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I’ve heard replicas described as paper-dolls for grown men, and it’s true. 

There is a subset of owners who like the idea of trying this or that and seeing how well they like it. I didn’t start out in this hobby thinking I’d be that guy, but here I am-- serving as a cautionary parable for all that can go sideways when you sacrifice treasure and reason in pursuit of… something.

Because a replica Speedster starts out as a simple device, how it’s festooned and fitted changes the flavor from one thing to the next. Unfortunately, this is one of the things I like (or tell myself I like) about owning my particular plastic fantastic. One can follow the worm-hole down as far as one wishes to go. There is no bottom.

Deciding what I want the car to be has always been the hard part for me, and it’s changed from one thing to another more than a few times over the years. Molding the car into one thing is hard enough, but attempting to make it into two things at the same time is an order of magnitude more difficult. My particular dysfunction has been trying to make it many things at once, which is a bit like alchemy.

I want my car to be good looking, race-car light, modern-car fast, handle well, and able to travel long distances in reasonable comfort. I’ve also been 100% committed to an archaic air-cooled power-train designed about 90 years ago to be cheap and disposable. None of the circles on the Ven diagram overlap easily, so I’ve fettled endlessly-- if not exactly robbing Peter to pay Paul, then borrowing from him, commoditizing the debt, bundling it, and selling it in an auction.

My solution over the years has tended toward adding complexity (often to the point of convolution) in an attempt to solve what I believe to be a complicated problem. This is antithetical to the original intent and primary appeal of these cars, but no matter-- it has been my little science project over the years.

I'm only happy when it rains
I'm only happy when it's complicated
And though I know you can't appreciate it
I'm only happy when it rains

Garbage

Dry-sumping allowed me to lower the car past where I’d have been able to with any extended sump. It also enabled me to use 911 oil sprayers to cool the under-side of the pistons, (due to the increased capacity of the pressure side of the pump, and because windage doesn’t matter so much when there’s no oil in the sump). The sprayers gave me the courage to bump compression up as well.

Then there is the twin-spark setup. The idea behind this is that with two flame fronts, combustion can be completed more quickly across a larger diameter cylinder. In theory-- this allows a higher compression ratio without pre-ignition, and should reduce the amount of total timing advance needed for complete combustion.

In addition to all of this, I also used thermal coatings in the combustion chambers, exhaust ports, and piston tops. The twin-plug thing required a kind of science project ignition, asking people to build things that were not commercially available. I have gotten very, very lost inside my own head over the years. I’ve sometimes struggle to determine if all this has kept me sane or driven me mad, but regardless-- the resulting car has been awesome

… except when it hasn’t been.

 

"BlazeCut®(TM) woulda' saved it!!"

Last edited by Stan Galat
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In the fall of 2018, after a summer of running like a scalded dog, I loaded the car on a flatbed and headed through the thunderstorms to the Maggie Valley in NC. I had hoped to drive, but the weather and the desire to continue in a happy marriage meant that I pulled the car down. The car ran well for about half of the first day in the mountains. Leon Chupp noticed a miss coming back from a run on The Rattler. By the time we got back to the inn, the car was running rough.

I carry no small amount of tools and spares, but nobody can carry the entire shop in the nose of a speedster. I checked the distributor, but could not get to the bowels of the science-fair project without a 7 mm socket (which I did not have). Stupidly, I forgot my maxim (99% of all carburation problems are ignition) and became convinced that my issue was fuel related (due to driving through Noah’s flood on the way out east). I tore the carbs off about 15 times. The car would run OK, then it wouldn’t. I had not come to the Smokys to sit in my hotel room, so I determined I would just drive it. On the way to the Dragon the next day, it bucked and farted and spit until I finally pulled off the road, defeated.

As I was standing there, staring at the distributor I knew was the issue, Tom Boney appeared and asked if he could help. Tom is one of the finest humans on the planet, but he has told me over and over for 10 years that he’s not a mechanic. I said, “without a 7 mm socket, I don’t think anybody can”. Tom went back to his car, and produced… a 7 mm socket.

I used the socket to get to the points replacement module and found the problem immediately. The module had loosened up on the mounting plate and was bouncing around in the distributor body. I tightened the mounting screws and the car started and ran much better than it had since the first morning. It still wasn’t right, but I drove the car for the rest of the weekend before I loaded it up and pulled it home. I pushed the thing into the garage and didn’t look at it for 6 months.

Last April, I decided to get the car ready for the summer, and pulled the air-cleaners off to clean and reoil them. When I looked down the throat of the 1-2 carb, I saw this:IMG-2791

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Apparently, on that drive to the Dragon one of the backfires got pretty out of hand, and got a little campfire going on the number 2 venturi. The fire melted my auxiliary venturi, and the running engine sucked the aluminum spatter down the length of the intake runner, into the head, and all over the back of the intake valve. I could only assume it had gone down the cylinder as well. 

The past few years have been a financial bloodletting. We had built a new house, and my shop was nowhere near ready to remove an engine, tear it down, and assess the damage. My season was over before it began. I put rags in the intake throats, and closed the deck-lid.

I set about finishing the shop, running my business, living my life, and taking a nice vacation with my wife instead of going to the mountains last September 

… and forming a plan, because it’s always good to have a plan.

I decided that as much as I love the Buck Rogers aspect of the twin plug engine, it is too complex and highly strung to serve as a mill to propel a car across the continent without undue drama. 

Reluctantly, I decided to remove one circle from my Venn diagram-- the one labeled “wannabe race-car”. Jeanie has a limited tolerance for balls-out corner-carving anyhow, and I had already put a “comfort” seat in her side (to go with the Speedster bucket in mine). Tube-frame IMs are lovely cars, with rollup windows and a lot of nice GT-style features-- but they are not light by any metric, and cannot be made to be so.

I decided to make the car into what it always should have been-- a long-legged GT, built to drive long distances in reasonable comfort. I got a second “comfort” seat, took it apart, remade the bottom frame to get it as low as it can possibly be in the car, reshaped the foam to fit my “unique” physique, ordered carbon-fiber seat heaters from Amazon, and took both seats to the best upholstery shop in the area to be recovered in leather. I’ll have them back by early May, Lord willing.

I swallowed hard and pulled the twin-plug 2276, then put it aside for a future project. I’ll likely rework the intakes in the heads, put an 84mm crank in it to bring it back to a 2332, and get a bigger cam, but that is a project for another day.

Around the first of the year, I discussed my desires with Pat Downs, and decided to build a 2234 with 92mm AA thick wall cylinders, Panchitos heads, and a CB 2292 cam and 1.4 rockers. That’s a big cam for a street engine, but the way Pat explained it-- the Panchitos have such great port velocity that bigger engines running these heads can tolerate a lot more valve overlap without getting soggy on the bottom end. It makes sense, and Pat has forgotten more than I’ll ever know, so I went with his recommendation. CB’s shop is backed up in the shop for way longer than I could wait, so I set about looking for somebody I trusted to do the machine work for the new build.

I contacted VintageVolks, which is a very small (two guys working nights and weekends) shop in Spokane, WA. We started out just talking about doing a case with the mods I wanted-- but after a lot of discussion, I contracted with them to build the entire long-block (explanation later). I’ll dress the engine with my DTM, (rebuilt) 45 Dellortos, and the exhaust from my 2276. Anand’s engine made 180 hp on Pat’s dyno, I’ll be happy with 150- 170. The flow numbers of the heads seem to support those numbers. 

The engine is being built on a new mag case, fully shuffle-pinned, welded behind Number 3, and drilled for Hoover mods, with 911 piston squirters (to spray the underside of the pistons, for cooling) installed.The bottom end is a 4340 CroMoly crankshaft (84mm, Chevy journals, nitrided) and 5.4” forged H-beam rods with ARP2000 rod bolts. We’re using SilverLine steel-backed main bearings, double-thrust cam bearings, and Clevite rod bearings.

We’re using AA 92 mm thick-wall cylinders and forged slipper-skirt pistons with spiral-lock retainers. I’ve got a set of Deeves rings, with a Total-Seal second ring. I’m very much aiming for nice, round cylinders without blow-by no matter how hot it gets. We’re setting the deck at .040 and aiming for 9.9:1 compression.

I contacted EMPI, who had purchased Bug-Pack a few years ago, and found that they had one leftover dry-sump oil pump, which I snapped up. This was like finding a diamond in a pile of coal, only less likely. The pump has plenty of volume to feed the squirters, etc. I was super jacked up about finding this, as it means I can leave the 2276 alone.

The valve-train is where I’m getting carried away. I’m using the CB 2292 cam, clearanced for stroke, and CB 28 mm ultra-light lifters with the Hoover mods. The heads are CB Panchitos… with a twist. I got new stainless 3-groove valves, and a set of Dan Ruddock’s “Beehives Done Right” valve-springs/retainers. The beehives are a single spring with lower seat and nose pressures, which can still control the valves at over 7000 RPM. As a result of the lower spring pressure, I’m running HD aluminum push-rods and will be able to get by with a stock (helical cut) cam gear, machined to be adjustable. The valve-train should be quiet, light, and (most importantly) produce less heat than a more traditional dual-spring hi-performance setup. I’m also going to run early MK1 Rabbit valve-seals in the heads. I sourced a set of PTFE seals that should hold up to the heat. Not many people do this, but I’m hoping it’ll be worth it to keep oil out of the combustion chambers.

The entire thing will be blueprinted down to the gnat’s eyelash. This is where a machinist can do his OCD thing when an assembler (like me) would pretty much just bolt things together, and why I decided to have VintageVolks do the entire longblock. I’m getting updates as we go on every measurement, and how it relates to everything else. The spread-sheet is very, very detailed, and building this engine will take probably 8 weeks total.

Bottom EndCylinders

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Most of the non-standard stuff is an effort to combat heat. The thick-wall 92s are the thickest iron cylinders available for a Type 1. Spraying the underside of the pistons with the 911 squirters is really very effective (as long as I can get rid of the oil heat). The light valve-spring pressure should make a big difference in the amount of “friction heat” produced. The Panchitos themselves are probably the best cooling Type 1 heads currently in production. The compression is high, but that’s a LOT of cam, and with everything else (the DTM, etc.), I think we’ll be fine.

I’m going to use Mega-Jolt for the ignition. I got a TPS kit from aircooled.net, and sent out my super-special one-of-a-kind crank pulley to Mario Vellota to have a custom trigger wheel installed. Mario’s laser cutting shop was behind, so he emailed me the file and I had a couple of wheels cut here. Everything is out in Spokane for balancing and to ensure it will all play nicely together (fit wise). I’ll use a standard ignition system to break in the cam, but will switch to the Mega-Jolt as soon as it is feasible.

All this is likely not going to come together in time for this year’s season, but I’ve got a card up my sleeve there as well. The 2110 for the bus is still on a pallet from a few years ago. I’m 95% sure it’ll be spending the summer behind us.

The final piece of this little jigsaw puzzle is the transaxle. In 2005, when I had the first one built, I was convinced I knew what I was doing with gearing. I didn’t. I bought a quite expensive custom mainshaft, which turned out to be far too close to work well with a 4-speed. I’ve had several (many?) different combinations of 3rd, 4th, and R/P gears in an effort to continue to use the mainshaft I’ve got.

A 5-speed would be the best solution, but I’m not ready to abandon a lot of what makes an IM special, and fitting a Berg 5 in my car would mean cutting it up, or remaking a LOT of stuff, or both. I’ve said before, and I’ll say again-- I’m not doing it.

And so as a result, the transaxle is out at Anthony’s in Kaliforna getting a Super Beetle mainshaft, a 1.30 3rd, and I’m keeping my .93 4th and the 3.44 R/P. I’m taking out the ZF LSD, which will be used in another project, after being completely rebuilt (probably by Paul Gaurd, but we’ll see). The box will become (after 4 or 5 rebuilds) pretty much standard gearing, with a .93 4th and a 3.44-- it’s the best all-around 4-speed transaxle for what I’m trying to do. It turns out the Sainted German Engineers weren’t so far off on this one. We're using all German bearings for anything "iffy".

From a logistical standpoint, the trans is the most crucial piece of this puzzle-- I need it to do anything with the engine so I’ve been bugging Anthony to the extent that he’s probably pretty sick of me. I’m hoping to have it back within the next couple of weeks, along with my very expensive and useless to me (for now) parts.

