My rail project (56K go bake a cake)

[DubsMcGee]

Someone in The Samba forums asked me to post up a link to my rail buildup so here it is.

http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=2748027&page=1

Pics for clicks

[SANDDUDE]

Welcome........Looks like a good start

[DubsMcGee]

Well I was asked to post the entire thing on here rather than just a link to the original so I will.

I recently picked up an engine out of a trashed '71 beetle along with the transmission, swing arms, brakes, etc.... I dont have a truck so I had to figure out a way to get this thing home and as you can see I managed.





Next the engine was dismantled to see what damage had to be repaired. When I drained the oil from the engine about a gallon of water came out as well :banghead: there is plenty of rust in the intake manifold so that is my idea of how it got in, good thing these blocks are aluminum or I would have been in a lot of trouble. Other than that everything seemed to be in decent condidtion, but we decided to replace pretty much everthing anyways.






Now it is time to get the heads reworked and cook all of the parts that can not be sandblasted to help in the cleaning process. Hopefully I will be picking up a frame in a couple of weeks to keep this project on track.

I will keep this thread updated as we moove along, and If anyone has any advice/tips/general knowledge they would like to share with me that would also be great.

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 8/6

I just finished mediablasting the intake manifold, tower, and the oil cooler attacher thing (dont know what else to call it) I forgot to take before pictures but you can probably imagine what 35 years of grease and grime looks like. I think everything turned out really good, everything looks brand new.



The heads are next, I spent some time with them in the parts washer and cleaned them up pretty good but they arent as clean as I would like them, so I think I'll mask them up and mediablast them as well. Here is a pic of them after the parts washer and before mediablasting.



I think I will to the same for the block, I'll just be extra careful masking it off so no critical surfaces get blasted. Well, that is all for now but expect to see more pictures of the cleaned block and heads next week sometime.

[DubsMcGee]

Update 8/9

Finished up some media blasting of the heads and the block today, I still have some sheet metal to do but nobody really cares about looking at that (in fact since there is barely anyone in the aircooled forum I dont really know why I am doing this at all, oh well). So here are some pics, I remembered to take before and after this time







Tomorrow, provided we get the crank back from being polished (didnt need grinding ) and the gears pressed on, the engine will start to take form. I'm also still in the market for a frame, so if anyone knows of one or someone that builds them in the twin cites area please let me know.

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 8/11

I finished cleaning up some of the sheet metal, but unfortunatly I still have more to do in the cabinet :banghead: :banghead: I took another step forward and did some painting today, and things are looking really good. I can not wait to see this engine complete still with many original parts that look new.

before blasting


after blasting


primered


painted


We will be getting the crank back next week. It turns out that one of the wrist pin bushings needed to be replaced but everything else is on the up and up. Once that happens you wont have to look at any more pics of bead blasted parts, and you'll get to see some real progress. Man am I excited.

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 8/18

Well like I said before we got the crank back from being polished and the rods got checked as well. One of the rods was a little out but the guy that checked them said it would not be a problem, they also got brand new bushings pressed in.



We then greased all the bearings and journals with assembly grease and put the rods on the crank and torqued to the recomended torque of 22-25 ft-lbs. we also made sure to give the nuts a good tap with a flat punch to ensure that they do not come loose.



Then we started to put the case together following instructons provided by "How to Build a dune Buggy" (I forget who it is by but if anyone wants to know more about it just ask and I'll find out). We greased up the lifters with wheel bearing grease to make sure that they stay in the block when we went to put it together. Also we put a light coat of silicone on the halves to ensure a proper seal when we put it back together.





Finally we got the block together and the sealing nuts torqued to 18 ft-lbs and the non sealing nuts torqued to 14 ft-lbs. everything went together pretty smoothly other than a slight hiccup with the installation of the cam and the crank bearings mooving around. That is all we accomplished last night because of the misquitos eating us alive.

Next I will be deciding what I want to do about the heads, either get the ones I have reworked or buy new ones. I have to talk to some people locally about reworking but hopefully I'll have made a decision by early next week.

I would like to also thank Don "Dirty" Lee (the guy sealing up the block that has the "Dirty5" ford you see in the background of the last pic) and Miller High Life for making this all possible :laugh: :laugh:

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 8/23

Within the last couple of days we havent gotten too much accomplished, however we did find the guy that is going to rebuild the heads and lighten the flywheel and we dropped those off to him yesterday.

