I picked up a used 2180 stroker that had gotten some water down into one of the cylinders. This original owner told the person I purchased it from that it only had a few miles on it. Nether the buyer or myself had heard it run so it was a total unknown conditionwise. This is what it looked like when I bought it home.

My wife thought I was crazy from looking at the outside, I wondered too. I pulled it down and sure enough one cylinder was toast.

Needless to say, I couldn't hone that damage out. The rest of the bottom end looked excellent. Bearings were almost new, the crank was forged with some beefy rods, cam and lifters were new and the case didn't look too bad.

Ed T. and I checked it and the case and crank which measured out std./std. All the bearing surfaces looked good so I decided to clean it up, polish the journals and replace the bearings.

I had the case boiled out and cleaned and noticed some water damage around the sump plate area. Sitting water will eat out a Mag case pretty bad if left with no attention, the resulting mess turns into a crusty varnish looking stuff that extends into the metal like a cancer. Apparently water had settled down to the bottom of the oil and corroded around the area where circle is cast for the oil strainer. Using a pick and some compressed air, I got out all the corrosion and attached a strainer gasket to the sealing surface. I then laid a coating of JB weld to recreate the lost metal. Luckily the sealing surface was untouched.

The JB weld isn't pretty but dries to a hard epoxy finish that holds up well to this type of application.

All the parts were cleaned, the lifters were lubricated with assembly lube. New bearings were installed and everything assembled. There wasn't much else of note with the shortblock assembly.

I'm in the home stretch with the new engine. I took the tin over to M&M Powder Coating and had it done in a Gun Metal Grey (they call it something else). I gutted the altermator and was going to polish the caseing but it turned out to be a huge job, there are many inperfections so I decided to just get it as smooth as I could and have it powdercoated with the rest of the tin. I think it gives it a unique look.

I had been planning on using some clipon aluminum valve covers but I didn't like the way the fittings for the crankcase vent hooked up so I got some stock valve covers and drilled them for the vents, I then had them welded in since they are notorious for leaking. I mounted the breather box on the front of the shroud out of sight and routed the hoses back up through the front tin. You can see the Kennedy 1700 lb. clutch in this picture. I went ahead and replaced the throwout bearing shaft with a HD unit and installed a quality TO brg.

The header is a 1 5/8" merged unit coupled to a ceramic coated Phat Boy muffler by EMPI. You can see the 010 I restored. The wiring will route over to the RH side hidden as much as possible.

This engine will replace this:

I go the engine installed this weekend after some test runs on the stand. Right off the bat it ran well and carburated cleanly due in no small part to the Dellortos. There were a couple of minor oil leaks to take care of (teflon tape on the full flow fittings) but they were easily fixed. I modified the manifolds for vacuum taps so I could use the motorcycle carb synch tool on this engine. It worked as expected and I was able to synch the front and rear venturis in each carb prior to installation. The fit is so tight that you could never do it in the car. I painted over the screws to keep them set and got everything ready for the install.

The engine bay looked pretty crappy so I attempted to sand it down and do some detailing, unfortunately it turned out to be a huge job due to the rubberized coating put on by the previous owner. I smoothed it as much as possible and covered everything with a satin black rustoleum.

The wiring was in need of some TLC and my original CDI location wasn't going to work with the new engine so I decided to tear it all out, put in some terminal strips and redo everything.

Since the engine doesn't have a mechanical pump anymore I needed an electric replacment. I originally planned on using a Faucet style pump with an external regulator but had heard about those units just giving up out of the blue leaving you stranded plus I didn't like the idea of a external regulator when you could get the entire package in one unit. CB Perf sells a carter rotary pump that's internally regulated to the required 3.5psi and comes with a late style metal canister fuel filter. The rotary pump is quiter and much more reliable. Since it's a pusher pump I needed to locate it up near the tank outlet. I mounted the whole assy on a plate which I located on the front side of the front firewall opposite of the mastercylinder.

Since the engine had been run a bit, I dropped the oil and replaced the filter. I also adjusted the valves.

It was now time to put in the engine. Since it was all powdercoated and looking nice I decided to protect the areas where I thought it may get scratched with some thick plastic tape.

I decided to use a Kennedy 1700 pound clutch in the car due to the extra horsepower. I also knew the clutch arm is a weak point so I decided to switch to a late style throwout bearing and arm. Mistake! The later transmissions use a guide tube located around the trans input shaft and my 69 tranny didn't have one. The modification involves tapping the trans housing for 3 bolts and putting one in. I didn't have that kind of time so I decided to revert back to the old style TO bearing. Since I didn't have the early HD arm available, I took mine and had it welded up to strengthen the throwout tangs. VW figured 2 small welds were enough for the stock pressure plate and they were right, it's lasted 45 years but I wasn't chancing it. So now I'm back to the early style clutch and ready to install the motor. Installation was fairly straight forward, the engine is slightly wider 13mm but the engine seals can accomidate that easily. What is a royal pain in the butt is using late tin in an early body. The 1600 engine is deeper front to back than the 1200 that was originally in this car, this difference shows up when installing the rear tin, it's like putting a tire on a rim with tire irons. This is the most critical time to be carefull about scratching your cylinder covers.

Once the engine was in and bolted down using all 4 mounting bolts I adjusted the clutch, I noticed the adjustment went almost all the way in before getting proper pedal feel. I should have stopped there and investigated but noooo, had to get it in and feel the HP! The carbs were next and what a job getting them in, the front manifold bolts required a blind contorsionist to get started and tightened up. After the carbs were on I mounted the remote oil filter system, header, muffler and ignition. The spark plug wires were another PITA to get connected to the front cylinders.

