ShopTalk Forums | Aircooled VW Tech & Restoration Help

Been wanting to make a build thread for my 2110 for awhile, and would like to show in detail what it takes to build such an engine. I'd like to take the information available about building this type of engine and merge it into my build thread, so that this thread can be used by others to learn mentally about the modifications such as clearancing for a stroker crank, setting the deck hight properly, dialing in the cam, setting up the valve train geometry, and the many other mod's needed to assemble a larger displacement engine correctly, all while visually seeing my engine come together. Pretty much all of the information I've found and will be posting comes from reading forums such as this one, thesamba, and the CLF; also from reading books like How to Hotrod Volkswagen Engines by Bill Fisher and The Step by Step Guide to Engine Blueprinting by Rick Voegelin, and also by talking in detail with local VW engine builders.

So that's the intro, here's the parts I've selected to assemble into what hopefully becomes a potent street engine. My goal is to have a streetable engine that will also hold it's own at the local eighth mile strip. The car it's going into is a full weight '64 sunroof. I still have to pick the exact gear ratio's, but will it will have close 3-4 gears and a 4.12 R&P. Tires will be 165's for the street and around 26" tall 215/65-15 M&H DOT's for the strip. I'd like the engine to make power up to around 6700-7000 rpm, and I think the 4.12 will be better suited to this powerband. My original plans were to use a Web Cam 86b, but I've read that the Engle FK-10 starts making power around 2800 rpm, so it would still have good bottom end power and would make a bit more top end power than the 86b. Also thinking of using one of the FK-40 series cams that have a steeper opening ramp for quicker valve opening. These are said to make very good bottom end power while making power at high rpms.

Now on to the parts list:

New OEM engine case, 8mm case savers, drilled and tapped oil galleys, cut for sand seal, bored for 90.5's,
welded behind #3, clearanced for 82mm stroke, silicon bronze lifter bore sleeves,
and ported main bearing webs between the cylinder openings. Other mods will be highlighted in the build thread.
CB Performance Super Race forged 4340 crank, counterweighted, nitrided VW sized journals.
CB Super Race Rods, 5.4", ARP 2000 3/8 bolts
Mahle Forged 90.5B pistons/cylinders, machined for .005" deck. (what i'm currently working on)
Web Cam 86b camshaft, clearanced and lobes polished, although I may go with a 86c, FK-10, or FK-46 ( again, will have close gears, 4.12 r&p to use higher poewerband)
CB Super Lightweight lifters, faces polished, added oil grooves.
CB Straight cut cam/crank gears. (I like the noise)
Planning on using DRD L6 CNC 42x37.5 heads and DRD CNC match ported CB big beef manifolds.
Italian Weber 48 IDA's, around 40mm vents, tall manifolds, individual UNI filters mounted on velocity stacks.
9.2-9.5 Static CR (if i use 86b cam, higher if i use others listed)
CB .040" copper gaskets.
AirCooled.net HD straight aluminum pushrods
JayCee billet pushrod tubes.
Pauter billet roller rocker arms, 1.5:1
CB/Shadeck Maxi 30 oil pump (May seem big but I'm doing oiling mods so I belive will need the extra volume)
Bugpack DDS style 1.5 qt deep sump.
12# flywheel, 200mm, 6V ring gear (still using a 6V starter).
Hybrid OG 36 horse/late doghouse fanshroud, no heat outlets, all german metal with correct internal vanes, will have all factory cooling tin, welded & balanced wide fan, FI velicity ring, flaps and thermostat, hoover bit, sled tins.
Homemade 1 5/8" heater boxes in OG housings,
1 5/8" A1 Sidewinder header, thinking about dual mufflers so it's quiet.
Still have to plan a breather/crank case ventilation system.
Brad Penn Oil, thinner/thicker weight will be used to adjust the oil pressure to within a proper operating range.
Jeg's Pro-Flo 350 series AN hose/Black fitting for fuel/oil/breather lines.