What we did get done is put the jugs and pistons on, mount the oil pump (I opted for the one that allows you to run a filter), put the strainer in, mount the oil cooler, and put the pulley on. I actually stripped out one of the holes on the sump that the strainer mounts to but we quickly drilled and re-tapped that so it is all good. Also the new woodruf key that came with the crank insallation kit was too big for the slot so we ended up taking that one out and reusing the old one. Other than those two little mishaps everything went together very smoothly. Now on to the pictures.





I also finally finished sandblasting the sheet metal and got it all painted. And since we are waiting for the heads and have run out of stuff to do we put the fan assembly back together.



And since people have asked about the mystery car in the background of one of the previous pictures here are some more. The car is a 1935 Ford that Don's grandfather purchased brand new then sat in a field for 50 years and was restored during a period of 10 years. The car is almost complete, the only thing that is left is the headliner and some interior panels. The thing is SICK!!!





edit: One last thing, I have finally found the frame for the buggy!! We are driving down to Webster City, Iowa on 9/8 to pick up a BerrienBuggy Warrior Chassis from Jones Cusom Cars. It will be a complete chassis including rear torsion and front IRS.

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 8/25

Not a big one today but I do have some questions for you aircooled guru's. We rebuilt the carb last night and came across a few interesting things.

1) The carb that I got with the engine was not listed in the Chilton's manual I have (I do have one for the correct year of the car) The carbs that were listed were SOLEX 34 PICT 2/3 and the one I have is a SOLEX 34 PICT 4.

2) There is a wierd brass looking fitting in the bottom of the fuel bowl that was not listed on the diagram for the PICT2/3 and we are wondering what it is? (you can see it in the first picture).

3) The last thing we came across was the accelerator pump diaphram was much bigger than the diaphram that came with the rebuild kit (which supposedly was for all VW carbs) so I guess I am wondering what the deal is with PICT 4? Any information would be great. (you can see the difference in sizes between the diaphrams in the upper right of the second picture).

And some pictures of the rebuild (I didnt take one of after the rebuild because it looks the same as before)



CARNAGE!!!!

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 8/30

Another smaller update on the project. I got done painting some more stuff, mainly the tower and intake manifold. We also did some cleaning of the transaxle and got that pretty good. I still need to go back and get in the little nooks and crannies with a conical wire brush. Then tomorrow I'll give it a good painting to make it look like the rest of the engine.

Again I forgot to take a before shot but here are a few progress shots of the transaxle cleaning.













This is what it looked like after I attacked it with the wire wheel (the machined surfaces look polished )



Hopefully we get the heads and flywheel back sometime this week so we can have the engine and tranny done by the time we pick up the frame.

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 9/1

Alright! we got the heads back from being reworked, they have new valves, springs, guides, retainers, keepers, a 3 angle valve job, and they were flycut. We also got the flywheel lightened.


While I was at the shop I decided to pick up some more stuff. I now have a sand seal dipstick and pulley, a new gland nut and washer, new valve adjusters, fan shroud plugs, distributer clamp, and headers (I'm getting a stinger too but he did not have that in stock)





We also picked up a new starter




So we finally made some more progress on the engine and got the heads put on with little trouble (the pushrods were being a little difficult)



We then replaced the valve adjusters and put the rockers back on and spent entirely more time adjusting the adjusters than it should have taken. Damn 0.006" tolerances :laugh:





After those were all on we installed the new flywheel, nothing too special about that other than remembering to replace the 3 shims that we took out earler. Main seal first then flywheel not too incredibly hard to do.





We still need to torque the flywheel properly, all we did last night was hit it with the impact wrench at it's highest setting.

And then I saw this on my way to work this morning

:screwy:

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 9/6

Did a little more work last night in preparation for the frame pickup on friday, and ran into a snag or two in the process.

But on a lighter note here is a picture of my girlfriend doing the two things she loves most, talking on the phone and working on engines :laugh:



I did some test fitting the other night and it looks like all the sheet metal should go on without too much difficulty, I will probably have to pick up some of those spacers for the fan shroud due to the gap between it and the cylinder tins.



