Hi Guys - this forum is great! Well done.

I have a 1600cc kombi and the engine has expired - was making a very loud klacking noise last time it was run - took the engine out to get it rebuild or repaired only to find the local guys here (airlie beach queensland) want between $2000 and $3000 to either rebuild/repair or replace (this is without seeing it or looking at it)....seems a lot ...any suggestions?

Yep! Time to start doing these things yourself. Firstly you only need a few extra things to work on a VW engine. Two items needed is a suitable flywheel lock which can be a simple piece of flat steel bar say 50mm x 10mm x 1 metre long with two holes drilled to match two adjacent clutch bolt positions. The other definite tool is a 36 mm socket.

A reasonable manual and off you go. Do all of the hard stripping, measuring etc yourself and go from there with repair or replace with a resulting bill at least half of your quoted prices above.

DH

PS. And before anyone rips into me about suggesting this, one purpose of the forum is to help each other, not keep some business in work. The best form of guarantee for any work is the satisfaction of doing your own work where possible and seeing the results which in the majority of cases is positive.





[ Edited on 17/5/2006 by 1500S ]

thanks 1500S - the father in law can re build he's in Adelaide - we're moving there soon - so I'll probably just buy a s/h 1600 to get there and take the old motor with me - thanks for helping - if you know someone with a second hand 1600.......

(ps - he'll buy the parts from someone's business so everyone wins!)

Doing the same thing at the moment on the splittys engine.
The money you save on paying somebody else for the labour more than pays for any tools or books you buy. Even if you are not confident to do all the measuring or make decisions about what needs replacing, at the very least you can clean and disassemble the motor. Then you can take the bits into the engine builder and ask them to check them for you and replace or recondition as required. I found How to Rebuild Your Volkswagen air-Cooled Engine (All models, 1961 and up) by Tom Wilson very useful. If you want to save a heap of money and have the satisfaction of doing it yourself, give it a go it's not that hard.