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<x-charset iso-8859-1>3 different kinds of pistons? that must have been a joy to balance!! Perhaps that or an out of balance clutch/flywheel is what took out #1 main. Keith Keith Park Top Notch Restorations topnotch@nycap.rr.com 71 Squareback 65 Notchback 65 Squareback 75 Opel 87 Golf 88 Rx7 10th Anniversary ----- Original Message ----- From: Jim Adney <jadney@vwtype3.org> To: <type3@vwtype3.org>; Mike Wodkowski <wodkowski@mac.com> Sent: Sunday, October 28, 2001 9:00 PM Subject: [T3] Report on Mike Wodkowski's engine > I finally finished taking apart Mike's engine, so I can report on what > I found. > > Report on Mike Wodkowski's engine > > Mike's 72 type 3 engine had been rebuilt a couple of years ago and > run after that with dual Weber carbs. Mike had had continuing > difficulties with it and eventually traded it in for a complete 72 type > 3 engine with FI which I had built. This is what I found when I took > his engine apart. > > The thermostat linkage had come apart so that the cooling air flaps > were open all the time. > > The rearmost cylinder head stud on the lower right side had been > pulled out of the case about 1/4". > > There were 2 different brands of cylinders and 3 different kinds of > pistons in the engine. The #1 piston had a broken top ring and I > THINK it was installed upside down. > > The fan housing screws were loose and would have come all the > way out soon, making the usual racket and requiring disassembly > to fix. > > Both heads were the late (72-3) style with the breathers, but both > were rights, thus there was no boss for the FI temp sensor. > Someone had drilled and tapped one of the cooling fins for a temp > sensor and there was one still in there, with its lead cut off. I have > not disassembled the heads, but they look to be in reasonable > condition. > > There were a couple of stripped studs in the oil sump. > > The bearings were all standard. The case has never been align > bored, but it should have been. There was a wear ridge on the #1 > main bearing saddle where I am not used to seeing one. The ridge > on the #2 saddle was the normal one which would have required an > align bore, but the #1 ridge was actually worse. The bearings > themselves looked pretty reasonable, but it was clear that they had > been loose in the case, so oil pressure could not have been good. > > The six O-rings that seal around the 6 main bearing studs were all > baked so hard that they actually made a small "clink" when > dropped on the concrete driveway. I doubt if they had been > replaced at the rebuild. I had to break them to get them off the > studs because they would not stretch at all to get over the threads. > > The front seal was the late red silicone style and looks "new." I'll > reuse it. The flywheel shims look just fine, and I think we measured > the free play when we took the engine apart and it was just slightly > over spec. I think it would have been fine but for the main bearings > being loose in the case. > > The crank gears are in fine shape, but the spacer ring between the > gears was quite loose. I like to tighten those up when I do a rebuild > just to keep things stable. > > Given all the things that were wrong, I'd say that this engine swap > was done at a good time. Left alone, the loose bearings would have > done this engine in soon, and the broken piston ring and pulled > stud probably would have lead to significant loss of power. > > - > ******************************* > Jim Adney, jadney@vwtype3.org > Madison, Wisconsin, USA > ******************************* > > ------------------------------------------------------------------- > Search old messages on the Web! Visit http://www.vwtype3.org/list/ > > </x-charset>