It fired off immediately and idled down nicely due to the pretuning. Test drive time, first thing I noticed the clutch wasn't right, pushed all the way to the floor and it still was hard to get into gear, I could tell it was dragging and there was a faint high pitched squeal when depressed all the way. I tried it out anyway. It ran like a scalded cat! Wow is all I can say. The power of a stroked engine must be felt to be believed. Gone were te mild anners of a 1600 cc and in it's place was a pissed off pitt bull. I quickly realized the ceramic muffler is for show, once the rpms hit 3K it's loud and very antisocial.

Ok the drive was over and i knew I had clutch issues, the engine had to come back out and I was dreading it.

I stayed up late and got everything removed and the engine dropped. Seems there is a collar I removed from the pressure plate for use on a late clutch system. I forgot to reinstall t when reverting back to the early release mechanism. That was an easy swap and I jacked it back up to slide it in. At this time I was working alone and trying to slide the engine back on to the input shaft. I could get it to go onto the shaft partially but not the last inch no matter how hard I tried.

Down it came and I rechecked it with the pilot tool, the tool slid into the disk easily so that couldn't be the problem. I tried again with no luck. By this time it was real late and I was pissed. Off to bed and hit it again the next day.

Sunday: The inlaws came in town to try their luck at the casinos, my 70 yo father in law didn't realize he volunteered for a lesson in VW engine installation. Actually he wanted to help and I didn't have to resort to bribes and threats. Laughing

Since the engine was out I decided to dis assemble the clutch and try the disk on the input shaft manually. It wouldn't go but strangly enough the pilot tool would. Definately strange. After inspecting everything closely I determined that the splines on the disk were damaged when I tried to put it in alone and the clutch pilot tool was worn enough to still work. Live and learn... Next time I'll get an old input shaft to use as a pilot tool instead of the plastic one.

Put it all back together and stayed up late again hooking everything back up.

Monday morning: Everthing was in place and ready to fire up. Turned the key and it hit off like I just parked it. Clutch was a little low and needed some more adjustment taken out (I'm real sensative to anything to do with the clutch now). The kennedy clutch is decieving, the high tension feels almost like a brake, it get progressively harder the further the clutch is depressed unlike a stock clutch where it releases and the pressure is consistant the rest of the way.

I warmed it up, set the timing to 28 degrees and took it out on a test ride. It's been raining off and on all weekend and the roads were wet. Anytime I'd rev it past 3K in second the back tires would break loose and it would get a little sideways. I could do it at will. This is going to be fun! I kept it (tried really hard) below 4k since the rings weren't seated and the engine was new. I'd heard the total seal rings were tough to get seated. Mine were definately not seated yet because I could see a slight amount of white smoke when revving it while stopped. I did the typical seating routing, run it up in second then pull your foot out of the gas and let the torque slow you down. Did that about 3 times and promptly forgot about it, since getting squirrley in 2nd and 3rd was so much fun. I stopped a few times to check for leaks but everything seemed good. I noticed my temp sensor wasn't working, that was probably due to the engine sitting down onto the oil drain sensor when I was trying to position it on 2x4s to jack it into the bay. Unfortunately I couldn't replace the drain with a standard one since the engine was full of oil and there wasn't room to get a pan under it. I did seem to get hot, I was half expecting it since the 65 engine compartment has very limited ventillation. Looks like I'll have to put on the standoffs, I don't mind the way they look but I hate the engine being open to the weather like that.

Longivity is an issue with this engine since I'm planning on using it as a daily driver. 100+ HP, 8.7:1 daily driver??? Well yeah, sort of... provided I can keep my liscense. This engine combo likes to run, it's powerband really comes alive around 2500 and I'm not sure of the upper limit but I suspect around 5500 since the cam is a 110. That's a mild combination pared to many 2110s out there. Hopefully that will help it live awhile. Since I'm bad for putting my foot in it, the jury is still out.

Well that's the story. 5 months and countless hours later it's done. Would I do it over, probably but it's allot of work. Many of the VW engine building techniques were new to me so i could do it allot faster and probably better the second time.

What do I think of the finished product? I looks like I achieved what I set up to do and it's very fast (for me), I love the power when the pedal is pressed but.... As I mentioned, the mild manners of a normal VW are definately gone. It drives in traffic ok but the clutch is harder to press down which I notice since the driving effort is inceased. This engine will out perform the chassis from the moment you let out the clutch. A bug was never meant for 100+ HP. 70 mph is effortless and 100 easily attainable. Luckily I have disk brakes, it's scarey enough with them, I can't imagine doing it with the stock drum brakes. This combo definately isn't for everyone. A T4 conversion probably makes the most sense, it retains the mild manners, easily exceeds 100hp and runs cooler due to it being much closer to stock configuration. Unfortunately, a T4 conversion can be an expensive proposition.

What resources did I use. Well, I picked peoples brains anytime I had the opportunity. I read the performance forum on thesamba relegiously and used the search function when I needed an answer to a question. Most have been asked before, use the search function, it's your friend.

The book, how to hotrod VWs is great. Although the information is dated, it's still applicable. The author walks you though the steps of many of the difficult procedures. Take my word for it, VW engines have their own set of techniques and things that work and things that don't so any information is valuable.

Hope you enjoyed the article.

Chris