Last edited by Stan Galat

I know these cars are never really “done”, but I think after a dozen or more permutations, this is as far as I’m going to take the IM. I’m on Carey Hines list for a repaint next fall, but as far as wholesale idiocy, I think I’m done

… which is not to say I’m done playing with paper dolls. I’ve got a plan for that twin-plug, dry-sump beast after all.

But that’s a topic for another time.

It's there Al. It's a melted venturi.....

Stan, quite the tale, I mostly knew the fate of the old motor. New motor and plan sounds very good to me. But you do have a way with words, my friend. 

Let me know if you want any Megajolt map tables. I'm on version 40-something or so. I've been refining my program for 12 years. Are you getting the dual map option? If you are it's a great idea. Any help at all you need, I'm here.

Last edited by DannyP
Lane Anderson posted:

From the Man-of-Few-Words department: WOW!

I think what you are looking for is, "what is the matter with you?"

Panhandle Bob posted:

There is no treatment for what my buddy Stan has. No amount of bed rest, therapeutic counseling or any drug regimen will even touch this affliction.

It is beyond any mere mortal's ability to control.

He is lost.

 ^ Like that.

Stan, I'm glad I decided to drop in and do a little light reading this afternoon. After all of our conversations over time, I think I have finally begun to understand what you mean when you say it's a continuously moving goalpost. 

As usual, you're defining yourself with your choices, not letting the car define you. You had the twin-plug itch, and it didn't go away. Now, having had the … joy? … of burning up pieces of it, you're back in sanity's low orbit. Good place to be.

And three engines with two cars is also a good place to be. I was hoping to read that the hopped-up twin-plug guy was headed for the Bus, but I suppose not. I'm really excited for these changes, and can't wait until I have another opportunity to run with y'all. 

Last edited by Cory Drake

 

Deus ex machina.  Wherein our hero's woes are suddenly solved by meteorite crashing through the garage roof, thus giving him a fresh start.

This reminds me soooo much of trying to squeeze even extra ounce out of a Ducati 2 valve.  There is no cure, only management and diligent visits to horsepower anonymous meetings.

Holy crap, Stan, what a saga. And what a cool engine you have cooking!

Quite the saga, Stan.  I might have been following you in a parallel adventure, but retirement restricted my funding (probably not a bad thing, from a Madness point of view).  So, like MUSBJIM, I drive what I’ve got and what I’ve got ain’t bad.

I got an old psychedelic chuckle from your first page, though, as it reminded me of this:

Last edited by Gordon Nichols
Stan Galat posted:
Sacto Mitch posted:
Panhandle Bob posted:

 ...It is beyond any mere mortal's ability to control.

He is lost...

 Was lost, but now is found.

Was blind, but now can see.

Not so fast, Mitchster. It's still a 4-speed.

Sacto Mitch posted:

 

Stan, you've made it to the mountaintop.

You'll get to the Promised land.

 

Very stubborn and thinks he can do it on his own he is, but enter the Promised Land he can not 'til he surrenders to the Way of The 5.

Last edited by ALB
Highlander356 posted:

I am going all in on electric batteries with an electric motor.

No need for expensive mechanical service and repairs, especially in a country like Australia where there are limited experienced air cooled mechanics.

I hope you'll keep us updated on the process and how that works out, Highlander. I suspect (that like all experimental endeavors) it won't be as easy as you hope, but if this lights your fire (as it were)-- go for it! 

It's a hobby, after all. 

Just to clarify the extent of my particular problem:

In my opus above, I mentioned not having finished the garage(s) in the new house. In 2015, we sold the place in the country with plenty of room, and built on a small lot in the center of an old (1850s) neighborhood in Morton. I went from having a 3-stall garage and full barn with heated floors to a couple of much smaller (his and hers) garage spaces with a small footprint, but ceiling high enough to install a couple of lifts.

Jeanie's side is only 13 ft wide, and doubles as her art studio. We need to store bikes over there, but hanging them so she can access them means encroaching on valuable space to the side of the minivan.

This was my solution-- built with a Harbor Freight winch, unistrut trolleys, and a bit of welding. It's a complex solution to a problem most people would have just lived with.

I'm pretty sure there's no cure for what I've got. I am what I am. 

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Here's a video of a small shop in southern California that installed electric drive in a new Vintage Speedster roller chassis.

Their only business is converting existing cars to electric drivetrains, and they made this video to promote that business. So, they're likely to gloss over many problems and fine-tuning issues. Still, they make it pretty clear that this is no process for the faint of heart.

There is A LOT of custom fabrication, electrical engineering, and software development involved if you want a result that works like you would expect a modern car to work.

One thing they mention only in passing, but which is a major issue with electric vehicles if you want to charge them in anything like a reasonable amount of time is heat management. Charging the batteries quickly generates large amounts of heat and can damage the batteries if charge rates are not managed correctly in software. There are also major heat issues in the normal operation of the car that must be dealt with in software.

Building one of these on your own looks like a much bigger task than what Stan is taking on in his new drivetrain.

 

 

For me all new platforms require a lot of sorting and that is why you want a car where millions have been made.  The frustrations of finding mechanics, finding parts, and not being stranded is no fun.  There are a number of frustrated buyers of Tesla as well as other cars. 

Our Replicars, plastic fantastics are NOT PLUG and play... they are like the old Windoze, plug and pray most times for those who are not mechanical and do not know cars or have a sense of how to diagnose an issue. 

Many builders have chosen to go with Subie powerplants for ease of finding a mechanic and use a stock ECU, again so that they do not have any issues.  A non stock ECU is a custom builders dream and can be made to work well but your comfort zone will increase if you live CLOSE to the builder or ECU programmer. 

El Guapo's suggestion of a reasonable cost, simple Acooled is a real worth while solution and cost effective.  So is the subie powerplant another platform that many have used and you can find quite a following in Australia in New South Wales for example so choices do exist but personally i could not see any benefits to E-Roadster a car unless your only goal is to stay in the city.

BTW and further to my rant .... my wife thinks I have lost it, when it comes to my car, as the sorting of issues took a long time and she looked at me and thought I was crazy so many times for keeping it.  Any wonder people sell cars with 1000 miles. 

You see, as to my spouse, she wants a turn the key and drive car.  No waiting for carbs to warm up and no gas stink, oh and No support, no issues.  (I do the support of course

Us males often think we can handle the custom build but in reality, secretly, we think it is a modern car.  

I think I was ready for this hand build car because of my experience with so many cars when I was young and this technology was current. 

The issue today is that you need to find a whole new set of people that can still do repairs on this type of car or is simply not a parts replacer but can think through and analyse the issues. 

In the end, we have a lot of dreams, read that as illusions, and then the builders who try to satisfy those have the issue of bringing into reality or bringing us out of that illusion to reality and making us realize that a more visceral drive is of course why we Dream of the Past.  They help to get us there but some never make the full leap and become disillusioned and abort when they realize it is not what they want.  That too is a choice. Enjoy your ride

 

Last edited by IaM-Ray

To sum up Ray's (very good) points-- everything boils down to managing expectations. If a guy is good at that, he can find success in this hobby reasonably easily and without a huge outlay of time and money. Some sad souls among us cannot (or will not) live with the kind of car that is easily built. They're too slow. They don't handle especially well. They are the antithesis of waterproof. They require no small amount of care and feeding.

Whacking any one of the moles means another one pops up in another place. Want to be faster? Your already sketchy brakes will need a serious improvement. Want to handle better? Your ride will likely go south when you stiffen things up. Want to be low-'n-mean? You're going to scrape a lot of driveways. Want to be dry in a thunderstorm? Oh boy... get out your checkbook.

The cycle keeps escalating until before you know it, you're looking at a twin-plug, dry-sumped 2.3L motor with more handmade parts than off-the-shelf stuff. Or a turbo Subaru, or a 6-cyl Porsche engine, or a 3L Raby Type 4.

At the end of the day, there is a secret sauce-- but that sauce is different for every guy, because every guy has his own set of acceptable compromises. A realistic assessment of who you are, and what you can live, along with how extensive your budget and skill-set actually are will go a long way towards finding long-term happiness behind the wheel of one of these death-traps.

That's my story, and I'm sticking with it. Your mileage may vary.

 

Stan (and Ray), that is exactly it.

This car started working out for me when I began accepting it for what it is, rather than trying to make it into something it wasn't ever going to be.

Small, light, simple, mechanical, it's a 'momentum' car. And I'd never quite understood just what that means.

It means if you don't pay attention to where the torque curve ends, if you don't get the revs up before you get to the hill, if you don't shift down before you get to the corner, if you pick the wrong line through that corner, you ain't gonna have any momentum to speak of.

The car's a handful to keep tracking straight down a rough road at speed.

The motor heats up and cools down as it gets more or less work to do. It's one of your jobs, as driver-in-chief, to watch the temp gauge and not give the engine more work than it can handle.

You could spend a whole lot trying to fix all of that. You could make the power and suspension and creature comforts more like a modern car. But this ain't your father's Oldsmobile. Or your wife's Camry.

If you let go of your ideas of what a sports car is and try to learn what a sports car WAS, this car has a lot to teach. There was a knack to being quick in those old machines. It was a lot harder than it is now. It took some skills that have almost been forgotten.

But on the right road, on the right day, for reasons that are sometimes impossible to explain, this can be the best car there is - if you give it half a chance.

 

Sacto Mitch posted:

 

Here's a video of a small shop in southern California that installed electric drive in a new Vintage Speedster roller chassis.

Their only business is converting existing cars to electric drivetrains, and they made this video to promote that business. So, they're likely to gloss over many problems and fine-tuning issues. Still, they make it pretty clear that this is no process for the faint of heart.

There is A LOT of custom fabrication, electrical engineering, and software development involved if you want a result that works like you would expect a modern car to work.

One thing they mention only in passing, but which is a major issue with electric vehicles if you want to charge them in anything like a reasonable amount of time is heat management. Charging the batteries quickly generates large amounts of heat and can damage the batteries if charge rates are not managed correctly in software. There are also major heat issues in the normal operation of the car that must be dealt with in software.

Building one of these on your own looks like a much bigger task than what Stan is taking on in his new drivetrain.

 

 

There are new batteries entering the market.

The new batteries are cheaper, charge quicker and safe.

They are not lithium based, they are carbon based.

I will be waiting for these new batteries to enter the market on a commercial level.

@Stan Galat that winched-up bike rack track is the bomba and epitomizes your superior ingenuity and terminal psychosis. It is brilliant overkill and I am in awe.

As you say, most people would simply live with it.

There are some who would have mounted J hooks up the wall a little higher than they were comfortable with and just manually lifted their bikes to them after each ride (or on occasion as time passed).

There are folks, such as myself, who might have rigged up something cheep and clever and slightly dodgy using nylon straps with cam buckles. 

But then there's you. The elite. 

I bow my head with great respect.

Sacto Mitch posted:

 Stan (and Ray), that is exactly it.

This car started working out for me when I began accepting it for what it is, rather than trying to make it into something it wasn't ever going to be.

Small, light, simple, mechanical, it's a 'momentum' car. And I'd never quite understood just what that means.

It means if you don't pay attention to where the torque curve ends, if you don't get the revs up before you get to the hill, if you don't shift down before you get to the corner, if you pick the wrong line through that corner, you ain't gonna have any momentum to speak of.

The car's a handful to keep tracking straight down a rough road at speed.

The motor heats up and cools down as it gets more or less work to do. It's one of your jobs, as driver-in-chief, to watch the temp gauge and not give the engine more work than it can handle.

You could spend a whole lot trying to fix all of that. You could make the power and suspension and creature comforts more like a modern car. But this ain't your father's Oldsmobile. Or your wife's Camry.

If you let go of your ideas of what a sports car is and try to learn what a sports car WAS, this car has a lot to teach. There was a knack to being quick in those old machines. It was a lot harder than it is now. It took some skills that have almost been forgotten.

But on the right road, on the right day, for reasons that are sometimes impossible to explain, this can be the best car there is - if you give it half a chance.

That's really sage advise, Mitch... but unfortunately I just can't take it quite that far. It would be better if I could. The car (as it sat pre-campfire) was ticking all the boxes, including having the ability to travel long distances. We drove it to NC in the fall of '17.

It was very fast, comfortable (for both Jeanie and me), and interesting mechanically.

