It's Alive!

Finally, we got the engine put back together and in the car.  It even runs.  Now we have to set the timing and adjust the carburetor to get in top shape.  I purchased a new electronic distributor, but every one that knows about VWs is telling me that the one I got is worthless.  Just my luck.  I hate points, so I'll probably just install the electronic parts inside my original distributor.

Now we can move on to the last few restoration areas, like the interior and installing disk brakes in the front end.  That should wrap this puppy up.  Then the fun begins.  Daniel gets his drivers permit in September!  I'm almost scared to let him drive this thing.  It's like brand new!  Oh well, it's just a car ... right?  Later

Engine Rebuild

For the last two months I have been rebuilding the 1600 cc Dual Port VW engine in Daniel's Super Beetle. This has been a labor of love, and I do mean a LABOR!  I've rebuilt about 10 engines in my life from all different makes and models, but this is my first VW engine.  I'm not sure what those Germans were thinking! The engine design is simple, but way different from American motors. The good news is that the basic principles are the same.  Thank God for You-Tube!  I've watched a ton of videos to learn the tricks of the trade in assembly.

I spent a lot of time deciding what colors to paint the engine.  When I was a teenager, I leaned towards yellow and black color schemes.  If was different then, but I thought it looked nice.  Now that this bug is yellow, I toyed with the idea of a yellow and black motor, but I finally landed on a silver and black scheme. I think it looks clean this way.  I also installed a newly released galvanized exhaust system.  I wanted to stay stock, but these pipes were better made and they were less expensive.  Ya just can't beat that deal.

Here are a few pictures of the assemble process.  I hope you enjoy the pics.

Power Plant Work!

After fixing the starter problem, I discovered a performance issue with my engine.  The heat riser is a tube that vents exhaust gas under the intake manifold to help the gas from the carburetor atomize before reaching the heads.  My heat riser is completely clogged.  This is a common problem older cars.  This clogged heater makes the car run like the engine is dead cold.  After the choke goes off, the car runs really bad.

To fix the problem, you must remove many major engine components to access the heat riser.  I came to realize that it would be easier to remove the engine than to disassemble it inside the car.  Soooooo, guess what I did all day yesterday?  Yep, I pulled the engine.  The good news is that I had help from a good friend and his two sons, along with Daniel.  It was a team effort, so we got a lot done pretty quick.

Once I started taking the engine apart, I saw that I really just need to tear it all the way down and rebuilt it from ground up.  Sitting for seven years allowed massive condensation to get inside the engine and rust was pretty bad.  Oh well, it a hobby, right?  ;)

Bad Bumpers!

Well, after fighting with the original chrome bumpers and losing, I decided to go with simple T-Bars.  For whatever reason, the back bumper was higher on the ride side.  The brackets must have been bent.  The front bumper, that was given to me when I bought the car, was too small.  It was obviously not for a Super Beetle.

As for the T-Bars, I chose black, since most of the car's color scheme has been yellow and black.  Here are a couple of new pictures.

Starting Problems Fixed!

For almost a year, we had a serious problem with the electrical wiring in this car.  When we first bought it, the owner told us that the ignition switch was bad and the car would not start.  He gave us a new switch to install, but that did not fix the starting problem.  After months of troubleshooting, I found some burnt ignition wires under the dash.

After repairing those wires, the car started intermittently. Two months later, the problem returned and it would not start at all.  Man was I ticked off!  I could not find any reason for the starting problem.  The circuits were all good.  Low and behold, I found that almost all older VW's has a similar problem that was easy to fix.

The issue was corrosion in the wires that caused enough resistance to prevent adequate current flow to engage the starter.  Compounding this problem was the fact that, by design, all that high voltage had to run from the back of the car, up through the small plastic ignition switch, back to the starter.  This long path added to the resistance problem, especially when the wires were old and corroded.

The good news was that a simple relay could be installed at the back of the car, which shortened the distance of the high voltage from the battery to the starter.  Wowser - a cheap and easy fix! During my Google search about this, I found out that nearly every vintage VW owner knew about this and had installed a starter relay in their car. Unfortunately, I was new at this and I didn't know many VW owners.

In any case, the starter problem is now resolved!  Today we turn the key and the bug fires right up.  Praise the Lord!