And the # 3 Cylinder Bites the Dust!

My blue Speedster has been running pretty crappy lately, not idling well and popping out of the exhaust on deceleration. I cleaned the idle jets on the 40 Webers and found that the driver side jets were clogged. That fixed the idle problem, but did nothing for the popping. I noticed that removing the number 3 cylinder plug wire made almost no difference, so I took it in to my mechanic this morning. He did a compression check and gave me the bad news.

I think he said #3 cylinder was about 60PSI. He said it's most likely a "burned piston" and will run me around $1000 for 4 new pistons and liners. He did say that it could also be the head, but #3 is the one that always goes bad. His repair will also include what he called lower cooling tins, which I have never heard of, but it sounds like it makes sense. I told him to do the work, because I was planning to drive the car to Tahoe this weekend.
Troy

#3 does tend to run hotter than the rest.
Did he also do a wet compression test? This is a must as it will tell if it's a valve or rings. A shot of oil down into #3 spark plug hole then do a second compression test, if the compression reading comes up, it's rings. A burned piston will cause the motor to smoke as it will have a hole in it allowing oil to pass from the case into the combustion chamber and be burned. Cool tins do work somewhat a long as all the other usual cooling issues are spot on.
If it is a piston R & I the motor and replacing the piston - cylinder set for a grand, is a fair price. While it's out, I would carefully check the valves and straight edge the head surfaces too. Also replace the main rear seal, (reconfirm the end play) inspect the gland nut and confirm that it is torqued to the correct ft lbs. Replace the oil cooler O' rings, new push rod tubes and seals. Make sure that he sets the compression ratio correctly.
My condolences to your wallet. ~Alan

There are mixed opinions on the cool tins.

They were not designed by VW for type 1 engines.

I took mine off after reading about them on theSamba.

You may want to do a search there.

Alan. What would we do without you?!?!?! Thank you, but I do think your pulling my leg about "setting the compression ratio". ;-)
Troy

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/classifieds/search.php?submit=yes&keywords=pistons&type=text&stype=all&username=&yearfrom=&yearto=&pricefrom=&priceto=&model[]=§ion[]=69&wanted=show&zip=&zipdist=0&state[]=&usaregion=&country=&sort=date&sort_order=DESC&submitButton=Search

$1K for Type 1 pistons / cylinders is waay too much

not sure what size you are going for - but 94 fordged wiscos are only $350. that is just for parts, but these engines can be pulled in under 1/2 hour a full gasket set is only ~$50

that leaves you ~$500 for labour + tax. seems pretty steep to me.

and no - alan wasn't joking about setting the CR. you'll need to CC your heads to start.

I'm guessing you won't be doing the work yourself?

doing a piston/cylinder replacement is not hard at all and required basic tools (except to set the CR - that can be a bit tricky, but still not super hard).

Mango - we think alike and just look at cost of parts! Mechanics working on engines seem to command $100/hr plus they charge you retail. So wrenching adds 3x the cost of just parts. I bet its a valve or valve seat and you'll be looking at new heads or head repairs too! Might be time to replace clutch disc too - $30.

gotta love these type 1s
i might be weaning myself away from them and going to a dependable V8 other car..

He should have done a leak down test.

That would have told him immediately where the problem exists. As stated, more than likely, it's not a burned piston but more like a burned valve or bad cylinder head.

Too bad you're in Fresno, I could save you a lot of money.

Forget the cool tin. The standard flat plated that goes between the cylinders is more than adequate. Years ago, a guy bought a bunch of the Type 3 cooling tin. He decided to sell them to the public and called them "Cool Tin" and convinced everyone that they cool better than the flat piece of tin that's standard on a Type 1 engine. Everyone bought into his story and now everyone thinks you must have it to cool your engine.

Works on Type 3 engines with horizontal cooling. Does nothing to increase cooling on a Type 1 with vertical cooling.

Be VERY careful with your wallet once the engine is out, things add up really quickly and seem like a splendid idea when you hear them. "Makes good sense, doesn't it?" is a phrase often heard when mechanics suggest preventative maintenance to the engine since it's out anyway.

Replacing a main seal can quickly turn into a new clutch and possible KEP pressure plate upgrade. "Why not a new throwout bearing while we're in here?" comes trippingly off of the tongue. Then the inevitably transaxle mounts replacement 'cause, "It'll have to be done SOMETIME."

