Running our engine outside of the car

After having some problems with carb icing and a few coughs and splutters while down in Newquay for the boardmasters festival a couple of weeks ago, myself and Charlie have decided it's time to give Kevins engine a bit of tlc. It's never been out of the car since it was restored 5 years ago and the engine and the engine bay is a bit tatty. We've always said we'd tidy up the engine bay and clean up the engine but only when we had a reason to. The time has come.

Yesterday we took the engine out of him, ready for a bit of a tidy up and to fix the issue with the carb icing. We're also going to have the engine bay repainted. I'd really like to get the engine running while it's out of the car to make sure it's running sweet before putting it back in. I understand that one of the things we will need is an old bellhousing or an old gearbox to cut up, is this correct? If so does anyone have one lying around or can they point us in the direction of someone that might.

Any help will be much appreciated.

Thanks

Hey there,
i have one of these in the garage (well an empty gearbox for this reason...) you can borrow.
Are you going to the meet on thursday?
I might not be able to make it as i might be fixing the van ready for VW Action on friday, but if i can i will bring it along...
if not we will have to organise something else.
where abouts are you from?
cheers

Hi Ben,

That's brilliant, if you don't mind lending it too us that would be much appreciated, we should be there on thursday. We're only in Rainham, so if you can't make it to the meet on thursday we could always arrange to pick it up from you at a some point in the near future.

Good luck fixing the van, and thanks again.

I've got a spare gearbox as well if Ben doesn't arrive in time.

Thanks Russ, that's excellent.

Don't suppose anyone has a crankshaft pulley wheel puller we could borrow too? Thanks for all the help

So after getting the engne stripped down, cleaned up, parts replaced and put back together, it seems like we may have overlooked the type of gearbox we needed to get the engine running outside of the car.

The bell housing on the gearbox that Ben kindly lent to us appears to be too small to fit around our flywheel, quite frustrating as we were ready to it running today, you live and learn I guess.

Can anyone explain the differences in the gearboxes/flywheels, so we know for future reference. Is it something to do with earlier beetles/vans having smaller flywheels or is it just as simple as 1300 engines have smaller flywheels than 1600's.

Does anyone else have a spare gearbox that they think will fit our 1600 engine, we'd ideally like to get our engine running this week ready to put back in before the weekend so that we can head down to grill n chill.

Cheers George

Ha ha! Crap! Didnt realise it was a 1600 engine... If you want you can grind out the inside of the bell housing so it goes over the flywheel. I had to do it on the gearbox I have in the van at the moment.
Basically I would use a flappy paddle disc on a grinder or if you have any smaller tools that might be easier...
Cheers

I see, sorry Ben I probably should have said, lol
You sure you don't mind us hacking away at the inside of the gearbox? Is it a pig of a job?

No that's fine mate. You go for it! That gearbox will never be used as a gearbox again!

Fair enough, we'll give it a go then, thanks Ben

George&Charlie wrote:So after getting the engne stripped down, cleaned up, parts replaced and put back together, it seems like we may have overlooked the type of gearbox we needed to get the engine running outside of the car.

The bell housing on the gearbox that Ben kindly lent to us appears to be too small to fit around our flywheel, quite frustrating as we were ready to it running today, you live and learn I guess.

Can anyone explain the differences in the gearboxes/flywheels, so we know for future reference. Is it something to do with earlier beetles/vans having smaller flywheels or is it just as simple as 1300 engines have smaller flywheels than 1600's.

Does anyone else have a spare gearbox that they think will fit our 1600 engine, we'd ideally like to get our engine running this week ready to put back in before the weekend so that we can head down to grill n chill.

Cheers George

6v cars have smaller flywheels and if you fit 12v flywheel in a 6v gearbox a small amount of clearancing is required.

doesnt matter if its 1200, 1300 or 1600 its only the voltage of the starter that matters. If convert to 12v and run a 12v starter then the flywheel will also need changing.

Cheers rob thank you for clarifying, I had a look at a few videos on youtube, and one of them mentioned a bushing converter for the starter motor, is this necessary when using a 6v gearbox and a 12v starter motor?

The video im refering to is here...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yO2ZVLDQFlQ

Cheers

George

Yes your right forgot about the bush.

you'll need the correct bush for the starter your using.

i think you need a special conversion bush as the od is also not the same between 6v and 12v.

Thats weird... Shouldn't be a gearbox from a 6volt vehicle. I never had to get anything special either. Just ground it out and shoved it on. I'm pretty sure the box on the van wasn't from a 6 volt vehicle either...

My spare gearbox won't need any fettling, please feel free to come & borrow it.