Cam Gears

How are you Carl? There are bigger than VW dual and triple springs that exert so much force on the cam thrust that with VW's helical gears they can wear out the cam thrust surface in a few miles. The cure is straight cut gear sets, but tend to be noisier. 

Correct, very noisy. Plus, that is a very good explanation of why there is a straight cut gear on certain engines. Thanks ALB.

In an open cockpit car like these - are the straight cut gears even noticeable while driving? I imagine they sound like a sewing machine at the stop lights, but other than that, how noticeable are they?

Ted

I think it depends on the gears (there are a couple different makers) and how they fit; on the Samba the odd person says they're not noisy at all, but that's not the norm. I do know a fair number of guys end up taking them out of their street cars because what seems "cool" at first grows old after a while. I've never run them, because even with dual VW size springs there's no need.

And thanks Dennis; glad to be of service I am! Yoda out.

I can attest to this. When I first got my engine back from Rascon it started making noise before I got it home. Turned out to be the cam thrust bearings. When opening the case up there was what seemed to be about 80-90 thousandths of an inch of play back and forth. This was creating a knock at idle that was very concerning.

Roland put the straight cut cam gears in and this particular set is not noisy at all. Very good solution for engines with bigger heads, lifters, and heavy valve springs. 

There is something else... I am a little hard of hearing! One thing I did notice was with the top up on the freeway there is a very high pitch whine that really irritated me at first. Now I don't even notice it. Perhaps everything wore in.

In unrelated news a woman called the fire department complaining of a gas leak. When the fire fighters arrived she pointed to her husband and said it was coming from him. The couple was fined $500 by the city.