The problem for me is that I came to understand that it couldn't do everything consistently enough, and reliability (and sadly and boringly, comfort) have become more important than other most of the other attributes at this point (at least within the parameters that I've dictated for myself). There will have to be other cars that can tick other boxes-- cars meant to ride on a flatbed or in an enclosed trailer from the shop to the foothills. Cars strung more highly.

I know there's real wisdom in just letting the car be everything that it wants to be, but I really can't do that, and neither can very many people. I would respectfully submit that neither can you. There is a continuum everyone falls along, with the drum-braked single-port 1500 on one end and a car like Bob Carley's on the other.

There's a sweet-spot somewhere in-between, a piece of real-estate that may differ from man to man. Most everybody can find it with a 2110 and disc brakes. You needed the 5-speed to find it. I ended up taking something too far (again), mostly to prove to myself that it could be done. This (latest) setup is an attempt to step it back to what I hope will be the edge, but not over a line I'd rather not cross.

Last edited by Stan Galat
Sacto Mitch posted:

 

Stan (and Ray), that is exactly it.

This car started working out for me when I began accepting it for what it is, rather than trying to make it into something it wasn't ever going to be.

Small, light, simple, mechanical, it's a 'momentum' car. And I'd never quite understood just what that means.

It means if you don't pay attention to where the torque curve ends, if you don't get the revs up before you get to the hill, if you don't shift down before you get to the corner, if you pick the wrong line through that corner, you ain't gonna have any momentum to speak of.

The car's a handful to keep tracking straight down a rough road at speed.

The motor heats up and cools down as it gets more or less work to do. It's one of your jobs, as driver-in-chief, to watch the temp gauge and not give the engine more work than it can handle.

You could spend a whole lot trying to fix all of that. You could make the power and suspension and creature comforts more like a modern car. But this ain't your father's Oldsmobile. Or your wife's Camry.

If you let go of your ideas of what a sports car is and try to learn what a sports car WAS, this car has a lot to teach. There was a knack to being quick in those old machines. It was a lot harder than it is now. It took some skills that have almost been forgotten.

But on the right road, on the right day, for reasons that are sometimes impossible to explain, this can be the best car there is - if you give it half a chance.

 

Mitch,

   Perfectly put. So many people are trying to make these cars what they aren’t. Let them takes us back to what driving was like in the fifties. Mine takes me back every time I jump in and love it for what it is. Sparse, basic, under powered but so damn fun I can’t stay out of it. I feel you get it.

Tom(Gotno356)

To more clearly define my path, I would have to say that 1600N engine is not a fast car. I tried 1835cc and had a 2110cc for 5 years in my 2004 IM.  I liked it but it lacked in a lot of areas. 

I then tried to make a mental list of what would like, to be able to make it a car I could go on longer trips as a highway cruiser.  

I think this process is what Stan most clearly elucidated.  He advises that every envelope of features and power range and car types will require ultimately some form of acceptance if you want to stay in the hobby but you can mitigate your chances or at least be somewhat more satisfied if your expectations come with realistic goals based on your experiences and what others have accomplished with their cars.  Remembering that it is near impossible to try all permutations or even try some of these cars so your dreaming most times of this illusionary car. 

So I realized that seats were a real issue AC and more power and of course the 5 speed, dual rads, and a large trunk with spare and finally some sort of reasonable on going repair and support cost and please Henry no 6cyl P at this point anyway. 

I considered a Subie-6 maybe but that was not in the cards for IM. 

Experienced builder he was, he was more comfortable doing a turbo 4cyl or NA subie but my car became the first with a subie tranny dual rads, larger gas tank, and big trunk.  I got involved in the R&D and helped to source somethings that I wanted.  Retro-sound system and bluetooth telephone is a help to make it more enjoyable as well. 

So i got much more of a car.  Actually it is light years ahead with full 911 front end, sway bars etc etc. 

In conclusion, this is really a nice car to drive, still has some nuances of a hand built car still has some tech that is 50 y.o. and some 2009 tech but you can just drive it with minimal issues.  

BTW I even installed Cruise control myself after IM were gracious to send me a schematic for the ECU cruise system.

I think I got pretty close to the max that the hobby can give me with my wish list, without much more rear weigh and the switch launch of some turbo setups. 

The 5 speed allows me to row through the gears as as a full subie there is less mismatch between engine and tranny powertrain. 

All in all I still had to accept the nuances of a new skin, old tech, new tech setup but I do not have to live with the 911 click click click I am doing a 100mph automaticity. 

I think it is the automaticity that is boring me out of my tree with DD. 

Enough said. 

I am typing this by the pool  

 

 

@edsnova,

Regarding the bike rack: I had already tried the dodgy ropes and cams set-up. Mrs. Galat declared it unacceptable, and she was right. She cannot lift her bike past about 2 ft off the ground, which does precisely nothing to get them out of the way. The ropes-'n-pulleys looked like an accident waiting to happen (and as you know, if there's a way to maim myself or break things, I tend to find it).

Aside from living with it (which really isn't such a bad alternative), this was the only real way. 

My 30 y/o son saw it and remarked that it is a distillation of everything that is right and wrong with his father in one device.

"There are new batteries entering the market.   The new batteries are cheaper, charge quicker and safe.  They are not lithium based, they are carbon based.   I will be waiting for these new batteries to enter the market on a commercial level."

Question: Does Carbon burn?  

Last time I checked it burns at a higher temp than wood. Just saying. 

I hear you Gordon, real heat is a must if you live somewhat north.  Seat heaters are absolutely great too.  

Aren't you glad we skipped steam in a speedster your back seat would have had to be the coal storage area and just in front of the stick shift the burn pot door for you to throw in coal with your right hand while you steer with your left. 

Just kidding, burning coal would be awesome heat though

 

Wait, how did we get from different expectations for our cars to coal-fired cabin heat and bicycle hoists? You can't leave here for an hour without everything going pear-shaped.

Stan and Ray, what we've got here is three drivers, three different cars, and three very different budgets. Three examples of how these cars can be different tokes for different folks.

Maybe the reason I'm happy as a clam with my lesser Speedster is where I live. I'm close to the roads I like to drive on. I will drive on the freeway if forced to by circumstances, but usually don't have to for more than 20 or 30 miles. For me, the interstate is a means to an end.

If I needed to spend long hours at 80 mph just to reach the Valhalla exit, I'd probably have to completely rethink how my car is set up. And recalculate just how much I wanted to invest in it. Most reasonable people would probably be thinking about another type of car altogether. But who ever said we are reasonable people?

My car will do 70-75 mph on the freeway and not complain too much. I do hit 80-85 merging with traffic sometimes, and have even gotten to 90 in an unthinking moment. But the car is much happier at 60-65. There, it just hums along quietly, as happy with the day as I am.

So, the car has changed my perspective a bit. It's woken me up to the joys of puttering along the back roads, not obsessed with getting to the next corner as quickly as possible. I've found parts of this state I sort of knew were there, but probably wouldn't have otherwise discovered.

The more I drive this car, the more it teaches me.

 

Were you commenting on the road speed or the body speed or age when you said 70-75   

More to the point for around town and little highway any car will do I would think.  On version 2 or 3 you might choose a different car of course according to your budget. But in reality while budget comes into play we were not really talking about that factor much even if it has a bearing on it. I have seen a lot of high end cars in driveways where the owner is not really the owner.

If you nearing 85 mph, oh I meant age you might blow it all on one last chance to go where you have never gone. Don't they list cars here where the owner has departed for greener pastures...  You know but then you will have to change your drive to a Triumph.

You guys crack me up !  I have always thought I was a little weird and had a tendency  to obliquely go off doing things that interested me. When I saw what Stan did for storing his bicycles I was absolutely sure of why I like this forum so much and the unique individuals who are on here. I totally relate to everyone on here in some way or another. I almost feel like I joined a "secret society" in which I can comfortably share my wild assed ideas and projects.  Thanks Stan, for posting your bicycle lift.  Here's mine !  I don't have bicycles any more but the electric winch is still up there (and still operating) in the attic. It's attached to the garage roof rafters. The ceiling door is now used for better access to things on the opposite side of my fold-down stairs. ( I don't have to crawl over a bunch of stuff to get to things on that side. ).      Bruce

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OK, maybe we are defined more by our bike lifts than by our cars.

Stan, what we've got here is two bikers, two different bike lifts, and two very different budgets.

I have only modest expectations for a bike lift.

I went with the store-bought rope-and-pulleys contraption. Six wood screws into the rafter and done. One bike at a time, but the slower pace lets me better appreciate parts of my garage I might have otherwise overlooked.

I guess if I had to hoist the bike more than eight feet in the air or do two at a time, I'd probably have to completely rethink how my bike lift is set up.

Maybe the reason I'm happy as a clam with my lesser bike lift is the agreement I have with my wife. She leans her bike against the garage shelving when returning from a ride and notifies me there's a bike that needs hoisting.

She doesn't have to deal with ropes or pulleys, and I get to experience how bikes were hoisted back in the early days of bicycle storage.

The more I hoist her bike manually, the more it teaches me.

 

IaM-Ray posted:

"There are new batteries entering the market.   The new batteries are cheaper, charge quicker and safe.  They are not lithium based, they are carbon based.   I will be waiting for these new batteries to enter the market on a commercial level."

Question: Does Carbon burn?  

Last time I checked it burns at a higher temp than wood. Just saying. 

If you don’t know anything about this technology it’s better if you simply do some research before adding your 2 bobs worth...!

Highlander356 posted:
IaM-Ray posted:

"There are new batteries entering the market.   The new batteries are cheaper, charge quicker and safe.  They are not lithium based, they are carbon based.   I will be waiting for these new batteries to enter the market on a commercial level."

Question: Does Carbon burn?  

Last time I checked it burns at a higher temp than wood. Just saying. 

If you don’t know anything about this technology it’s better if you simply do some research before adding your 2 bobs worth...!

Baaaaaaaaa that made me laugh... My comment was in jest of course, but since you asked.

While it is a new technology it is not any denser so you get the same capacity but faster charging, as well it seems to be less prone to heating up so it may be less prone to fires but, It is not yet a solution.  So if that is your cup a tea go for it, or rather wait for it.  Does that ad up to 2 bobs.? :0) 

Bike lift?

We don’ need no steenkin bike lift!

I got my own bike pahkin space!   I use “Smaht Pahk!”   (Until I hear: “HEY!  Get that damn bike outa my way to the freezah!)   

Bike lift.   You’se guys got too much free time on your hands.  (Although, Jeanie sounds a lot like my wife.  You sure she’s not Irish?)

BTW, Stan.......   Very clever solution!

Forget both carbon batteries and the regular lithium kind. I saw a TV show about it and it seemed to me that dilithium was the future. 

Seriously, there appears to be some incremental progress on batteries that will show up in cars over the next 4-5 years. I recently read what seemed to be a credible article on a breakthrough electric motor that 'might' eliminate the need for a transmission and give 2x-4x improvement in torque. Limited market availability for scooters in the next year or so and who knows after that.

We still plug our main car - an old 2013 LEAF into our house's 240v charging station powered by the 40 solar panels on our roof. It's paid off long ago and we live on a small island, so it works for now. I don't see anything that would make me want to spend money in the near future.

Everybody thinks I'm a universal EV hater, but I'd love an electric work truck... as long as it had a 300 mi range (in the winter, with full heat running) and could recharge overnight. Trucks are money sinks and the bane of my business existence. We've got one in the shop now, where it's been for at least 30% of this winter.

If I lived on a small island with lots of sunlight, I'd think pretty hard about it as well. If I had a 45 mi commute that never varied, I'd probably do it.

We're just not there as a primary vehicle, and I doubt we ever will be. As a "fun" vehicle, an EV speedster wouldn't be my cup of tea.

But if Highlander wants to give it a whirl-- I say, "go for it"... as long as he knows going in that it isn't going to cheap or easy. 

My friend, Scott, has been around as long as me, and riding bicycle just as long, too.  He’s 6’ 5” with loooong legs and has been developing hardening of the arteries over the past four years (pro’bly longer, but that’s when he first noticed the symptoms).

 A week ago he took delivery of a Trek E-Bike road bike so he can continue to ride whilst not over-stressing his heart.  We both see that as a very good thing.  Gets him out of the house so his wife don’t kill him for being underfoot, and he might finally, finally beat me up a hill.  

I don’t know when electric cars will be the thing, but an ebike makes a lot of sense.   For Scott, that is, and I guess for us old bike riders that need a little help.  