We ended up deciding to change the pulley to a sand seal type instead of the stock ish that was on there. I like the way it looks way better that the original one and now I dont have to worry about getting crap inside the engine.



I also got a nice billet sand seal dipstick.



Now when we installed the pully we had to put a spacer behind the generator pulley to account for the non stock placement of the new crank pulley and while I was pulling the generator pulley off I noticed that it was cracked pretty bad. The thing is being incredibly stubborn and does not want to come off.





We did, however make some progress. We got the distributor and fuel pump installed and set to about where we want it. We started the timing about 8 degrees before TDC, if anyone has some input on that I would be more than glad to hear it. The dizzy is a Bosch 009 with a breakerless ignition in it just in case you were wondering what those wires were for.



We also got the valve covers sealed and on, can you believe that those are original? I can barely believe it, I really like the way that they turned out.



And this is how she sits now.



We are driving down to Webster City, IA on friday to pick up the frame from Jones Custom Cars. The owner, Andy Jones, seems like a real nice guy and he has some very reasonable prices. I'm pretty excited to get down there and pick it up, expect an update soon

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 9/10

We finally picked up the frame!!!!!!
Oh man does this thing look nice, the drive to Webster City from the Twin Cities was fairly uninteresting but you definatly know you are in Iowa when you see a Kum & Go.



We arrived at Jones Custom Cars and immedaitly knew that we were at the right place when we saw all the scavanged aircooled parts lying around the yard :laugh:





After I got fitted for the seat position and shifter position he did some final welding and we loaded the frame on the trailer and proceeded to have a few with Andy Jones and his buddies, a great bunch of people just as I expected :thumbup:



Now it was time for the long, boring drive back, we hit some bad weather so most of the drive was spent trying to avoid rain and such. Here is some Iowa action.



We finally got back to the cities around 11pm (we left the cities at 2pm) and got the frame into the garage to protect it from the elements. Now Don has the best looking garage on the block.



This thing came with a lot of stuff for a very reasonable price.

Complete front suspension


Battery box


Beefed up torsion arms


Shifer and box


And a chassis brace kit






I also finished taking the suface rust off the frame with a spun fiber disk in an air drill and some scotch brite. This is what your hands look like after scotch briting a whole frame.



On another note we finished putting the shrouds on the engine, now we are just waiting to get the new generator pulley, coil, plugs, and some fuel line and the engine will be complete.





We did a test fit of the new exhaust, fits kind of crappy but that can be fixed.


I also finished painting the transaxle, it looks much better now.


We are going to start the final fab of the frame on Tuesday by welding mounting tabs and figuring out the rear shock mounts. Another update then.

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 9/13

Less of an update than questions for the gurus. We decided to test fit the tranny last night and make a plan of attack for tabs and more welding and such. I got a transmount with "straps" but when we went to test them out it seems as if they wern't made right. the rear strap runs into the bell housing and will not line up with the hole correctly.









and the front strap seems just as bad, it will not sit flush against both the tranny and torsion housing (it will sit flush with one but not the other). The whole thing just seems rally poorly thought out and put together. Any suggestions about getting it to work right, if not I'll just run without them. Oh and one more thing, I am assuming that you dont run any kind of additional transmission mount (poly or stock) with this set up.



However, I did take buggyman's advice and took the front sway off. We'll cut it later and put the pieces inside of the tierods to stiffen them up :thumbup:

[DubsMcGee]

UPDATE 9/15

I went back to Dune Buggy Supply yesterday and picked up some more stuff so that we can finish up the frame and get it painted/powdercoated. I got headlights, tail lights, a licenceplate light, IRS shock mounts, a shift rod, a new pulley, a chrome stinger and muffler, longer pulley bolt, shift coupler, exhaust nuts, u-joint, and some tools to make our lives easier.



We finally buttoned up the engine mechanically, now all we need is to get the coil and plugs and it'll be all ready to go.



Trying to decide where to mount the headlights and I would like some of your input on where to mount them, we have narrowed it down to 2 places.

here


or here


Now installation of the IRS shock mounts has us a little confused on where they actually go, we cant figure out if they mount right before the stub axle like in the picture or inbetween the stub axle and the traling arm itself. We are thinking that they install between the axle and arm but if anyone knows for sure please chime in :thumbup:





That's all for now, thanks for looking.