8. Karmann Ghia Restoration - Engine Rebuild Part 3

Well it's time for the final bits and bobs to go onto the engine for my 1971 Karmann Ghia convertible restoration. As I mentioned earlier in the blog, this is a "dry build", so quite a lot of the items fitted will have to come off again before the engine is fitted in the car. Consequently some things have been fitted without gaskets and in some cases not all of the fixings. Just sufficient to be sure that everything will fit when the time comes. This has turned out to be very wise, particularly with regard to the chrome engine tinware. I don't think that there has been a single panel that has not needed modification and I repeat my warning; "If you are considering fitting this replacement chrome tinware (and it's not chrome, it's thin polished stainless steel) which does look beautiful, then be prepared for lots of extra work.

So here's the next, and very typical, example. I decided to try fitting the rear engine tray. Everything lined up on the right hand side, but the left side overlapped the exhaust flange, as you can see in the picture. Now, as I am fitting twin carburettors, I don't actually need these inlet manifold flanges, but I do need to blank them off and I can't do that and make a gas tight seal with the tinware where it is.

So I marked the tray, with a chinagraph pencil, where it needed to be cut and removed the tray again and set about it with a small cutting disc on the Dremel. I also took a small amount off the right side too, just to give it a bit of clearance. I then had to finish and re-polish the edges, but it now fits and I could look at making some nice blanking plates for the flanges.

So I made two cardboard templates, one for each side, and then  found some thick aluminium to make the plates out of. These have to be quite thick in order that they don't distort when tightened down to make a gas tight seal.

I then marked out the aluminium using the templates and cut them out. By placing the cardboard templates over the flanges, I could poke a spike through the templates to mark the correct position of the fixing holes. These positions could then be transferred to the blanking plates to allow them to be drilled, with a 6mm drill, for the fixing bolts.

All that was left then was to polish the blanking plates and fix them in place using the normal VW gaskets underneath to make a good seal and tighten down the bolts nice and tight.

So now it was time to take a look at the heater pipes. These are the two large flexible hoses that come from fan housing and pass down through the large holes in the rear engine tray and connect to the two heat exchange pods that are mounted on cylinder 2 and 4 exhaust pipes and these in turn connect to the heater boxes. Well they don't!!! Firstly the heat exchange pods are missing on the sports exhaust. So I thought that I could simply connect the hoses from the fan housing, down through the two holes in the rear engine tray and connect them directly to the heater boxes.

So I stupidly set about making two adaptor tubes to fit in the heater boxes, for the hoses to fit on to. They fit into the heater boxes well, but I then discovered that there was no way that I could get a hose on to them as they are directly below the rear exhaust pipes. So they had to be scrapped. My next idea was to remove the pods from my original silencer and fit them around the new exhaust pipes. Getting them off the old exhaust wasn't too difficult, however when it came to offering them up to the new exhaust I found that the sports exhaust pipes are at severely different angles from the original exhaust and this stops the pods lining up with the heater box and the holes on the engine tray. Failure number two!!
 So finally I decided to give my friend, Colin, a call at "Unit Two Services" (Formally Gladex) in Ilkeston, Derbyshire. He came and had I look and said that what I need are "Dairy Tubes". I had no idea what he meant, but apparently they are tubes bent at right angles that can  be cut and welded together to fit around difficult bends. He said he would order some for me and give me a call when he can fit them. So that part of the build is now on hold.

I then turned my attention to the other end of the exhaust/heater system and decided to fit the heater levers. These open flaps inside the heater box and allow warm air to pass to the inside of the car. After greasing the pivot points I proceeded to fit the levers, not realising that there was a left and a right. I had looked at the levers and at first glance they looked identical, but I missed one small hole. That is the hole that the return spring fits through and must be to the flywheel side. Needless to say I didn't spot this until it came to fitting the springs and I had them the wrong way around. So they had to come off again and swap sides.

The next bit is no surprise. I hooked the return spring onto the lever and then found that there was no hole in the tinware to hook the other end. I checked on the original tinware and found where the holes should be and then had to drill the new ones to suit. Not a big job but yet another missing detail on the replacement tinware.

Now for an exciting bit. I decided to try dry fitting the twin carburettors. These fit remarkably easy, straight on top of the inlet manifolds with mounting plates on top to support the actuating bar that runs between the two. This bar was the only thing that needed modification and I had to shorten it by about 50mm (2") for it to fit nicely between the two carburettors. I must admit that they have made a huge difference to the look of the whole engine.