Who was that guy on an island near Seattle or Vancouver who converted a speedster to electric?

  @Michael Pickett  Been in your extended front yard for a week, over in Ko’olina.  I see why you live here.  The wx is WAAY better than SoCal!  Also shopped at Bailey’s Aloha Shirts.  Even more amazing than Leonard’s Bakery!  Gotta come back!

Back home tomorrow.  Really gonna miss this....... But oh that jet lag!

Last edited by Gordon Nichols
Gordon Nichols posted:

  @Michael Pickett  Been in your extended front yard for a week, over in Ko’olina.  I see why you live here.  The wx is WAAY better than SoCal!  Also shopped at Bailey’s Aloha Shirts.  Even more amazing than Leonard’s Bakery!  Gotta come back!

Back home tomorrow.  Really gonna miss this....... But oh that jet lag!

Glad you made it over here. We completed a trip back to NC last week and I'm nearly recovered. That just means you need to plan longer trips. 

Conceptually, I like the hybrid electric cars that use a small engine (a turbine maybe?) to self-charge when needed. 

If batteries can be made light and compact enough (they're basically there) without overheating (not quite yet) and cheaply enough to work in the market (??) you could turn over the whole fleet in about 10 years and save 80-90 percent of the of the current hydrocarbon emissions burned on the road while maintaining or extending present day automotive range and potentially reducing maintenance time and costs substantially. 

But, as Stan often points out, the energy has to come from somewhere. You'd still need to convert the power grid to like 95 percent wind/solar/nuke with just a few gas peakers (and maybe vast arrays of these batteries?) to manage load.

AFAIK it could be done right now—and should be, given what we know about how carbon emissions affect the climate—but it's not like I or anyone else could just snap our fingers and make it so. 

mppickett posted:

For me, the battery range is the primary issue. Anything over 200 miles would be great (our LEAF gets around 100 miles).  The Speedster conversion approaches I've looked at get around 100 miles range, too. The low end torque is unparalleled, but there's just not a lot of room for batteries in our car, so for now, range is limited.

check out this new technology 

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5C7a2hVFHS8

 

 

edsnova posted:

Conceptually, I like the hybrid electric cars that use a small engine (a turbine maybe?) to self-charge when needed. 

If batteries can be made light and compact enough (they're basically there) without overheating (not quite yet) and cheaply enough to work in the market (??) you could turn over the whole fleet in about 10 years and save 80-90 percent of the of the current hydrocarbon emissions burned on the road while maintaining or extending present day automotive range and potentially reducing maintenance time and costs substantially. 

But, as Stan often points out, the energy has to come from somewhere. You'd still need to convert the power grid to like 95 percent wind/solar/nuke with just a few gas peakers (and maybe vast arrays of these batteries?) to manage load.

AFAIK it could be done right now—and should be, given what we know about how carbon emissions affect the climate—but it's not like I or anyone else could just snap our fingers and make it so. 

The electric Sports car technology has come a long way.

Check out this link:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5C7a2hVFHS8

 

edsnova posted:

Conceptually, I like the hybrid electric cars that use a small engine (a turbine maybe?) to self-charge when needed. 

If batteries can be made light and compact enough (they're basically there) without overheating (not quite yet) and cheaply enough to work in the market (??) you could turn over the whole fleet in about 10 years and save 80-90 percent of the of the current hydrocarbon emissions burned on the road while maintaining or extending present day automotive range and potentially reducing maintenance time and costs substantially. 

But, as Stan often points out, the energy has to come from somewhere. You'd still need to convert the power grid to like 95 percent wind/solar/nuke with just a few gas peakers (and maybe vast arrays of these batteries?) to manage load.

AFAIK it could be done right now—and should be, given what we know about how carbon emissions affect the climate—but it's not like I or anyone else could just snap our fingers and make it so. 

We agree nearly 100% here, @edsnova. The pure EV gets all the love (and credits), but it is the plug-in series hybrid that has the actual chance of working in the real world. If we removed the range limitation, electric starts to make a lot of sense for service and delivery trucks especially. 

The wind/solar/nuke grid will take more than a few gas peakers, but just accepting that it's going to take nuclear power to get to a grid that is less reliant on carbon is a huge step, and one that most people just refuse to believe. Nuclear scares the crap out of most people, but there's no other way to get where they say they want to go.

Highlander356 posted:

We all need to face the fact that oil is running out, by 2030 there will be no more oil.

I'd love to make a wager on that, Highlander. It'd be my only good investment so far this year.

I've been buying oil stocks for 5 years, because I know the world needs it and it seems super-cheap to me (you know, given that we are running out in 10 years, etc.). But oil is in a price free-fall (off 20% this AM, and trading at under $30/bbl), precisely because we have a glut of it in the market. Right now, Transocean (the largest offshore drilling company in the world) is trading at about 2% of it's value 6 years ago. Exxon/Mobil, BP, Royal Dutch Shell, Chevron, etc. are all in the toilet, down 30% +/- because people have a virus in China.

We have no idea what the future holds-- but in proven reserves, we have enough petroleum for the next 50 years (at a minimum), and more if we conserve it. If we continue to find ways to extract it (shale oil, etc.) there is no end in sight. Wagering that we still have PLENTY of oil in 2030 (or 2040, or 2050) seems like a sucker bet.

... but I'm wondering-- you keep posting about EVs like a zealous recent convert. Do you own one, even as your second or third vehicle? Are you making progress towards converting your speedster, or just dreaming? You have a car and an opinion (which you feel strongly enough about to post on multiple threads), have you taken the car to the Australian EV experts?

Let us know how the progress is coming. 

Last edited by Stan Galat

Highlander:

We have a TV show here in the states called "Mountain Men" wherein one of the featured characters powers his truck with a wood burning system. I suggest you consider that alternative as well. 

I realize that you have had some severe fires that burned a lot of your trees, but maybe this alternative would work for you, or build a small nuclear reactor in the frunk.

How about a steam engine.......pedal car......just coast downhill?

 

I guess I have accepted the limits of my Speedster as well. By that I mean I haven't pushed it there by any means, but based on input from a lot of you, I can see what I think is the limit of the cars potential.

My wife says that I'm one guy when behind the wheel of our other cars, and a different guy when I hop in the Speedster. Driving the Speedster is always a transformative experience.

One is the mundane experience of getting from here to there and back. The other is an exhilarating adventure, even if it's just to go get milk.

One is predictable and without challenges or issues. The other is unpredictable and anything might happen.

I take the Speedster whenever I can.

Highlander356 posted:
edsnova posted:

Conceptually, I like the hybrid electric cars that use a small engine (a turbine maybe?) to self-charge when needed. 

If batteries can be made light and compact enough (they're basically there) without overheating (not quite yet) and cheaply enough to work in the market (??) you could turn over the whole fleet in about 10 years and save 80-90 percent of the of the current hydrocarbon emissions burned on the road while maintaining or extending present day automotive range and potentially reducing maintenance time and costs substantially. 

But, as Stan often points out, the energy has to come from somewhere. You'd still need to convert the power grid to like 95 percent wind/solar/nuke with just a few gas peakers (and maybe vast arrays of these batteries?) to manage load.

AFAIK it could be done right now—and should be, given what we know about how carbon emissions affect the climate—but it's not like I or anyone else could just snap our fingers and make it so. 

The electric Sports car technology has come a long way.

Check out this link:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=5C7a2hVFHS8

 

That was six years ago. Looked/looks promising but the technology still isn't here. There are options available but they are expensive. More expensive than it's worth if you ask me. But if you want to continue waiting go ahead. Me? Well, I'm going to drive my Speedster today and the next day and the next day and so on and so on. You can sit and watch your Speedster go nowhere or you can do what everyone suggested and find an air-cooled mechanic at one of the dozens of air-cooled clubs in Australia so you can drive it. Or you can wait until battery technology improves enough to build yourself an electric Speedster. 

Last edited by Robert M

Back to our regularly scheduled program:

I was cleaning out the shop cabinets this weekend, and found an IRS super-diff I forgot I had. I called Anthony this AM, but a new one is only about 2x what the shipping would be on this one, so I'll just keep it. We've reached critical mass in the garage. I have lost track of what I have in the stash, which is pretty pathetic. I'm thinking a sale is in order.

Anyhow, here's what the gearing will be. I wish the spacing was inverted (with the narrower spreads in the upper gears, but this is as good as I can get with what is available.

Anthony is hoping to get this back to me within the next couple of weeks.

Shift Point Chart4-speed gearing

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mppickett posted:

Thank Ferdinand that you switched the channel. So how much difference will there be between your new diff and your old one?

The new one is just a super-diff, which is pretty common on hi-po Type 1 transaxle builds. It also is a step back from the edge.

The ZF is rare like hen's teeth. VW had them built for about 20 minutes in the early 70s (for use in the "Thing" in non-USA markets, unless I'm mistaken). I waited for more than a 18 months to find one, and snapped this one up on TheSamba as soon as it became available a few years back. I think I had to give $1500 or some such thing. Mine is worn out (as per Anthony). Stock, they came with metal discs and clutches, but there is a guy (Paul Guard) who has a rebuild kit available for them using friction discs and some other special whatnot. The mystery is if what I have will be rebuildable, as not all are.

If it is, the plan is to use the shards of the true cross ZF LSD in a future 5-speed for Project X, but that's a story for a different day.

Last edited by Stan Galat

@Stan Galat wrote- "...Stock, they came with metal discs and clutches, but there is a guy (Paul Guard) who has a rebuild kit available for them using friction discs and some other special whatnot. The mystery is if what I have will be rebuildable, as not all are..."

If the housing has worn from tabs on the plates (the only place they really wear), I have heard Paul doesn't feel they are worth putting the effort into, and says 1 day he will machine some new housings. Bruce (here in Burnaby- who I think sold it to you?) has reconditioned diff housings by welding/re-machining and can rebuild it for you with the Guard ceramic friction plates and proper belleville washers (he keeps them in stock). He will rebuild it for you.

Or- if you want to believe Mr. Guard when he tells you it is junk- instead of throwing it the scrap pile you can send it to me. I'll pay the shipping and a 6 pack (what the heck, make it a 12 pack!) of your choice.

Your Kanucklehead buddy Yoda

PS-  ZF limited slip differentials were a factory option in Beetles and Super Beetles, various commercial vehicles, Karmann Ghias, Type 3's and Things starting in the mid '60's. There are both swingaxle and irs versions, as well as various later bus models. The thing- it seems they were never available in any cars destined for the U.S. or Canadian markets, hence Stan's comment that they are "as rare as hen's teeth".

I have no idea how accurate this code list is-

https://www.limebug.com/how-to-guides/view/32

Last edited by ALB

Stan....From the 90% of us that do not understand 90% of what you wrote all I can say is "we are not worthy." Thankfully the DNA pool creates folks such as yourself and other technically intelligent people so that the mechanically inept can enjoy these cars as well. I can only imagine that the VW engineers from the 30's would say if they witnessed what they wroth upon the 21st Century. Of course we could probably still find one of those English engineers that rebuilt the factory after WWII and infected the cars with Lucas DNA oil leaks. 

 

edsnova posted:

@stangalat you're buying special "beehive" valve springs and all kinds of rigormorole and what-have-you building a bigish engine with Panchitos yadda yadda.  Why are you showing shift points below 6000?

Good question @edsnova. Habit, mostly.

I'm interested in where the shift-points are in normal travel. I could've (and probably should have) put in 4000 as the shift-point because that's where I like to shift when I'm being a good boy. I used to plug in redline, but @ALB broke me of the habit in one of the 50 or so PMs we've sent back and forth over the years regarding the perfect 5-speed.

FWIW: Al Blanchette is the residing "king of gears" (all hail the king), at least as I see it. We joke about the holes and the quizzes of new members, but he's been enormously helpful as a resource-- both for knowing where to get stuff and for knowing what is available for gear-stacks. I wish I'd have known him 15 years ago. @Anthony has been equally patient as I've cycled through about 6 different gear combinations. He's an amazing asset to this hobby, and I wish I lived close enough to avail myself of his services without incurring many hundreds of dollars in UPS charges.

Anyhow, this motor should pull to 7000+ RPM, but Panchitos aren't big heads by any metric. They're inexpensive, with 40 mm intakes and 62 mm of port volume. The magic is in the flow and the port velocity-- the "as cast" numbers are crazy: 167 cfm at .500 lift and 300 fps. The net/net is that these heads will work on a hot street motor of pretty much any common displacement.