If you replace the engine main seal, you should replace the transaxle seal as well. Of course, with the engine out, you're going to see how the body was mounted and sealed to the pan and want to address some of the small rushed things that were done at the "factory."

"Is that clutch cable supposed to look like that?" comes next. A new throttle cable wouldn't hurt, and "should the bowden tube be bent downward THAT far."

Not to mention balancing the carbs and a new fan belt while you're at it, changing the oil cooler "O" rings, the aforementioned end-play, adjusting the valve lash, "These valve stems could make good use of a set of lash caps." "One of these springs has weakened." and so on.

In New England we replace the piston, period. Possibly hand-hone the barrel and replace it only if needed.

Be careful out there.

Luck,

T

Thanks for all the advice. I should have said he can do it for under $1,000, so it could be substantially less. At least I know him and have used him a lot of times in the past. I took my wife's Ford Taurus to him once thinking it needed a new AC compressor, but it turned out to just need a clutch. He could have easily charged me a lot more. I have used him for my silver Speedster and my blue one in the past and have always found him to be honest. He works on everything under the sun and I've seen a Rolls in his shop as well as some very nice Porsches and Ferraris. He used to own an IM. So I feel like I have a pretty good basis for trusting him, but I will keep my eye on him.

hmmm, interesting, I published this as part of an answer on another thread and it ended up here...sorry about that. Must be pilot error... please disregard...

#5

The "cool Tin" looks like this:

http://www.type2.com/rvanness/kooltin.htm

After looking at the attached link, someone specify the EXACT piece of cooling tin being talked about...?
http://www.vw-resource.com/engine_tin.html
ADD: http://www.vw-resource.com/cooling_qa.html#tin
OK-just saw a response below. Got it, thanks!

Troy:

I was driving around today doing errands and thinking about your "why is it always #3?" comment, and it occurred to me to ask this:

I know that you have an external oil cooler on your 1915, but do you also have the stock, VW cooling tower inside of the fan housing?

Sometimes, when an external cooler is installed the builder uses an adapter in place of the tower, just runs oil lines from the adapter to the external cooler and that's all they use. BIG no-no! This type of set-up always makes Cyl #3 run hotter than the others.

You should be running the stock cooler in place, and have oil output coming off of the oil pump cover and oil return going to a fitting slightly above and to the left of the oil pump.

If you DO have a stock cooling tower, make damn sure that it doesn't have any bent vanes which would obstruct the air flow through it and on to #3. The vanes (easily bent, too) should be straight and none of them should be touching together.

If you do NOT have the stock VW cooling tower, get one appropriate for your fan housing and get it installed. Believe it or not, the engine cools better with the tower installed as the fan shroud was designed expecting it to be there. Remove it and the air flow gets all screwed up and #3 gets MUCH hotter than the other cylinders.

Regardless of which alternative you currently have, you should also have ALL of the directional air vanes inside of the fan shroud as well as a good, operating thermostat installed below the cylinders. It will cool better with all that stuff installed and operating correctly.

Of course, if you don't currently have a stock tower you'll have to get the case drilled and tapped for a free flow oil system, but whoever does your rebuild can do that.

gn

I won't spill the beans but wait till you hear how it got fixed ~Alan

OK. My mechanic called me this morning and said that my car would be smoking if it was a burned piston and that he wanted to do a leak down test and a wet test, before he pulled the blue Speedster engine.

I called him later and he had good news. The compression leak was coming from the exhaust valve. He took the rockers off and banged the valve and it broke loose the carbon (or what ever it was) and the compression went back up to 145psi and quit running erratically.

He also replaced my plugs and my plug wires with better wires and put on some small cooling tin, that was apparently missing from underneath the engine. He also adjusted the valves and carbs (40 Webers). Instead of $1000, my bill was $352.

Now, when you pull any of the plug wires, there is a significant difference. However, it is still popping out of the exhaust on deceleration. He claims it's my crappy muffler, but I'm not convinced. Otherwise, it seems to idle fine and accelerate fine.

Any suggestions?

Troy,
My Vintage 1915 also backfires like mad on deceleration. Larry Jowdy checked it out for me and concluded........crappy muffler.

So what do we replace a crappy muffler with?

A-1 Performance sidewinder exhaust with MagnaFlow muffler (and flanged heater/j-tubes).

But I like the looks of dual exhaust pipes better.

