how bad is a locked up 1600 vw?

looking at a sand rail that has a vw 1600 with a 3 rib bus trans. guy selling car says it has been sitting for some time, and that the engine will not turn.

i don't know what is up with vw engines, but i do have a friend locally who has at least one bug(he had 2 last time i was at his place) that may have some spares sitting around in a worst case. or i call kennedy for an adapter and go buy a rusted out subaru and listen to the boxer goodness growl.

but what kind of pain would i be looking at if i bought this thing? besides the fact that it looks like it was a professional kit in the pics judging from the nice bends in the cage. more i am concerned with how much pain i would be going through trying to free up a stuck VW engine. is it your typical pour ATF down the cylinders for a few days and hope you can free up the rings sort of deal?

he is only asking $700 with the trailer made to tow it, and i've seen crap ones with no trailer go for more than that, so i think it is a decent deal. maybe this one is crap on a crap trailer though.

the FIL has a place up in michigan up by the huge sand dunes and my parents have 16 acres down here in ohio with lots of trails through the woods. thought it might be fun and the wife really wanted to get one.

So offer him $500 since the motor is locked up. The worst that can happen is he says no.... Then when you get it home dump Marvel Mystery oil, ATF or whatever down the carb(s). It certainly is worth a try. At the point you do free things up what is the worst that can happen? You might have to throw a set of jugs and pistons on it... If you go the Subie route you will have to fab a cooling system... So on the easy scale it would be better to fix or replace the VW motor.

The ac VW engine is probably the easiest engine in existence to work on. I t is almost like a Leggo kit.

Rebuilding one is more like a lawnmower than a modern car engine. Dropping the engine is at most a 1 hour job, alone with nothing more specialized than a floor jack.

Unfortunately, parts for them aren't much cheaper than anything else, and in the end you have ~58hp(unless you do something crazy). I'd imagine you could find a good deal on a used Kennedy adaptor for your engine of choice, and in the end swap in a good used newer engine for about the same money as rebuilding the VW lump.

58hp feels like about 300 in an 1100lb open car with 10/90 weight distribution.

It's not bad at all, it just means it's time to remove it to make room for the Subie motor :)

Kenny_McCormic wrote: 58hp feels like about 300 in an 1100lb open car with 10/90 weight distribution.

And the 135 from a 2.2 NA subie will make you think you are the fastest thing ever!

But seriously, as everyone else said, engines don't get simpler than this. Even if you have to do a rebuild it's pretty easier and simplified further being in a dune buggy where everything is exposed.

Wish you lived closer, we could have that engine running in a Saturday afternoon with some good used barrels and a tune-up.

If you want to stick with what you have, rather than replace the barrels and rings, fill the cylinders with ATF or penetrating oil or your choice. Top them off completely and leave the plugs out.

Put a breaker bar and socket on the crank nut and give it a push clockwise after a week or so, see if it'll move.

If not, pop the engine out, move it about to spread the AFT/oil around all surfaces of the barrels, and use a large pry bar against the flywheel teeth and a bolt through one of the top holes in the case. Only move the flywheel a single tooth, then back to where it was. In another hour or so, move it two teeth and back. Move the engine a bit to splash the oil around again and try for three teeth and back.

Takes forever, but seriously works every time. Honest.

The tiny movements insure that the rings don't break, the sloshing and slow pace nicely cleans the sides of the barrels.

Once you can make a full two revolutions easily, Tip the motor and drain the oil. Spray some cleaner inside the barrels to make things nice. Re-install the motor and do a full tune-up including coil and wires. Pull the carb, soak in it gas, spray it in and out, force air through the boll vent and re-install.

Use good gas and some spray starting fluid and start it up.

If you wanna get adventurous, I have a nice 3.8 Buick and adapter kit for that sand rail . . . used to be in my Ghia.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/TeamEvil/File0002.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/TeamEvil/File0003.jpg

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/TeamEvil/eng12.jpg http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v136/TeamEvil/eng12.jpg

cool stuff guys. thanks.

i offered to trade him a car for it but he needs $ so the car is already for sale. i am going to try to get out to check it out thursday or friday as i'm working out of town monday-wednesday and possibly thursday.

petegossett wrote: Unfortunately, parts for them aren't much cheaper than anything else, and in the end you have ~58hp(unless you do something crazy). I'd imagine you could find a good deal on a used Kennedy adaptor for your engine of choice, and in the end swap in a good used newer engine for about the same money as rebuilding the VW lump.

parts are very cheap.. and decent hop up parts are as close as your nearest JC Whitney catalog if you want to stay cheap..carbs, exhaust, cams, bigger pistons. they have it all

Im told that ATF thinned with acetone is supposed to be the best for freeing up engines.

In reply to mad_machine:

Yes they're cheap, but no cheaper than Ford or Chevy. I picked up a '73 Bug a few years ago with a locked engine. One piston just wouldn't budge at all, despite trying every non-destructive method I could. I started pricing rebuild kits, reman engines, used engines, etc. and it seemed swapping in an SBC was just about as cost effective.

I ended up selling it because I didn't want to get that deep into it, and I'd bought it cheap enough that I could flip it as-is.

I am not sure anything is cheaper to rebuild/modify than a SBC

VW air cooled engines are half the price of rebuilding a small block chevy. Brand new set of jugs/pistons cost me $200 a few years ago. New VW crank - less than $100. Try getting a sbc head rebuilt for less than $200. And that's without any performance modifications. I wouldn't even pour anything down the cylinders. Just take it apart and fix it right, replace with an aftermarket engine, or just go with one of the many options available - Mazda rotary, Subaru, or anything else Kennedy Adapters makes parts for. The aftermarket is flooded with all kinds of cheap VW parts and pieces. http://www.hotvws.com/issue_preview.html http://www.kennedyenginc.com/Pages/EngineOptionList4cyl.aspx