1975 Volkswagen Beetle Cylinder head

WYDRANATOR

MEMBER
1975 VOLKSWAGEN BEETLE

Engine Mechanical problem
1975 Volkswagen Beetle 4 cyl Two Wheel Drive Manual 0

I am rebuilding a '75 air cooled Beetle motor. Where the cylinder seats in the head, there is a 1/8 inch side-to-side gap between cylinder and the head when the cylinder top is put in the head opening. Is this normal or should the cylinder fit tight inside the head? Also, two of the combustion chambers are pretty chewed up (it looks like rings broke and got beat around inside the chambers) Will this hurt/affect cylinder performance/compression ratio? And one more question please. The Haynes manual recommends "grinding in" the cylinder to the head w/light valve lapping compound. Do you recommend this?

Thanx!
Russ

1 Reply

RACEFAN966

MECHANIC
5,029 POSTS

Ok the lapping they are talking about is lapping in the valve with a valve grinding compound and after having a vavle job done yes this should be done. Now as for the cylinders being chewed up you should take the block to a machine shop and have them check it to see if it should be honed or if it needs to be bored this can have a major affect on how it runs compression and more. If you include a pic of the inside of the cylinder I can tell you more about what I would do.