I'm sure I've left out things but they'll show up once the build gets started.

So there's my plans for the engine and for this thread. Any ideas and suggestions are welcomed and will be greatly appreciated, and please add any relevant information if you see that I've left anything out!

(edited to update the title name)

First update!

I picked up the block and cylinders from the machine shop today; now I can mock it up and measure the new deck height and determine how much to take off the top of each piston to get my target deck height dead on .005". I'll save those details for later; I would like to start the build thread as if I were starting with no work done to any part of the engine, and step by step go through each stage of assembly, starting with block modifications.

In the next few days I will be going through the pictures I already have of the work thats been done to date, and will take new pics to fill in any missing steps so that every part of the build will be documented visually. When possible I'd like to show before and after pics of each modification, and explain in detail what it takes to do it. This may take me a couple weeks to catch up to where I am now with the build. I'll also try to include info and pics of some of the tools I'm using to build the engine.

As said before, commenting with suggestions or ideas will be appreciated!

Cool, I love these type threads.

Did a similar thing over in the Forced Induction section
http://www.shoptalkforums.com/viewtopic ... 3&t=125546

Try and post pics of everything, believe me you will refer to the pics down the road and having them all in one thread is really handy.

Good luck and we'll be watching....

Very cool thread, keep it coming!

If you want you're peak power to be around 6700 to 7000rpm's you will need the fk-10 or the 86c.The 86b will not give it to you.

vwracer1218 wrote:If you want you're peak power to be around 6700 to 7000rpm's you will need the fk-10 or the 86c.The 86b will not give it to you.

vwracer, you are correct. After reading this thread- http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewto ... ld&start=0 I've decided to go with an Engle FK-40 series cam. I can go with one that gives more upper range power, and the quicker opening ramps will retain good bottem end drivability.

theastronaut wrote:

vwracer1218 wrote:If you want you're peak power to be around 6700 to 7000rpm's you will need the fk-10 or the 86c.The 86b will not give it to you.

vwracer, you are correct. After reading this thread- http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewto ... ld&start=0 I've decided to go with an Engle FK-40 series cam. I can go with one that gives more upper range power, and the quicker opening ramps will retain good bottem end drivability.

I think the fk-10 is a better overall choice for a motor that is built to stay together for a long period of time.The reason being is the 40 series cams are hard on lifter bores and valve train parts.To get the power band you want you will have to use a fk-45 or 46,and it will not start making power any sooner than the fk-10.As far as being smoother on the bottom end,my 86x94 motor with a fk-10 drives as smooth as a stocker.But than again ,I'm a tuning freak and that can make a big difference.good luck!

vwracer1218 wrote:

theastronaut wrote:

vwracer1218 wrote:If you want you're peak power to be around 6700 to 7000rpm's you will need the fk-10 or the 86c.The 86b will not give it to you.

vwracer, you are correct. After reading this thread- http://www.thesamba.com/vw/forum/viewto ... ld&start=0 I've decided to go with an Engle FK-40 series cam. I can go with one that gives more upper range power, and the quicker opening ramps will retain good bottem end drivability.

I think the fk-10 is a better overall choice for a motor that is built to stay together for a long period of time.The reason being is the 40 series cams are hard on lifter bores and valve train parts.To get the power band you want you will have to use a fk-45 or 46,and it will not start making power any sooner than the fk-10.As far as being smoother on the bottom end,my 86x94 motor with a fk-10 drives as smooth as a stocker.But than again ,I'm a tuning freak and that can make a big difference.good luck!

The lifter bores have been sleeved with silicon bronze, and honed to get the oil clearance exactly whithin spec using my lifters. Brothers Machine was the only shop that mentioned that they would need my lifters to set the oil clearance, I liked that and let them do the work. I think they would hold up to using a fk-40 series cam.