So now just some final bits. Time to fit the HT coil. Now normally the HT coil bolts to two captive nuts mounted on the fan housing behind the distributor. Well firstly it can't go quite as high as normal or it will hit the Carburettor actuating bar and secondly (you know what's coming) the new tinware has not got any captive nuts in it anyway. Obviously I could simply drill the fan housing and fix the HT coil in place with two self tapping screws. But I didn't think that self tappers were a good idea on a vibrating engine and felt that over time they may come loose. I needed captive nuts, but you can't get to the other side of the fan housing front plate to fix them. So once again I went to see my friend Colin and low and behold he had a special tool for fitting "Hank Bushes" These are like threaded "Pop Rivets" and can be inserted from one side of a piece of metal, just like a Pop Rivet, and then compressed with this tool to fix them in place. Well I borrowed it and it worked fantastic first time. So with two 6mm thread Hank Bushes in place I could now fit the HT coil.

The old HT coil was in good working order but like everything else, pretty grotty. It had been hand painted with blue paint and the fixing bracket was rusty. Now I had already bought a polished stainless tubular trim plate to fit around the coil and a nice new chrome mounting bracket, but the coil itself posed a problem. As it mounts upside down, you would be able to see the old painted bottom sticking through the stainless sleeve. I've polished a few HT coils on motorbikes before and they have always been made of aluminium. But this one was steel and if I polish it, it will rust. So my first thought was to repaint it. But as I started to clean it another thought hit me. If I polish it to a mirror finish then I could spray it with clear lacquer and it would look like chrome. So that's what I did. The final bit was to fit the polished stainless tubular trim plate over the coil, but when I offered it in place it was too long and stuck out well beyond the coil body. So now I had to figure a way of cutting about 10mm off one end of this trim plate without distorting, squashing or damaging it. Well using any kind of tin snips or nibbling tool was bound to damage the shape of this tube as it is less than 1mm thick. So I marked it with a chinagraph pencil and then very carefully set about it with a miniature cutting disc on the Dremel. This was reasonably successful but did not leave a totally flat edge, but a few seconds on the belt linisher put that right, then a quick re-polish and on with it. And I think the result is really pleasing.

Now for the fuel pipes and the oil breather pipe. I was trying to figure out what to do with the oil breather pipe, which would normally go from at side of the filler cap to the old VW air filter. As I no longer have a standard air filter, where could I take it? My first thought was to make an oil "catcher" tank and fit it in the engine compartment, and then I came across this picture on the Internet and saw this brilliant solution. This person has taken the hose and dropped it into the top of the air filter directly above the number two cylinder venturi. I immediately thought that this is the answer.

I also noticed that he had used braided hose and I've used this before on my motorcycles and really like the look. So I bought a selection of braided hose and found a suitable right angle connector for the top of the air filter from a local pneumatics store. and set about fitting them and what a nice result.

Well the final thing to fit is the HT leads. I made the mistake of buying a set of blue leads (because the car is going to be blue when it's finished), before checking what they were made of and when they arrived I found that they were the "carbon" type. This basically means that there is no copper wire down the centre of the lead and relies upon some silk like material that has been carbonised. I remembered, from my days as a VW mechanic in the 1960's, that these leads work OK when they are new but create problems as they age. Furthermore I didn't like the "crimped on" plug caps. If one of those ever failed, I could not simply screw a standard plug cap into a carbon lead as the screw would just break up the carbon. So I scrapped them and ordered some proper copper leads which you can now see in the picture. So, cut to the right length and fitted all that was left was to push them into the new retaining clips that I had bought. But surprise, surprise, once again the new tinware had no holes to push the clips into. So once again I had to drill the fan housing. But there we are it's done. The tappets have been adjusted and the ignition timing done. So I am almost there.

I'm just waiting for the heater pipe connectors before I can fasten down the rear engine tray and then once the engine is off the stand, I can fit the back plate, behind the fan housing and the oil cooler cover. Then all it needs is some oil.

Hopefully by the next episode I will have started on the bodywork, provided my friend has time available in his workshop. If not I will start on the gearbox.

You can contact me on hopcroftscoot@gmail.com

Copyright 01.01.18 all rights reserved.

My Other Blogs:
1961 BSA A10 Super Rocket Motorcycle:
http://60sclassicmotorbikes.blogspot.co.uk/2012/07/before.html

1961 Ariel Arrow Super Sport Motorcycle :
http://60sclassicmotorbikes.blogspot.co.uk/2014/01/1961-aerial-golden-arrow-restoration.html

Miniature Land Rover Defender:
http://miniaturelandrover.blogspot.co.uk/2016/02/1-miniature-land-rover-defender-idea.html?view=timeslide

Motorcycle Trailers / Caravans:
http://motorcycletrailersandcaravans.blogspot.co.uk/2018/01/1-motorcycle-trailers-problem.html