I've spent way, way, way more money on heads in the past, and they were way, way, way bigger to get those flow numbers (and couldn't hope to get those port velocity numbers). It's the port velocity that should make them drivable, and pleasant as a GT (snappy pull from everywhere in the RPM register) as long as the cam is not too much, and I'm trusting Mr. Downs on that. The CB cam series is super-interesting, with all of them ground on 107* centers rather than the usual 108*. I've never run one before, mostly because the catalog (for cams) is such a mess that it's really hard to find what you are looking for (even the numbers don't correspond to anything). But I'm excited to try this one.

The beehives yada, yada, yada are all me-- my personal desire to complicate something built to be inherently simple. I just love the idea, and being in love with theoretical ideas is what gets me up in the morning.

I'm only happy when it rains.

Last edited by Stan Galat

Stan, I'm really looking forward to seeing this come together. 

I recently sent young Brian to Autocraft in MA to get his heads flycut rather than all the way out to CB(shipping$$$ and time). He'll end up with a motor more similar to Anand when he's done. For those that don't know, Mike at Autocraft is a class act. They do a ton of VW drag motor work, and are the source for the only currently manufactured serious dry sump pump. CB makes one as well, but Stan and I are of the opinion that the CB pump has gears that are too small. Autocraft makes a 1.5 stage, 2 or 3 or 4 stage. I have a 2 stage, it sticks out a few inches and does what I need. It's also complicated enough.

I'm only happy when it rains, too.

Stan Galat posted:
edsnova posted:

@stangalat you're buying special "beehive" valve springs and all kinds of rigormorole and what-have-you building a bigish engine with Panchitos yadda yadda.  Why are you showing shift points below 6000?

Good question @edsnova. Habit, mostly.

I'm interested in where the shift-points are in normal travel. I could've (and probably should have) put in 4000 as the shift-point because that's where I like to shift when I'm being a good boy. I used to plug in redline, but @ALB broke me of the habit in one of the 50 or so PMs we've sent back and forth over the years regarding the perfect 5-speed.

 

Ah. So... Um.

Why not redline? Or better yet, why choose any particular rev range as a shift point when figuring gear ratios? 

In other words, what is, distilled from those 50 PMs, the wisdom here?

 

edsnova posted:
Stan Galat posted:
edsnova posted:

@stangalat you're buying special "beehive" valve springs and all kinds of rigormorole and what-have-you building a bigish engine with Panchitos yadda yadda.  Why are you showing shift points below 6000?

Good question @edsnova. Habit, mostly.

I'm interested in where the shift-points are in normal travel. I could've (and probably should have) put in 4000 as the shift-point because that's where I like to shift when I'm being a good boy. I used to plug in redline, but @ALB broke me of the habit in one of the 50 or so PMs we've sent back and forth over the years regarding the perfect 5-speed.

 

Ah. So... Um.

Why not redline? Or better yet, why choose any particular rev range as a shift point when figuring gear ratios? 

In other words, what is, distilled from those 50 PMs, the wisdom here?

 

When figuring out gear spacing, if you plug in 3600 as Max Rpm (stock shift point- the upshift marks on a stock speedometer) you can then compare what the chart calls the 'Shift Point' (what the rpm falls to in the next gear, or what some call the 'recovery rpm') to a stock 4 speed, which is (aprox) 1900 rpm in 2nd, 2200 in 3rd and 2400 in 4th. You'll notice that with every upshift the recovery rpm gets higher- all stock gearboxes (that I know of) are like this to make the best use of the engine's powerband in normal driving. Al

Ps- if you're trying to work out the best spacing for racing/performance then you would look at the recovery rpm's from redline. Again, as you shift from gear to gear, for best acceleration the recovery rpm will get higher as well.

Another PS- any time you make the gear spacing wider than stock you run the risk of creating a zone where the engine can't cool itself properly and will overheat if operating under full power for any length of time. For example- when going to a .82 4th the recovery rpm drops about 200 rpm and think of going up a hill under full power in this area (2200-2400) where even at full power the car won't go any faster. The engine can't get rid of the heat generated fast enough. When I first started driving VW's as a teenager, this is what old guys called 'lugging it', and cautioned against it because it meant death for the engine.

Note- this is more of a concern with a smaller engine than something 2 liters or bigger.

And another PS- I forgot to say- great question Ed!

Thought for the day- since a watercooled engine uses air to cool the water, doesn't that make it just an overly complicated aircooled engine?

Last edited by ALB

To square the circle: plugging in 7000 RPM is kinda' cool, and if you are looking at the graph (as opposed to the chart) should give me what I'm looking for... because I went to Tremont Grade School, and can pick a point on a graph and see what it corresponds to.

Plugging 3500 RPM (or 3600 as Al said) makes the numbers on the chart useful, as it tells me where I can comfortably cruise in any gear. Of note is the final-drive, which has me spinning at about 3500 RPM at 79 mph (perfect for me). 

In this instance, 3500 RPM (about my maximum desirable RPM for sustained cruising) equals 19 mph in first, 36 mph in 2nd, 56 mph in 3rd, and 79 mph in 4th. Those "shift point" numbers are nice too-- they tell me that if I shift at 3500 RPM, I'll drop to 1869 RPM on the 1/2 shift, 2234 RPM on the 2/3, and 2486 on the 3/4.

If I spin up to 5500 RPM, I'll drop to 2950 RPM on the 1/2 shift, 3476 RPM on the 2/3, and 3952 on the 3/4.

Shift Point Chart

I hope I haven't overcammed it.

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Last edited by Stan Galat

I forgot to mention earlier- thanks for the kind words, Stan. The engine will be a beast, and I'm interested in what you think of the beehives. I'm sure your gearstack will work quite well. You'll like the slightly shorter 3rd and 4th.

Oh- btw- haven't received a tracking number for that hunk of steel yet. I've got beer money in an envelope for when it gets here... 

'preciate the feedback. 

At the risk of sounding contrarian (when I'm actually not, at least on this point): how does the "stock" 3600 rpm upshift point relate to the real-world in-the-torque-curve zone of a typical Pat Downs 2110—or this here engine?

I think I know the answer, which is 'If Pat's doing right by me or Stan or anyone the street 2110 or 2332 or whatever is going to make a lot more torque at 1800 than the original engine did and be perfectly happy pulling you up a hill from that rev range.'

But I also think it's in the nature of hot-rodded engines, or any sort (and not just VW), to, let's say, like and appreciate the area of torque lying somewhat above the original engine's power band. 

—and that finding gear spacings that play well with those higher RPM ranges is at the core of this discussion.

In other words: of course you're going to get acceptable spacing from stock gears if you plug in "cruising" RPMs. That's baked into the VW transaxle cake. 

No?

 

While you're talking shift points and gear charts...

I notice if you enter a 'Max RPM', the chart generates its own 'shift points', which are not the 'max' and differ for every shift. 

Keeping in mind the chart software has no idea what engine is being used (and no idea of what torque or power curves are available), where is it coming up with these shift points and what do they signify?

 

ShiftPoints2

 

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OOOOOOOOOH!

NOW I get it!

Mitch, once again your Hollywood looks, unlimited bankroll, lovely wife and all-round 5-Speed sensibilities have answered my question and afforded me unearned wisdom. Thank you.

@Stan Galat of course 5500 RPM is just about the right upshift point for the engine you envision. That's going to be right around peak HP. No idea how I missed seeing it on the first and second look.

 

Last edited by edsnova
Sacto Mitch posted:

 

Ray, the difference is, if you specify a 'max' of 3500, you will have to downshift at lower revs to avoid going over 3500 once you've shifted down, no?

 

Sorry, what I meant to say was that at 3500rpm or 3000rpm whatever your cruising speed RPM you want to have it at least gives you a feel for what gear and what mph you will have plus what the recovery rpm will be for your next gear.  Did I say that right?

edsnova posted:

'preciate the feedback. 

At the risk of sounding contrarian (when I'm actually not, at least on this point): how does the "stock" 3600 rpm upshift point relate to the real-world in-the-torque-curve zone of a typical Pat Downs 2110—or this here engine?

I think I know the answer, which is 'If Pat's doing right by me or Stan or anyone the street 2110 or 2332 or whatever is going to make a lot more torque at 1800 than the original engine did and be perfectly happy pulling you up a hill from that rev range.'

But I also think it's in the nature of hot-rodded engines, or any sort (and not just VW), to, let's say, like and appreciate the area of torque lying somewhat above the original engine's power band. 

—and that finding gear spacings that play well with those higher RPM ranges is at the core of this discussion.

In other words: of course you're going to get acceptable spacing from stock gears if you plug in "cruising" RPMs. That's baked into the VW transaxle cake. 

No?

Ed, to answer your musings about the nature of hot-rodded engines: the torque band doesn't necessarily get shifted higher in the rev range. If the engine designer does his job well, the modified(and probably larger displacement) mill should have more torque everywhere. And if he gets it right, the torque curve will be close to flat as a board, with no peaks and valleys.

While what you say has merit for high-revving track motors and drag racing, it doesn't really apply to today's hot street motors.

What makes Pat's Panchito formula work so well is port velocity. High port velocity and small port volume equal higher efficiency. Port velocity equals torque AND more importantly drivability. A bigger cylinder with high velocity filling is more efficient. The increased swirl creates a more even charge, thus allowing higher static compression. The high static compression is enabled by huge lift. Large lift numbers lower the dynamic compression: valves open longer and deeper counteract that high static number. Dynamic compression is more important than static because it gives you numbers under actual working conditions.

A case in point: my static compression is 10.2:1, running 32 degrees total timing on 93 octane pump gas. I'll admit, I am right at the razor's edge of too much timing. I do have two maps loaded in my ignition, swapped by a flick of a switch. Or a 2 second flash from a laptop. The second map retards the max timing to 28 degrees in case we get some not-so-good gasoline, or if only 91 octane is available. Also note that I run 0.550" valve lift, not a small number. My heads(with 44mm intake) flow very well, but I'd love to see a set of Panchitos with slightly bigger valves, say 42mm intake. That would be very impressive.

I'm really looking forward to seeing what Stan's motor will do. I would most probably build one exactly like it if I ever needed to replace mine.

@LeonChupp,

You're the perfect hammering companion-- you've got great ears, you're a great wrench, and you really like to go fast. You're welcome to come along for "brisk" rides any time.

But to re-emphasize, I'm not necessarily aiming for "more" with this set-up-- I'm aiming for more reliability and simplicity, with as little step off from what I've got as possible.

I've got plans for the twin plug motor, and those plans are to unshackle it for "Project X". I hope to send the heads to get the intakes re-worked and opened up a bit, put in 44 mm intakes, stroke it to 84 mm to make it a 2332 again, and use some JPM thick-wall 94 mm cylinders and slipper-skirt forged pistons in it. I'll run a 1-3/4" header on it, and probably bolt on the tri-jet 48s. I'm undecided on the cam, but I'd like to see how I like the cam in the 2234 before I jump. Target will be a legit 200 hp, and I think I should be able to hit it without a ton of trouble. 

@DannyP,

It's like you read my mind and open my email. One of the hardest things about this project was to not mess with the heads more than I already am. Believe me, opening up the intakes just under the seat (and nowhere else) and putting in 42s is something I'm still toying with. To my mind, this would make them "perfect", but I have a way of creating a series of unintended consequences when I head off the reservation.

The latest updates from the machinist put me months away from being ready to get funky with the heads, so I've still got time to change my mind 4 or 5 times. But the allure of bigger-valve Panchitos is a siren song that has me lashing myself to the mast. 

Last edited by Stan Galat

Stan, my friend Leon is harder of hearing than you. What exactly did he hear? LOL!

And also, I think Panchitos are the absolute perfect head for a 2.0 liter or smaller. Probably still perfectly good for a 2110. And then we have Anand's motor making 200hp in 2332 size. So maybe I'm(we're?) wrong, and you should leave the heads be. 

But you'll always be wondering what if? Perhaps order them regular, and if you don't like it, you can always rework the heads with 42s.

The updates from this weekend were mostly piston/cylinder work.

The cylinders came in really nice. All 4 of them measured the same, were round, and had very good clearances with the supplied pistons. One of them, however, had a cracked fin from being punted by a UPS guy. This weekend, Jason got a replacement which was not a perfect match for the other 3-- it was a tad longer (.0015"), so it was chucked up in the lathe and cut down. It's perfect now and ready for installation when the time comes (after a dingle-ball hone).