What carbs (or FI?) are you running on your engine? I'll be running IDA's with the third progression hole drilled, and others running them have them dialed in well for driving on the street. I'm interested in using EDIS ignition on the engine, and that would open up a range of tunability that distributors can't match.

Don't get me wrong,I know the 40 series cams run well.And since you have the bores bushed handles that problem.What I don't like about the ramps is that they are so quick and with heavy spring tension that is required can promote wiping.I've done it in one of my street motors in less than 500miles.Race motors are a different story,usually they get serviced long before damage.But,some may have better luck than I did.I use 48IDA's built at A.C.E with third hole ,40 vents.My car runs as smooth as any fuel injected car.As for as dist,I use a MSD which is very tunable.

I can't but Tom Notch can.

vwracer1218 wrote:Don't get me wrong,I know the 40 series cams run well.And since you have the bores bushed handles that problem.What I don't like about the ramps is that they are so quick and with heavy spring tension that is required can promote wiping.I've done it in one of my street motors in less than 500miles.Race motors are a different story,usually they get serviced long before damage.But,some may have better luck than I did.I use 48IDA's built at A.C.E with third hole ,40 vents.My car runs as smooth as any fuel injected car.As for as dist,I use a MSD which is very tunable.

I appreciate the input. I'm going to do some more research before I make a final decision on the cam. Also, been thinking about using beehive springs; these may control the FK-40 series' fast ramps without using excessive spring pressures. I have info on a company that makes beehive springs for VW's, will call them and see what they have to say about this cam/spring combination.

Agreed that the MSD is tunable, and MSD or Mallory was my first choice until I learned about EDIS + Megasquirt/Megajolt. I guess I should have explained what I meant about EDIS being more tunable than a distributor. With EDIS/MS I can adjust the "centrifugal advance" curve similar to how a MSD/Mallory can be adjusted. With the IDA's there is no vacuum port; can't run vacuum advance to kick in extra timing under low loads to increase driveability and gas mileage. If I understand correctly, I can add a throttle positon sensor to one of the carbs, and can program a part throttle advance curve like a SVDA style distributor would have. After pricing a Mallory Unilite ($340) with vac and centrifugal advance (both adjustable, but the Vac advance would be useless with IDA's), a Hyfire VI-AL CDI/Revlimiter ($240), and a Promaster coil ($65), I can convert to EDIS/MS and still come out cheaper than a typical high performance ignition system.

david58 wrote:I can't but Tom Notch can.

Thanks, I appreciate others posting things that would be helpful to this thread, and relevant to the topic, but there are other forums and topics for that other stuff

Ive got the pics of the case porting around the main webs uploaded. Since I took these pics I've noticed another area that I believe can benefit from porting and I'll post up some pics once the mod is completed.

Here's the before pics, after the cylinder bores were opened up for the 90.5's.

And here's the after pics. I'll try to round up the tools I used to open up the webs and smooth them out and add pics of them too. It's easy to see how the larger and smoother openings will help internal air flow/windage. There should be much smoother air flow inside the block, hopefully reducing oil foaming and reducing the pumping losses (free horsepower ) caused by internal air being pumped back and forth between the main web openings by the back side of the pistons. Oil splashed on these areas may also drain to the sump easier.

Here's the different carbide burrs, flap wheels and sanding drums I used to open up and shape the ports in the main bearing webs. I used an air drill/grinder and a Dremel. If I were to do it again, longer reach burrs would make it easier to get to some of the hard to reach areas. The taller, narrower flap wheel was also alot more handy that the shorter, wider one. The burrs remove material very quickly, and leave a semi-rough finish. The sanding drums will smooth the finish, but it's hard to make the surface exactly even; they want to 'dig in' with such a small contact area. The flap wheels are great for blending the sanding/grinding marks into a completly smooth and level, finished surface.

We used to polish the entire inside of the case with HD motors back in the day...
While you got all of the polishing stuff out...

With the oil slinging off the crank, it can't hurt.
(Maybe hurt your fingers from all that polishing)