Spare VW engines

So we've got a spare air-cooled engine or two around the house. In fact I have a 1500 single port and a siezed 1600 dual port. Well after today the 1600 isn't siezed and I know what went wrong with it back in it's day. I've always looked at these two engines as "take apart" engines. Sort of like my early preschool brand "take apart" car. I learned alot taking that toy apart and then re-assembling it. In the late '80's I did the same thing with a VW Super Beetle I bought for $200 and my father's Beetle. My beetle got re-assembled. Pop's didn't. But I learned a lot. (The confidence I built doing that work translated very nicely to engine swapping from a Chevy Malibu to a C-10 pick-up in the 1990's. It added years of life to the old blue truck.

So back to present day. Having the experience of Kiddo's Thing motor getting taken down and re-assembled in getting new main bearings, I decided to continue the take-apart project and put wrenches to engines today. Previously kiddo and I had pulled the carb off the motor of choice and tin as well, but today, I went a heck of a lot further. Generator stand, Distributor, Oil cooler, Valve Covers, Valves, Exhaust system, Heads, Push rods, Cylinder Jugs, Piston Heads, Armor (this was a 181 engine after all, armor was really the off road, skid plate stuff), Oil pump plate, Oil drain plate, Oil screen, the list seems like a lot, but it was all really pretty simple after the first bolt or eight. So it ends up the #3 piston had locked up. Lots of crud in it. I think it's a pretty normal way for an air-cooled to die. Something related to overheating or the like, I need to research more on it (should take like 10 minutes thanks to Google, just not now). So I pulled the Piston's off the rods (they're still in the case attached to the crankshaft) and am pretty amazed at how not engine like this engine looks right now. I mean, I'm used to seing an engine block, this thing is an engine shell. I love it.

I think I want to rebuild. It's a 181 case, I'll check the codes later to be certain, but everything that should have been there was. I just can't rememeber where Pop might have gotten it (I got it from him). I think I'll need pistons and cylinders for a start, new heads (trust me the old ones are shot, badly corroded by things that fell into the partially stripped engine and rotted), I'll need to see if there's any end play now that the flywheel will turn, but I'm getting ahead of myself. I started off just wanting to take it apart. Then as I was going, I was thinking, I'd love to save the case. That seems to be a given, now I think I want to build something back that's just simple and runs. I'm thinking a spare for Pepe' or Zippy. Shoot, I don't know, but I like what I've done and learned today. All smiles, this cadaver might live again.

-Rob "I'm a doctor Jim, not a Mechanic" D.