The piston pin heights were off .007" from one another out of the box. This was corrected by trimming all 4 of them on the lathe to get them as close to spot on as possible (.0009" variance). Then he balanced them to within .1 gram. Most folks balance to a factor of 5-10x that.

The Deeves rings and Total-Seal second rings are still on back order, so he's done with pistons and cylinders for a while.

This stuff takes crazy amounts of time and attention, and VW parts are not aerospace quality out of the box, so it's akin to polishing turds into truffles. I'm amazed at guys who can do this and do it really well.

More details as they develop.IMG_20200316_180750IMG_20200315_183854IMG_20200315_183642IMG_20200315_183556

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DannyP posted:

Stan, my friend Leon is harder of hearing than you. What exactly did he hear? LOL!

And also, I think Panchitos are the absolute perfect head for a 2.0 liter or smaller. Probably still perfectly good for a 2110. And then we have Anand's motor making 200hp in 2332 size. So maybe I'm(we're?) wrong, and you should leave the heads be. 

But you'll always be wondering what if? Perhaps order them regular, and if you don't like it, you can always rework the heads with 42s.

Leon may be hard of hearing, but he's got great ears for hearing a miss. The dude can pick up on a misfire from the passenger's seat 5 minutes before I can detect it. It's like he's a savant of some sort.

Regarding the heads-- I decided tonight to just leave well enough alone. I'm getting a multi-angle valve job, and we're doing a "fluff-n-buff" cleanup on the runners. They already flow 167 cfm at 25" and .500 lift, so what exactly am I thinking will get better? The valve-job alone should be worth 5-10 CFM.

Pat has forgotten more than I'll ever know. It's hubris to think I can improve on his chamber and port work. I'm leaving it alone.

Last edited by Stan Galat
aircooled posted:

Stan, is that your shop in the photos ?  Looks like someone besides me likes Grizzly Lathes !  I will be getting an new Grizzly lathe in the near future. The one I have is too small and it's close to being worn out now after nearly daily use for 20 years. I like the gunsmith version............Bruce

Nope.

That's at the machine shop in Spokane, WA.

Marty Grzynkowicz posted:

Without reading the entire thread, what was the horsepower target on this motor?

I know you are probably busy talking people back from the ledge as the markets take us back to the stone age, but you don't need to read the whole thread to get the details, just the first page.

150-170 is the target. I'm hoping for the high end of that figure.

There's a cool calculator on Wallace Racing's website that allows you to plug in the CFM of your heads, pick a general class of cam, plug in a displacement (in cubic inches, you'd need to convert), and number of cylinders-- then it spits out a HP number.

It's not perfect, but gets you close. My numbers come up in the 168 hp range (@6400 RPM) using the "street/strip" choice, and 182 hp using the "typical race engine" choice. With the cam I've got, I don't think 170 hp is unreasonable at all.

The heads will limit anything more-- it'd take 180 cfm to get to 200 hp at this displacement. 

Last edited by Stan Galat

Excellent, that what I'm shooting for on my Alfa Project.  Was tempted to go higher, but the engine builder asked me how I use the car.  When I told him how far and often I go with the clubs, drivability was the number one determination.  Let's set up a drive with the Midwest boys as soon as it's safe to be within a car's length of each other

 

It's time for installment 2 in the "step towards (relative) sanity "series, whereupon our protagonist attempts to restrain Mr. Hyde and allow Dr. Jeckyll full control of his car.

I believe that when we left off (pre-COVID), we were merrily prepping the bottom end. It's a long/boring story, but there was a problem that involved QC with the new case-- a problem which involved the cam bore being offset, etc. The case would be fine for a less involved project, but we all decided that for something with as many "extras", we'd be best off to start over. One step forward, two steps back. The good news is I didn't supply the case, so it's not my responsibility. The bad news is mid-lockdown, it's hard to know when a new case will arrive at the machinist's.

VintageVolks has been fantastic throughout this process-- really, really stand-up guys.

So, attention was turned to the heads.

As discussed, I'll be using the new Panchitos. Normal people just order the heads they want, and bolt them on. Normal people are happy. Normal people don't try to make very nearly perfect things more perfecter. The problem with the protagonist of this ongoing saga is that he has a hard time being "normal", even when normal has been demonstrably better.

My Panchitos were ordered "built" like most people would-- valves, guides, seats, dual valve-springs, and cromoly retainers installed. CB sells them bare for idiots who think they can do better, but I had resolved to be good and try to blend in. I got my heads, and they were beautiful. And alas, I yam what I yam.

Typical "H/D" single valve-springs lose control of the valves with pretty mild cam profiles at pretty low RPM. I have been looking at bee-hive valve springs for a couple of years. Beehives are single springs wound differently than standard, which allow more aggressive cam profiles and higher RPM without setting up a harmonic that causes the spring to lose control of the valve-train. They've been used in the V8 world for years, but have not been used in ACVWs because of what is commonly available.  There's a guy named Dan Ruddock who's come up with a pretty interesting way to use them in ACVWs. Dan makes a couple of different sets for different applications and calls them "Beehives Done Right". The idea behind beehives is the promise of being able to accurately control smaller valves (like the Panchitos) up to 7000 RPM with very low spring pressures. This is important for a couple of reasons:

High spring pressures create a lot of heat and a lot of wear. Everybody is (rightly) worried about the cam lobe/lifter interface-- this is the primary reason car-guys get all bent out of shape about the zinc and phosphorous content of motor oil. ZDDP in oil is "sacrificial", and is meant to provide a shield between the cam lobe and lifter face in an extremely high shear wear situation. Everything becomes critical with super high valve-spring pressures, and the cam lobes and lifter faces live an exceedingly hard life.

High spring-pressure require very robust components-- straight-cut cam gears, very strong pushrods, and rocker-arm assemblies that look like they are built to hold up a bridge. Big components are heavier, and heavier components require more spring to control. It's a viscous cycle that gets some guys running K800 springs on the street.

... but for me, probably the main consideration is that the friction created by the springs jamming the lifters into the cam creates a huge amount of heat-- heat that goes straight into the oil. Heat that is hard to get rid of. Heat that kills engines.

Unsurprisingly, I decided I had to have them. As I said, my Panchitos arrived ready to go with sensible (not obnoxiously heavy) dual valve springs, valves, guides, and seats. The "Beehives Done Right" kit requires valves ground for "normal" triple groove keepers. CB's heads come with single-groove valves and keepers-- so getting to the beehives would mean removing and setting aside not only the valve-springs and retainers, but the valves themselves. Undeterred, I sourced and ordered 8 new valves and the appropriate kit from Dan Ruddock.

Beehives Done Right

In addition, I decided I wanted to be in the .001% of the ACVW guys out there who run valve-stem seals. The 4 people in America (Bob Hoover among them) who believe this to be worthwhile run early Rabbit valve-seals (P/N: 026 109 675), because they will fit VW valves and the normally used guides (if they are turned down), and the OD is small enough to clear a compressed VW dual valve-spring. Fortunately for me, my machinist is one of the guys who believes in this modification. I found a guy on TheSamba who had a set of TPFE Rabbit valve-seals, which I picked up. TPFE has a very high heat tolerance, as compared to Viton.

Unfortunately, once the valve-springs were removed, this is how much guide was sticking out of the spring boss:Short Guides

As you can see, there's not enough meat to attach a seal to the guide. This left us three options: 1) cut down the boss to expose more guide, 2) just ditch the valve-seal idea, and steer this ship towards more conventional horizons, or 3)

 Point of No Return

So, what we have accomplished is to successfully take a set of fully built and perfectly good heads and proceed to:

  • Remove and set aside the valve-springs and retainers
  • Remove and set aside the valves and keepers
  • Drill out the installed valve-guides

It's a good thing I've still got the seats. I wouldn't want to have purchased complete head for nothing... 

It seems to be raining. I'm happy.

More details soon.

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Last edited by Stan Galat
LI-Rick posted:

Stan, how much exposed valve guide do you need for the seals? Are you just going to install a longer valve guide or split the difference and cut the guide boss also?

I like to see .250" minimum of the guide sticking up above the boss in order to do seals.  Most stock guides have somewhere .250-270".  There is no spec for this, so it is sort of hit or miss.  The guides that were in the heads had maybe half that.  No way would there be enough there to grip the seal.

aircooled posted:

Stan, is that your shop in the photos ?  Looks like someone besides me likes Grizzly Lathes !  I will be getting an new Grizzly lathe in the near future. The one I have is too small and it's close to being worn out now after nearly daily use for 20 years. I like the gunsmith version............Bruce

I love my Grizzly lathe.  Its perfect size for what I do and the community support is amazing.  I actually built all the parts a while back to convert the spindle to a D1-3.  I just needed a back plate for at least my 3-jaw chuck before installing it all.  Now that it has shown up, the conversion is complete.  That was the best modification I have done to this thing yet.  Now I can turn in reverse and not unscrew the chuck!

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Once the guides were gone and the valves were out of the way, I was powerless in the face of temptation and succumbed (again) to the "while we're in there" syndrome.

As such, I had Jason (VintageVolks) do a "fluff-n-buff" (insert sophomoric joke here, Jethro) port clean-up. Panchitos come with very well designed "as cast" ports-- they're meant to be ready to go without any porting. Indeed, there's almost no extra material in the casting to remove if a guy DID want to port them, and what makes them so magical is that they flow ridiculously well with a very small port. This is what the "as cast" ports look like:

Panchitos, Raw Ports

There's really nothing to be gained by messing with the ports, but the theme here is "why leave well enough alone?", so we (I) wanted to just remove the casting flash-- no reshaping or enlarging of the port walls, but just a clean and deburr.

Before anybody says anything-- yes, I know the intake needs some surface character to keep the mixture in suspension, but taking it to this level should have no negative ramification. I was going to have VintageVolks put a mirror finish on the chambers and exhaust ports (not for flow, but so that carbon doesn't stick as readily), but stopped the process before it got out of hand (see @Panhandle Bob-- I can stop any time I want to!).

This is what we've got with a bit of 80 and 120 grit and a die grinder:

Panchitos, 120 Grit

We're nowhere near done yet. The new guides will be installed (the heads heated and the guides chilled-- Jason shoots for a 400* temperature delta) and cut for the seals.The heads will be flycut to 56 cc chambers to get 9.9:1 CR with .040 copper head gaskets (assuming 0 deck). If this proves to be too much, I can get back to 9.4:1 by swapping the .040 gaskets with .060 gaskets.

Once the chambers CC correctly, Jason will do a nice 3-angle valve job, and we can turn our attention to the beehive set-up, and the Hoover modifications to the rocker arms.

Stay tuned for the next exciting episode...

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Vintage Volks posted:
aircooled posted:

Stan, is that your shop in the photos ?  Looks like someone besides me likes Grizzly Lathes !  I will be getting an new Grizzly lathe in the near future. The one I have is too small and it's close to being worn out now after nearly daily use for 20 years. I like the gunsmith version............Bruce

I love my Grizzly lathe.  Its perfect size for what I do and the community support is amazing.  I actually built all the parts a while back to convert the spindle to a D1-3.  I just needed a back plate for at least my 3-jaw chuck before installing it all.  Now that it has shown up, the conversion is complete.  That was the best modification I have done to this thing yet.  Now I can turn in reverse and not unscrew the chuck!

Not to divert Stan's thread too much, as we are prone to do, but how did you pin the adapter to threaded spindle?  How much did it add to the chuck overhang?

LI-Rick posted:
Vintage Volks posted:
aircooled posted:

Stan, is that your shop in the photos ?  Looks like someone besides me likes Grizzly Lathes !  I will be getting an new Grizzly lathe in the near future. The one I have is too small and it's close to being worn out now after nearly daily use for 20 years. I like the gunsmith version............Bruce

I love my Grizzly lathe.  Its perfect size for what I do and the community support is amazing.  I actually built all the parts a while back to convert the spindle to a D1-3.  I just needed a back plate for at least my 3-jaw chuck before installing it all.  Now that it has shown up, the conversion is complete.  That was the best modification I have done to this thing yet.  Now I can turn in reverse and not unscrew the chuck!

Not to divert Stan's thread too much, as we are prone to do, but how did you pin the adapter to threaded spindle?  How much did it add to the chuck overhang?