Guess ya gotta pick - Show or Go! Take a look at the stainless steel Vintage muffler on SAMBA (although tips may need to be lowered to clear rear pan). Sounds like time for a can of SEAFOAM in the gas - wonder elixir.

Hmmm, sounds like time to drive it like you stole it! No more puttering around, ok?

The berg 932 has dual exhausts - they exit right behind the wheels.

I get a little burble on rapid deceleration - sounds hot-rod-ish. Kinda like it means business...

So do the experts agree that exhaust back firing on deceleration can be a crappy muffler? My muffler has about 14,000 miles on it so I guess it could be bad.

Troy,,, Typically, during deceleration if you get popping sounds, it's one of 3 things. A bad muffler, an exhaust leak (cold air mixes with the hot gasses and makes loud popping sounds and the worst is a burned exhaust valve. (In most cases, you'd notice an acceleration problem and general performace problems if the valve was burned)

With an insulated pair of pliers, remove the #3 spark plug wire from the distributor cap while the engine is running. Hold the wire above the cap and look for a spark that jumps between the wire and the #3 hole in the cap. What you're doing is forcing the coil to produce more voltage to jump that gap. If their is no difference then swap the #3 with the #4 wire. Test again. If the #3 wire is bad, then the #4 plug will appear dead and the #3 will be working fine.

In most cases, a long distance diagnosis only works "sometimes" It's always better if the car in present so the mechanic and "hear" and see the problems.

I get some mild popping on decel since I had the a-1 exhaust installed. But car runs smoothe in all gears with no perceivable decline in power. Am I missing something???? Bob---- Have 2110 with weber 40s.

Bob,
I had the same issue when I installed the A1 system.
I increased the size of the venturis on my Weber 40 idf's from the stock 28 to 34.
More power.
No more popping.

Terry, right you are! A lean condition can cause the popping. Whether it be from a leak or jetting, lean sounds like the culprit.

Thanks, Terry.

Not a type 1 fan, nor do I work on them, but someone who was told me something a long, long time ago about them that I've never forgotten.

He said #3 cylinder runs hot. It runs hot when it's 36 horsepower and it runs hot when it's 136 horsepower. He said that the german distributors have the #3 contact in the cap slightly askew of the rest to slightly retard the timing to that cylinder which helped it run cooler.

I've never heard anyone else volunteer that and have always wondered if it was true. This guy was actually an automotive engineer from Germany no less, but for all I know he went to MSU (Make $hit UP)...

angela

Think about that for a second (well, maybe a couple of seconds if you're over thirty)....

It really doesn't matter if the contact in the cap is off-position by a few degrees does it?

That doesn't matter, because it's not the CAP that determines when the points (or point equivalent) close to cause the coil to change state and produce a spark, it's the lobe on the cam that does that. Now, maybe the cam lobe for #3 is ground off a few degrees from 90 degrees to retard just that cylinder, but I've never heard that one - it could be, but then maybe not.

I HAVE heard that a VW engine will run hotter without the stock cooling tower than with it installed, so it wouldn't surprise me at all that those wild and crazy VW engine designers ( Hans and Fritz ) would do something like that in the cam.

But THAT would make it run slightly uneven, wouldn't it? Just one cylinder would be retarded and, therefore, weaker than the rest, like just enough for an ear-tuner like me to notice it, right? Like it sounds as though it's grinding up Walnuts in there or something??

Properly tuned VW engines don't sound uneven to me.

The #3 cam lobe is off on some distributors.

I think it is the older ones, pre doghouse shrouds.

Angela is correct, sort of. The #3 lobe on the dizzy was in fact retarded a couple of degrees on the old German distributors. Don't ask me which ones, I don't remember any more.

That said, on a 911 fan on a type1, which I have, #3 runs just fine. It is #4 that runs hot, as it just doesn't get enough air from an axial flow fan that is on an engine it isn't designed for. So that's where the CHT sender is, on #4.

Gordon is right though, about shrouds. The factory shroud with oil cooler, all flaps and a thermostat can't be beat. It just works, keeps it cool, and even temperature across all cylinders. The only thing that performs as well is a DTM, and only because the research went into it.

Dang, so that guy wasn't selling me muffler bearings, eh Danny and Michael? It was one of those things that sounded so plausible (when you think from the german perspective) but I've never heard any one else confirm it. Lobe makes more sense than the cap, I tend to forget that these motors were points... Anyway, thanks for confirming with the correct details- I KNOW you you aren't doing an "MSU" - !!!!

angela