As mentioned on the previous page, it didn't work out quite the way I had imagined.  I was hoping to just clean the engine up, install it in the buggy, and be off.  But I knew that was too little work to be true.  I found out very quickly that I needed to have a completely new header made, and that figuring out a throttle linkage would be tricky, but I didn't think that I would have to do anything to the long block.

As a disclaimer, and in defense of the previous owner, all of the things that I ended up doing, were because I wanted to make sure that everything was done right, and to ensure that I didn't skimp on anything.  I had come this far with the car, I didn't want to spare expense to just save a few bucks here or there.  Granted, I didn't just throw money at it, but I spent if I needed it.  Here is a list of the things that I ended up doing:

• Line bore the mains and the cam saddles of the case (oversized cam bearings)
• Reamed all of the lifter bore's
• Full flowed the case, drilled and tapped for the deep stud on Cylinder #3
• Replaced the 92mm pistons and cylinders with new units
• Had the Porsche rods resized, straightened, and rebushed
• Polished the Scat crankshaft
• Cleaned the heads up
• Replaced the camshaft with a Web Cam 218 grind cam, with new Scat racing lifters and straight cut gears (more on this and the final combination later this page)
• Used Scat barrel spacers instead of stamped steel shims
• Used copper head shims to reduce the compression to 8.0:1

Here are some pictures of the engine during assembly:

Engine Specs. and Final Configuration

After many conversations with the guys at Car Craft, Inc., they were excellent to work with, I decided on running a Web Cam 218 grind that normally has a 108° lobe center.  Car Craft recommended advancing it to 105° to improve the bottom end, and reduce the turbo lag.  I have also sent them my Weber DCOE 40 carburetor, they are going to jet it for my application, machine the venturi's with some trick setup they do, open up the needle and seat to allow more flow, polish the body of the carburetor, and modify my holley fuel pressure regulator so that it is boost sensitive.  The fuel pressure regulator modification, allows the fuel pressure to stay at 2 psi at idle and cruise, but under acceleration and high boost levels, allows the fuel pressure to increase to 6 psi.

Car Craft's prices are extremely reasonable, and their knowledge is unsurpassed for the carbureted turbo applications.  They also recommended that I weld the advance weights on my 009 distributor, and set the timing at a static 24° BTDC.  This will improve my bottom end, and they said the only drawback is starting when it's very hot outside.  In that case, you just retard the timing, fire the car up, and reset the timing.  I also set the compression at 8.0:1, and it appears that I am currently getting about 8 to 10 psi of boost, with no pinging yet.  I'll be playing around with things for the next couple of weeks, and am very interested in seeing how it runs after I get the carburetor back from CarCraft, should be by the 15th of August.  Here are some pictures of the engine in the car, before the carburetor was polished.

Now for the Latest....

After a week or two of tweeking the new turbo setup, with the aforementioned tricked out carburetor, I decided that for the street, it was better to switch back to carburetors. The heat that the turbo developed, the fact that it ran too rich at idle (due to running a muffler on the street), and the fact that I wanted to simplify the looks of the back of my buggy, were all enough reason to make the switch.

I actually had a photo shoot with HotVWs the week of the 18th of August, and I left the car the way it was just for that shoot.  On the way home I blew 3rd gear in my transmission, so when I got home I pulled everything apart and sold the Turbo setup to a guy in Kentucky.  I have a new ceramic coated exhaust from Kymco and a nice set of Dellorto 40's, and hopefully the transmission will be out of the repair shop by the 12th or so of September.  I'll post new pictures once the new system is in place.

The New Engine | The Old Engine (Page 1) | The Old Engine (Page 2)