I turned a locking ring that is a close slip fit over the existing spindle and tapped 3 set screws that fit down into the existing tommy bar holes.  You can see 2 of the 3 set screws in the original picture, 1 at the bottom pointing toward the front way of the lathe bed and the second one pointing straight up.  Then when the machine work on the D1-3 adapter was all finished and I screwed it on the chuck for the last time, I drilled, tapped and countersunk an M6 flat head screw in the bottom of the each pin hole to lock the adapter to the locking ring. I wanted to use M8, but didn't have room in the hole to make it fit.  But really, 3 M6 screws will have more than enough shear strength to hold the adapter on the locking ring.

In this picture, you can see the back plate has a step.  I plan to turn that off when I get my 4 jaw chuck setup with a D1-3 back plate.  That will eliminate about .300" of overhang.

I have not measured to see how much extra overhang there is, but I would guess it is somewhere around a long inch, really its the thickness of the D1-3 adapter.  I rarely do any work that requires more than 6 inches of bed travel, so that was not important to me.  I was more interested in being able to quickly change chucks and have better repeatability when doing so.  My biggest driver in doing all this was to allow for turning in reverse and not unscrew the chuck.  Now that I can do that, I need to make new parting and threading tools so I can really take advantage of this whole setup.

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Last edited by Vintage Volks

Thanks, I was very happy with how this turned out. 

Bearing ware may be a valid concern.  Between the D1-3 adapter and the heavy chuck, there is an extra 75 lbs above the stock setup.  Hang that over the bed an additional 1.25" and it may cause extra ware.  I've been running this chuck for years and I just took the spindle out to repack the bearings a month ago and things look good.  So I don't know that it will be too much of an issue but I'll keep an eye on it.

Jason...Now that is really cool ! On occasion I have had to cut threads on the back side. That allows me to run the cutter off the loose end of the stock. I have had to really crank on the set screws to keep the chuck from backing off. This has screwed up the threads on the chuck spindle. Anyway, when I get the new Grizzly I'll contact you again. Thanks for making a totally drifted comment about your lathe too ! .....Bruce

Since CNC machines have taken over, there are a lot of good used Bridgeport and Atlas machines around. Lathes too.  Where the bucks go is on the next ones you buy because you will know what you want then and your accuracy will be a higher priority. Shop around Danny. If you find something be sure to buy all the other tools and accessories that go with them. Those may cost more than the machine itself in the end if you don't ! No Question about it though ! It's just like before you had a floor hoist or even earlier than that.....your first Hein-Werner floor jack with a set of four good steel jack stands!

Bruce

It's been a busy time in Lake Woebegon.

Spring has come and gone (mostly), and your humble protagonist has been busy shoveling money into the boilers of progress. If you recall, this particular project had 3 facets:

  1. The transaxle
  2. The seats
  3. The engine

Most of the focus of this forum has been on the engine (and various interesting rabbit-trails), which I'll get back to-- but items number 1 and 2 are complete, and the car has been back on the road for a month or so with a "spare" 2110 I've got for just such instances. The car went back on the road about a month ago-- just in time for one of the wettest Mays on record. I've only put about 300 mi on it since then, but here's where we are:

The transaxle got taken apart and re-geared (yet again). It got a reground Super Beetle mainshaft, a new (Weddle) 3rd geat, and we reused my .93 4th, as well as the China-Doll 3.44. I also got a new Super-Diff, which means my ZF LSD is in a box waiting for the Canadian border to open so it can be sent to Bruce Twiddle for a rebuild. The box got new syncros and German bearings (as needed), as well as various this-'n-that, which Anthony provided as part of the rebuild. Initially, I filled it with Mobil 1 GL5 oil which proved to be too slippery for the syncros to work. After crunching gears for about 50 miles, I sold some investment property, traded some shards of the true cross, and purchased some RedLine GL4 synthetic 75W/90 from our (only) local speed shop (Winner's Circle Racing). This oil was much better, but I ordered (Anthony's recommended) Brad Penn 80W/90 GL4 dino-oil from Summit Racing, and drained the liquid gold into the waste oil tank (we had a moment of silence). The syncos are loosening up and I'm feeling good about the noises the box is making.

I like the gearing well enough to call this done. 5 forward gears would be better, but my reasons for not heading down that road are well documented. I'm running CB's rhino mounts on both the front and back now, and I installed a spring-center clutch instead of the copperhead disc I've used for years. I've always run a Stage 2 PP in this car, as my wife doesn't drive it. All in all, I think this is a nice setup, and an actual step toward sanity, which was the whole reason I started down this road.

... which gets us to the second part of the program, which was the seats.

I never cared for the seats that came with the car. They were beautiful, and covered with the finest Italian hides, but even though Henry lowered them as far as he could-- they were way too high for me.

I lose track of time, but at some time in the middle-distant past (10 years? 12?), I bit the bullet and bought a set of Fibersteel seats and mounted them directly to the floor on a "flippable" hinge arrangement that allowed the seats to fold forward. It was less handy than it sounds, and took about a month of evenings to fabricate.

I loved those seats, but I had mounted them so that they sat evenly in the car, and Jeanie could barely see over the dashboard. She really did look like an 8 year old, sitting in the front of her dad's 3500 Ram diesel dually for the first time without a booster. In addition, she was uncomfortable in the Gemini Rocketman seats.

It never mattered, because our preferred method of long-distance travel was to buy her a plane ticket, and I would go on a Banzai run to get to our destination. The only firm time about the trip was that I would appear at the arrival door and pick her up in the car. We'd motor around Tahoe or down the PCH for a week or 10 days, then I'd get her back to the airport and beat it home across the country.

In 2017, we did the Tour de Smo in west NC. There are no airports with flights from Peoria in west NC, and it's only 10 hrs or so of driving from Morton to Maggie Valley. My lovely bride agreed to ride along with me. In gratefulness, I bought an EMPI VW replacement seat (which is a Chinese ProCar copy) and bolted it in the car on sliders. The experience was transformative for her-- she loved it. She could see out, she liked the lumbar support, it reclined, it had a head rest, and she was comfortable for the entire trip.

It was also as ugly as a mud fence, sitting there in all it's vinyl glory next to my sper-duper Gemini Astronaut seat

Seats

I tried it out on the driver's side to see how it fit. The top frame of the windshield was roughly even with my nostrils. The seatback felt like somebody had upholstered over a football. It was completely unworkable.

But, as there was no taking the passenger's seat out, I decided I would order a driver's seat, tear it apart, remake the bottom frame, install seat heaters, and get both seats reupholstered in leather. I started on this part of the project just before Christmas.

I wish I'd have taken pictures along the way, but I made a seat frame that reused the springs, but recessed the seat sliders into the side bolsters of the bottom cushion. I cut the seat pad foam on a pretty aggressive angle, so that the foam at the seatback is only about an inch thick, and the springs are skimming the carpet. Even though the seat base and foam were on as aggressive an angle as I could make them, I still mounted them an inch higher in the front, so that the entire seating surface pitches me back very aggressively. I reshaped the rear cushion to take out all of the lumbar. I kept cutting foam until it felt comfortable.

I bought some Water Carbon seat heaters on Amazon, and took them to Twin Cities Upholstery, right as the COVID shutdown was moving into place. Twin Cities was essential, but they were buried recovering chairs and booths for non-essential restaurants all over central Illinois. They still did the job in about 5 weeks, which I thought was amazing.

While I waited, I wired up the seat heaters, adding a relay so that the seat heaters are "keyed". I might have gotten carried away with how I did it, but if a QC inspector from a nuclear plant ever looks at the wiring, he'll be satisfied. It was a good thing the transaxle was out for this part of the program.

I got the transaxle back in the car right about when the seats were done. I picked them up and put them in at the end of April, then put the 2110 in during the same burst of activity. I'm pleased with how they turned out-- they are comfortable for 2 people with very, very different physiologies, and look like they belong. Don't tell Jeanie, but I think I may like them even better with my older bones.

Comfort SeatsComfrot Seats 2Seat Heaters

I'll have an update on the engine as time allows-- but for now, I'm back in business. It feels really good.

 

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Last edited by Stan Galat

 Stan maybe there is hope for us other guys who ride solo ... well because

On the seats they look pretty nice I hope they work out ...

If you want to make them lean farther IM reduces or cuts in the sides of the rear seat area to allow the seat to recline.

btw Marty put in a power seat lift for his wife ... I guess I should not have mentioned it

Last edited by IaM-Ray
@barncobob posted:

i am a perfectionist at keeping the wife happy:} everything else is alot easier to deal with

Right around the time that saying came out my son was around 4 y.o. and was being baby sat by a friend and his wife.  In the course of the day his wife was asking him to do stuff and he was not cooperating, my son at 4 says to him :" Bob you should do it," he looks him straight in the eye and says "Happy wife, happy life" Bob just about fell over from laughter, then went to please his wife. ... We still laugh at that comment to this day.  

@edsnova posted:

Thank you once again for the entertaining update, Mr. Galat. You are the one and only The Man.

Truer words have never been spoken. Stan blazes the way.

Negative. I believe the term you are looking for, Mike is "cautionary tale".

Anybody can get it right if they get it 5 (or more) runs at it. I'm just a guy who's lost all perspective, and doesn't know when to quit.

Last edited by Stan Galat

Mitch-- Regarding buying and crying and the optimal number for each activity: one seems like a pretty good number (in the hypothetical abstract). It's good advice don't you think? If only I was capable of heeding it.

You do know the definition of "hardhead", right? In Miriam-Webster's there's a picture of a silverback ape under that heading.

"Don't be like Stupid Stan."

Last edited by Stan Galat

 

@Stan Galat posted:

 

...You do know the definition of "hardhead", right? In Miriam-Webster's there's a picture of a silverback ape under that heading.

"Don't be like Stupid Stan."...

 

Stan, I don't think what you do is 'stupid' at all.

You're a builder. You build stuff. You like building stuff.

Houses. Garages. Motorized bicycle hoists. (No one builds a motorized bicycle hoist unless they like building stuff.)

I think you like the building as much as the driving, maybe more.

Some people like solving a Rubix cube. The joy is in the doing. When the puzzle's solved, there's elation, but some disappointment, too. We're done here. What's next?

It's the achieve of, the mastery of the thing. (footnote 1)

One thing I've learned here is that we all get something a little different back from these cars. Me? I'm no mechanic. The less I wrench, the better a world this is. I can wreak more havoc with a screwdriver than most people can with high explosives.

I like a motor that just keeps running. It doesn't need to make more horsepressure than Fred's motor. If it just keeps running.

If the car can get me through some vineyard country and let me taste the air as I go and feel the terroir rise and fall under my wheels, that's payback enough. I'm good being me. You need only to be you.

There's no right and wrong here. No better or worse.

There is no stupid.

 

 

Stan is here to help us, because he is "that guy". He takes the bullet for all(some?) of us.

Don't pay attention to what the Silverback Ape is doing. Stan is sometimes a contradiction. So am I. Sometimes we try things against our own sage advice. Sometimes they work, mostly not.

But definitely LISTEN to what the Silverback Ape says. He speaks the truth.

I know pretty well who I am, and who I'm not. Mitch (of course) has my particular psychosis pretty well pegged, from his observation regarding what I advise and what I do, to his realization that I enjoy working on this car almost as much as I enjoy driving it (and maybe more). I love the VW Type 1 because it can be almost any one thing a man chooses, but not several things at once. Both Mitch and Jim Ignacio are very good at just choosing a configuration with the broadest bandwidth, and accepting the limitations. They then (wisely) adapt themselves to accept what they have.

Although I see the great value in the "zen" of that, I'm just not that guy. I'll never be able to fully leave well enough alone, and I'm OK with that. I'm happy in my own skin.

I do like to build. But even more, I like to solve problems (whether actual or perceived). This makes me a lousy leader, or a fantastic one, depending on the situation. I'm a fixer of things, and always default to the belief that there is nearly always a way to bring the mountain to Muhammad, if one applies enough effort. Sometimes this belief works greatly to my advantage, sometimes it does not-- but while most people find dead-ends to be frustrating defeats, I just look at them as one more solution for a problem other than the one I'm trying to solve at the moment. Even outright failure is just one more answer ("let's not do that again").

