Hello all. I was wondering if anyone could offer a simple solution for a problem child.

The beast concerned is a Rewaco trike fitted with twin Solex H40s that ice so badly the thing will not go during the winter months here in the Central Tablelands of NSW.

I have sucessfully fitted electric early fuel evaporation grids out of a Ford Meteor but unfortunately they are not designed for continuous duty and eventually burn out.

I have heard there is some sort of "electric blanket" that wraps around the inlet manifold available, although I've yet to see one.

Thanks for any help

Can you collect/pipe warm air from near the exhaust to the air cleaners? That's how 'standard' carby cars do it

Hi,
I had icing up this winter when My pre heater tubes blocked up..

I was lucky to get an electric blanket which came from Europe or the US...

I also fitted a heated air pick up and original oil bath air cleaner which have done the job...

With twin carburetors its going to be a bit more tricky..

Lee

Looks like that engine is out of a Trike or Buggy

you need to make a metal shroud up to fit in front of the carbies to stop the wind blowning past the mainfolds

after looking at the pics again

You may be able to use four electric blankets on your inlet manifolds

if you can find them in Australia..

or go to a single carburetor with heat riser heated inlet manifold....

cheers

Lee

Thanks for the input so far gents.

The engine is currently sitting in the back of the shed while I do some work on the gearbox. As I said in the opening post it's out of a Rewaco Trike.

Rewaco's Australian agent, Bon Trikes offered the solution of not using the thing if the ambient temperature was under 20 deg. C. I won't go into how unhelpful this mob is.

Obviously, being a trike, space is a consideration as well as asthetics. I have seriously considered arranging a hot air riser off the exhaust although a home made thing is going to look less than pleasing to the eye, plus I dont want to melt the foam air cleaners in summer.

These Rewaco Trikes are sold worldwide so someone must be experiencing similar problems as me. Despite hours of surfing the internet I can't find a solution that doesn't require major re-engineering or fuel injecting. If anyone knows of a fix it'll save me a lot of sleep deprivation

where in nsw are you ?? near me?

you can buy a heat proof tape that can be wrapped around the mainifolds to keep them warm
looks like asbestos bout 25mm wide

Fuel injection would be the answer as well

Gday Pete,

Yeah i have a Trike with the 1916, twin Solex and similar chrome shrouds.
I don't experience any icing despite the cool weather altho my 1600 Super bug with the solo carb gets a little icy at times due to the heat tubes being blanked off, but not enough to cause any running problems.
I have noted there is a fair amount of warm air blowing thru those holes the spark plug leads go thru right next to the intake manifolds. If you could somehow redirect the hot air from these holes to run over the manifolds it may help?
Normally those spark plug holes should have rubber grommets sealing them off as a fair bit of the cooling air that should be flowing thru and over the cylinders escapes thru said holes.
Might be worth a shot. I know where your coming from with unhelpful Trike dealers, been in a similar situation myself. Put it this way, I didn't even bother claiming any warranty when it was new because it was just easier to scour forums like this goldmine here to fix most of the VW related problems.

Keep us posted on the outcome chief...

Hi

Many years ago I used to run a Holley Bugspray on a 1641 bug, Holley Bugsprays are the world champions at icing up.

What I did was invert a plastic ice cream container over the air cleaner and drew warm air like Lee has done from the stock VW hot air outlet which draws warm air from the right hand head .

To make it look nicer for a trike, find some small saucepans or similar in place of the ice cream container and then draw warm air from the head or exhaust via a tube.

Steve

are u sure u havent got a vac leak in ur balance tube
its not overly common for twin carbs to ice up even in an open layout like a trike as the heads tend to keep the manifolds nice and warm - one of the best aspects of twin carbs is the lack of icing up

im working on making some more electric manifold heater elemnts once things slow down at work

dads got my old one on his bon trike but its a single 40mm weber. works wonders

Thanks again for the input gents.

Now the spring weather has arrived I won't have any problems until next year.

In the meantime I'll investigate rigging up a system that utilises a pair of self regulating ceramic diesel glow plugs with thermostatic swithching to prevent overheating and burnout.

Hi

What about motorcycle hand grip warmers on the manifolds.

Steve

I'd thermo wrap the manifolds as a first option, mod for a warm air intake, ala Steve C, second, and I did see an electric manifold heater in the cover ad of the latest VWMA from VW perforfance centre (melb), but feel electric heaters WILL overload the system.

this is the electric heater i fitted to dads trike
it barely draws anymore than the stock choke unit
i plan on making some more when i get a bit of free time

the difference it makes even during summer is unbeleiveable
i originally put them on a switch so they could be turned off when it was hot but they still make such an improvement around town in summer i hard wired it so it runs all year round

Thermo wrapping is not the solution as it is the process of vapourising the fuel combined with creating a vacuum below the throttle plate/venturi that generates a temperature drop. Think of it like a TX valve in an air conditioner. Wrapping will only exacerbte the problem as the temperature inside the manifold is well below the ambient air temp.

Do you mind if I drop you a PM Joel?

pretty sure u need one more post first (post count 5 b4 PM is availble) but yea go for ur life or email me boosted_bug at yahoo dot com

I used to have a similar problem when I ran Kadron's on my old 1640.... but I had the vent area above the butterfly icing up, not below the butterfly or the manifolds.

Solution a carb place told me was to do away with the insulator in the middle of the carb - between the butterfly and the vent area, which is the white part (nylon?) you can see in your pics. Instead I had a cardboard type gasket there - the theory was it would transmit more heat from the manifold up to the vent area of the carb. Seemed to work pretty well - at least I didn't have them icing up in winter any more !!!

Well, after a LONG day, I got the thing back together and fired it up.

I think Sides might be onto something as it is the throttle body that is running cold and I suspect I'm masking the problem by placing heaters at the top of the manifold.

Hmmm......Better drink more beer before I start thinking too hard

Thanks again gents. You've been a great help and when I nut this out I'll let you know.

Mat, the wire i used is so fine its like a strand of hair with a cloth braiding around the outside
just hope the mob i got it from still sell it cos it was 6 years ago i got it and theres a list as long as my arm of ppl that want one now

glad to hear u may have worked it out Peter