I need a new Aircooled Engine 2

It’s something that those of us who have owned old VWs for years will come across at some point…that slight knocking, oil leaking, backfiring feeling that can only mean one thing. I need a new aircooled engine!

Just recently I had a customer Mark who owns a lovely spiltscreen pickup who was having engine issues. It had low compression on one side, had the distributor drive installed incorrectly, parts of the fuel pump pedestal crumbled inside the engine and a worn out valve guide. After trying a number of repairs, each showing more issues the decision was made that a new engine was needed.

The market for new and reconditioned engines is a funny one. Stock to high performance can go from £600 to £******! Suffice to say there are some shockingly bad builds out there as well as some genuine awesome ones. I strongly believe in promoting good products when I see them and the engines The Vw Engine Company produce are well worth shouting about. Having come across a number of their builds in customers vehicles and being impressed, I was looking for an excuse to visit their facilities.

I removed the Engine from Mark’s Splitty, craned it in to my daily VW and delivered it to the The Vw Engine Company. I never thought that two weeks later I’d be refitting the reconditioned unit, their turnaround time is seriously impressive!

Aircooled power – always 😉

I was lucky enough to get the full tour which not only showed off their setup but their extensive knowledge of aircooled engines. It was a pleasure to chat about the workings of an oldschool business in today’s world. These guys started back in 1979 but keep up with the times, they try and test new products as they come out before using them on customer builds and only use the best parts available. Because they do builds for private customers as well as commercially they also have a great deal of original used VW stock parts which are getting harder to find these days especially on Type4 engines.

Stripdown area and used cylinder-head store

When an engine is received it is tagged then stripped down completely. The block, internals and tinware are then washed in industrial cleaning units before being inspected. Everything from the crank, case, tinware, fan, carb, electricals, pumps, pulleys, heads are rigorously inspected. I was genuinely surprised on the number of issues they picked up on from the engine I delivered to them, the fan was defective and not cooling properly and the case had be machined within an inch of its life among other things.

Machining & Balancing dept

You can go for a brand new aircooled engine or a reconditioned unit. The tolerances for both new and recon units are strict, simply put they won’t use parts that are not up to the job. Once all the parts are either reconditioned or new ones sourced it’s time for the build up!

Engine Building Room

The most common aircooled engine builds are 1776 engines, these units mated with a set of twin carbs, an ignition upgrade and potentially big valve heads really help to keep even the heaviest of buses cruising all day long.

Once the builds are completed, the engines are fully inspected and hot tested on a rig. Once they pass inspection they are ready to go out to the customer. They can be collected, fitted or delivered. In my case I removed the engine for the customer and delivered it and arranged to have it delivered back to the customer’s address for me to re-install.

Expert friendly service (thanks James) and a professionally built engine delivered to your door, does it get better than that?

Once the shiny recon engine was delivered to the customer (in an impressive crate) it was time for me to get it back in and running. I fitted a new release bearing, fuel hose and filter and prepped it for first running. Within a couple of hours it was back in, had the exhaust, throttle cable and fuel lines fitted and ready to start up.

So how did it run, was it difficult to setup or start up? It started first time and ran extremely smoothly! See for yourself :

If your vehicle can be driven to them in South London they will fit the new engine for you, however if your vehicle can’t be moved and you need someone to remove your old engine and install your new one don’t hesitate in contacting me I’d be happy to help!

This blog post is not sponsored by The Vw Engine Company….I just think they’re Awesome!