft and gear came out without difficulty, as did the crankshaft.  I pulled out the distributor drive gear, the cam followers, the cam bearings, the split main bearing and the main bearing dowel pins and set them all aside.

Cam followers are good

Cam bearings are good

Crankshaft is out

Now it was time for an inspection, especially to see if the bearings were any good.  The state of the bearings would tell the story for this engine.  If they were intact and unscarred, then it meant the engine was good and would not require anything more major than a clean up and reassembly.

In fact, the bearings looked perfect.  It's as if this engine was rebuilt, then run for a very brief bit of time before the car was simply set aside.

Some gunk under a cam bearing

Lots of wiping & polishing

There was no discernable wear on any of the bearing surfaces, though I did see a faint line on one of the cam bearings and decided it was an easy and cheap enough fix to replace them.  The main bearings have to be replaced as a set and I couldn't see any reason to go through the difficult procedure of tearing down the crankshaft to replace the bearings.  So I didn't.

A hot bath is coming

Next up was cleaning.  Lots and lots of cleaning.  First came wiping down.  Then I washed both halves in soapy water and did a lot more wiping down and blowing off/out with compressed air.

Bearing saddles are polished

Then I started polishing.  Although they merely need to be clean, I resolved to actually polish the bearing saddles just to be absolutely sure of a good fit.  This resolution cost me many hours of polishing with steel wool, but the results were worth it.

Cylinder mating surfaces, too

After all the saddles were polished and as many of the surfaces as possible had been wiped clean, I polished the case studs and finished with all the mating surfaces on the two halves.  Then came another bath in soapy water, then two rinses in clean hot water, and another blow out and wipe down.

Pushrod tube ports also

After a few hours of drying, I masked and painted the two case halves again, just hitting those spots where I'd failed to reach in my first pass.  For the most part, it was painted but after touch up, it was a good as it was going to get.

Now, with all the parts clean and ready to go, I am ready for round two:  assembly.

Engine Follies

When I bought this car, I had no idea if the engine was any good.

The engine prior to tear down

It looked ok, and when I gave it a test--turning it over with a wrench--it was not frozen, which I took as a good sign.  Another good sign was the absence of oil, either on the bottom of the engine, or from any the various places where leaks typically develop, like the oil pump and front seal.  I made the decision early on not to buy a rebuilt engine for the Ghia, or to even rebuild the engine in it, for a couple of reasons.

First of all, replacing the engine with a 'brand new' completely rebuilt one would cost me around $2K.  While this would eliminate any question of how the Ghia will run, it is also too expensive to consider as a reasonable option.  After all, I only paid $1,300 for the car itself!

The clutch came off first

Nor did I want to  rebuild the engine, as this is a most difficult and time consuming task.  It's not without it's rewards, which I know because I have rebuilt a VW engine once before.  It took me several months and even though I was successful (perhaps because) I didn't want to tackle this job unless I absolutely had to.

Besides, while it doesn't cost nearly as much, rebuilding an engine can be a fairly expensive task if a lot of parts need to be replaced.  So, not eager to perform the work, and not knowing how much it would cost, I elected to forgo the whole thing and simply put the old engine back into the new car.  I figured that if it didn't work, it's a relatively simple matter to remove the engine and replace it if I absolutely have to do it.

The clutch plate and disc

Of course, I did not plan on simply bolting the old engine onto the transmission without cleaning it up a bit, so as soon as I finished with cleaning up the heads, I turned to the engine to see what I could do to make it look and work better without actually cracking it open.

Clutch disc looks good

The first thing to come off was the clutch.  Looking at the clutch plate from the outside, the absence of dirt and grime suggested to me that the clutch disc inside was going to be in pretty good shape, and fortunately, this proved to be the case.  In fact, I was encouraged because the lack of wear on the disc suggested that it was a replacement, and that the car had not been driven a great deal.  This in turn made me think that then engine was likely to be in pretty good shape.

New cylinders and pistons

These cylinders are shot

The cylinders, however, told another story.  Although they did not appear to be leaking gases at either the base or the heads, these unpainted and untreated steel pieces were covered with rust.  On a VW engine, the cylinders are designed to be easily replaceable and they are relatively inexpensive, so I decided to do just that.  A replacement set of cylinders with pistons and and wrist pins was just under $100.

The case gets cleaned up...

...and painted

The engine case was in need of a good cleaning, so after removing the cylinders, I spent a few hours going over it with a wire brush and some solvent.  Then I masked off the cylinder ports and gave the case a quick coat of black paint.

Pistons and wrist pins are first

The wrinkle band ring compressor

Next it was time to mount the new cylinders and pistons.  This required the use of two special tools, one of which I had to order.  I already have a set of locking ring pliers, but needed a wrinkle band ring compressor to slide the pistons into the cylinders.

Compressor in action

It worked perfectly

Auto parts stores do not sell this tool so I had to order it online.  With the pistons mounted on the connecting rods, I used the ring compressor and mounted all four cylinders.  It was starting to look good.  With a few more pieces, like the heads, pushrods and tubes, it would really start to look like an engine.

Ready for the heads

Both cylinders are on

I finished mounting all the cylinders and stepped back to admire my work.  I spun the clean and painted case around on the table a couple of times and decided to call it a day.  But before leaving, I somehow got the idea to check the fuel pump.  I'd taken the pump itself off the block a long time ago, leaving the plastic fuel pump pushrod guide in place to keep stuff from falling into the engine through the open hole.  Now that I had the beginnings of an engine block, the guide had done it's job, so I figured I'd pull it out to have a look at it.

Fuel pump guide, obviously broken

Disaster

I could not have been more disappointed when I pulled it out.  Instead of a whole guide, what I removed was broken, missing a fairly large piece at the bottom.  Whether it broke as I removed it (unlikely) or had been broken the whole time, I will never know.  But it doesn't matter.  I knew even as I saw the broken piece that there was only one outcome.  I would have to take the engine case apart, find the debris and rebuild it from the crankshaft up.

That piece?  In here...

Now, this is not the end of the world.  It's not even all that agonizing, since I still believe that with the new pistons and cylinders, this engine will run perfectly.  By tearing it down, I'll have an opportunity to be certain about the capability of this engine.  If the bearings (or anything else inside) are shot, well, then I'll know it's time to buy a new engine.

However, this is going to delay the completion of the project by a few weeks, to say the least.

Next:  What's inside.