The air-cooled flat 4 is one of the most modular mechanical devices ever conceived and manufactured. It can be configured to be anything from a 1200 cc pea-shooter to a 3L, turbocharged drag motor-- all with the same basic architecture. What it isn't is super-flexible at being several things at once. For me, the white whale has been in choosing which set of limitations will best fit the particular application. What do I want this car to be? What am I willing to give up to get it there? Once the parameters are identified, then taking the thing to it's logical conclusion is just a matter of applying time and money.

I've never been displeased with any iteration of this car, but my expectations of it have evolved and crystallized to bring me to a moment where I took a couple of steps back so that I could head down a road that was slightly (but significantly) different. So far, I like it a lot.

I believe the engine we are building will be the icing on the cake. I can tell you this, before diving into the details-- I have enjoyed the process immensely, and my enjoyment of it is firmly rooted in finding somebody as inquisitive, detail oriented, and honest as I hope to be.

I cannot recommend @Vintage Volks highly enough.  

Last edited by Stan Galat

I tried with some success, and some failure, at making my Spyder a great all-around sports car. Track use, autocross, cruiser, intertstate-traveller, and mountain-road-topless-fair-weather zipper. I've come to realize that is an impossible task to do it ALL WELL. The last one is my favorite use of the car.

I have finally accepted the fact that it can't do it all. I may re-gear the trans to make it a little shorter and closer for twisty and hilly work. Right now it's a decent compromise.

That's why I bought a Cayman. Different cars for different uses. Instead of a homemade Swiss Army knife I have 2 different knives now.

Parallel paths Stan. You helped me come to this conclusion. Thanks man.

Getting back to the engine (and the madness)...

As I said in the opening monologue, I’m using Panchitos with Dan Ruddock’s beehive spring kit. The plan was to use a CB2292 and 1.4 rocker arms, as this is the combination that got 180 hp for Anand’s 2332 (Pat was recommending the 2292 with 1.25 rockers). Everybody always says, “the power is in the heads”, but the truth is that the heads and the cam are a married couple-- one is only made complete with the other. Cam selection is very, very important.

The Dan Ruddock beehive springs will allow .550” of lift before coil bind with a “standard” installation (1.7” installed spring height), and a standard installation has the right seat and nose pressure (the amount of force exerted on the valve-train when fully closed and fully open). The idea is to run lower spring pressures, while still controlling the valves-- so that there is less friction at the cam/lifter junction, and less wear and tear on everything else in the valvetrain. I’m using CB’s lightweight lifters, aircooled.net’s heavy-duty pushrods, and modified stock helical cut cam gears (which require a low spring pressure). 

The CB 2292 has .378” of lift at the cam. Doing the math (and CB has the math, right on their specs for the cam), using 1.4 rockers works out to .529” of lift at the valve, which is well within the range of the beehives. I put all this stuff together having done all the calculations, and sent it out to Jason. I was a genius!

… except when Jason mocked up the valvetrain, we came up with .557” of lift at the valve-- too much lift for the beehives. Huh?

IMG_20200504_233947

Well, it turns out that all of the economical “1.4” rocker arms actually measure out to 1.45:1 or greater. Mine figured out to north of 1.47:1. Pauter (of course) makes a true 1.4:1 rocker arm assembly, but they cost $650, and are good to about 10,000 RPM, which seems like a bit of overkill for an engine that won’t see over 7000 RPM.

Panchitos are done flowing at about .500” of valve lift. They only flow 4 cfm more at .600” than they do at .500”, so there isn’t much point in lifting past .500” anyhow. The thing is: if I lift to .530” or so, the valve actually spends quite a bit more time above .500” (where it flows the best) as the valve opens and closes. In my mind, I really wanted as much “dwell” as I could get at around .500” of valve-lift.

Cams are super cool. When we look at the specs, all we can see is the total lif and the total duration. We can’t see the shape of the lobe. Some cams lft really fast and have a very long dwell at maximum lift (which makes more power), but these cams are noisy and super-hard on the valvetrain. Other cams lobes look like a splitting wedge-- very pointy, with slower ramps, but way less time at maximum lift. The result is that cams with nearly identical specs can be different enough for one to be preferred over the other. The 2292 is very like an Engle FK10, which is very similar to a Web 86c.

It’d be neat if you could use whatever cam you wanted with whatever lifters you wanted, but the metals often don’t play well together. CBs lifters are super-lightweight, which is the theme of this entire endeavor, so using a cam ground on an EP-12 blanks (like CBs are) was kind’ve baked in the cake.

So I was stuck. But, I had an ace up my sleeve! In anticipation of needing them someday, a while back I had bought the last set of CB’s “1.3” rocker arms I could find (they are a discontinued item). If the “1.4” rockers measured 1.47:1, I hoped that the “1.3” rockers would measure 1.35 or so. I wanted at least .500” of valve lift. I sent them out to Jason.

He put them in and measured them up. We had .489” of lift, which is about 1.29: 1 . I should have been happy. I wasn’t. I really wanted the valves to lift where they would have with true 1.4:1 rocker arms. I really didn’t want to buy Pauters.

I put the query out on TheSamba, fully expecting a bunch of unhelpful and non-related responses. Instead, I got a lot of good information. and found that “1.25” rockers often lift up to nearly 1.4:1. I briefly considered this option, but decided I really didn’t want to end up with 4 sets of rocker arms and none I could use. I also got a response from Dan Ruddock.

Dan knew this was a problem with his springs, and he had a solution. He’d contacted Web Cam, and had found a grind (the 252), which was not in the catalog. This cam has .366” of lift at the cam, and 260° duration (at .050”). He had the cam customized with more duration-- either at 266° or 272° with the same lift, and had it ground on an EP-12 blank (because he knows those lifters are the bomb). The CB 2292 cam has 270°, which is really aggressive. The Web cam has nice easy ramps, and a “snub nose” for a lot of dwell at full lift. A bit less aggressive, with easy ramps and a lot of dwell-- it sounded really, really good. 

The valve lift figures out to .538” with the “1.4” rockers (that measure 1.47:1), which keeps me well under .550”. Web cams are legendary for making power, and being easy on the valve-train. I chose the 266° duration cam. I didn’t want to deviate from the recipe, but I ordered the cam and it’s at Jason’s shop.

When one colors outside the lines, it gets weird pretty quickly. Stay tuned for the next exciting episode of "Stan's Lawn Mower Engine".

This is a step towards sanity, remember?

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Last edited by Stan Galat

Stan, very cool. FYI, Pauter rockers are the bomb. All the cool kids have them(old school roller-bearing 1.5s in mine). I'm surprised you didn't just order them. They did change them back to plain bearings, but still charge a lot for them, so I understand not getting them.

But either way, Webcam does make a good camshaft, so you're covered. It sounds like a very viable and well-laid plan.

Thanks for including all of us on this journey, or should I say "Odyssey"?

You had me at beehives, Stan.  I love this stuff, this kind of detailed thinking and building, seeing the way you and your builder are sweating the details. Magnificent!

I love the way springs behave. How, say a different number of coils over the same distance at the same spring rate changes everything. I got into it through race bike suspension set up, not valve trains, but things can get really crazy really quick.

I'm also glad I decided to go Suby before this post was up.  It's like Stan is standing just down a side alley saying to me, "Hey, kid, come here. I got some candy for ya."

You had me at beehives, Stan.  I love this stuff, this kind of detailed thinking and building, seeing the way you and your builder are sweating the details. Magnificent!

I love the way springs behave. How, say a different number of coils over the same distance at the same spring rate changes everything. I got into it through race bike suspension set up, not valve trains, but things can get really crazy really quick.

I'm also glad I decided to go Suby before this post was up.  It's like Stan is standing just down a side alley saying to me, "Hey, kid, come here. I got some candy for ya."

Thanks (I think), Michael. It's apparent that God made (at least) 2 of us. It's the small things like these springs that get me all worked up.

A standard "HD dual" valve-spring for a VW has about a 1.54" install height. The springs have 5 coils and an interference fit to keep harmonic vibrations under control. That friction increases oil temperature.

The beehives are installed at 1.7", with a funky looking retainer set-up that brings the spring almost all the way out the the lash-cap. They wires are oval-shaped, with 6 coils per spring. This means that each coil moves less with each compression. There are no inner springs, so there is no friction. The nose pressure is about the same as the standard HD dual springs (295 lbs), but the seat pressure is lower (about 110 lbs).

The part of the spring that moves the most (the top) is lighter than the duals, so it's easier to keep under control. There are two reasons to love the idea of these things: the reduction in friction, and the reduction in valve-train weight. The benefit of the first is obvious, but it's that second part I'm really excited about, as it's kind of a new way of thinking for me. This will be my first engine with smaller (40 mm) intakes, lighter lifters, light retainers (12.5 grams), and aluminum push-rods. I'm really hoping to be able to spin this out to 7000 RPM, as the cam will still be making power up there.

It's a big engine to spool up that far, but that's why we're doing what we are with the bottom end. But that's a story for another night. 

Last edited by Stan Galat

I've not really followed this thread that seriously - just jumped in and out whenever I saw a post I thought I could understand.  Technical stuff like this is way about my pay grade (but I'm retired, so I guess that analogy does not fit anymore).

Anyway, whatever Stan is doing there looks interesting as all get out, and I am fascinated with the level of detail that this entails.  I believe it's a healthy thing for Stan to be doing these days.  :-)

On a side note, whenever I see the word Panchito, I get a craving for chips and dip, or a week in Mexico.

 

It's been a couple of months since my last post on this project, and it'd be easy to get lost in the weeds regarding what'd been happening this summer. As with most of us, 2020 has produced more than it's share of frustration and setback-- but it's all part of the journey and part of the "fun" (I keep telling myself).

I've been motoring around in the Speedster with the 2110. It's an OK motor-- Cima/Mahle pistons/cylinders, an SLR "120-ish" cam, and some heads AJ Sims did for me 20 years ago. It was a fresh rebuild, and broke in nicely. I've been fighting an older set of 40s for most of the summer, and finally gave up and put on a set of 45s with a fresh rebuild. With these carbs, the engine idles down to 600 RPM (should I want to) without a fart, spit, or sneeze. I believe I've got a twisted throttle shaft in the 40s, but that's a project for a winter day, not for right now.

On March 20, at the front end of the COVID shutdown, I boxed up the twin-plug heads and sent them via USPS to Denmark to have Torben Alstrup rework them. During the great fire of '18, they ingested some molten aluminum from the misfire problem chronicled elsewhere. That was not the only issue-- the same erratic spark had caused enough detonation/pre-ignition that the combustion chambers needed work. The heads have what appears to be a DRD port. Lots of guys liked them because they flow well on the bench, but the I/R ratio is not good (too much exhaust flow for the intake). Torben knows exactly what to do, and had the time to do it.

Anyway, the heads were guaranteed to get there in 6 days, and the cost was about $200, which was less than half of UPS. I boxed them up in the mother of all boxes, bought all the insurance USPS would sell me ($650), and sent them on their way.

USPS offers "tracking", which is a joke. I watched them go to St. Louis that night, sit there for a week, then go to Chicago (we're halfway between the cities). At that point, they fell off the face of the earth. I inquired (in person) at the 2-week, 1-month, and 2-month marks. The postmaster recommended filing a claim, which I did on June 20 (3 months to the day after I sent them).

I heard nothing for 5 more weeks. On August 1, they showed up on my doorstep. My wife went to the post office to get the cost of shipping back (she's very good at getting refunds, I'm not). They now had good tracking (the kind you get every time you send something FedEx or UPS). The box sat stateside until July 23-- at which point, somebody put it on a plane for Denmark. It arrived in Danish customs, cleared, and sat in Copenhagen for 2 more weeks. The box processed through Copenhagen, "attempted delivery", and processed back to the US as "not picked up" all within a span of less than 10 minutes. I got it about a week later.

Apparently, some EU countries are just sending stuff back to the US because they don't like our COVID response (even though the package could not possibly have live US virus after a 2-week quarantine after Danish customs). Regardless-- the heads are back home after a 4 month tour of the post-apocalyptic landscape that is "the new normal" (I've got a dozen such stories in my business). The heads still need reworked, but I'm not super excited about $1000+ in shipping two ways. and hoping for the best. I need to figure this one out before moving forward. Failing to plan is planning to fail.

Progress on the longblock has been similar, but Jason from VintageVolks is doing a killer job for me. It's just been very slow, mostly because of me. I'll have more details as soon as I've got more to tell, but I'm quite grateful to be as deep into spares as I am-- I'm not sure what I'd do if I were just waiting.

Last edited by Stan Galat
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