Moving along, I spent some time polishing the 90 degree oil cooler adapter that connects the engine case to the oil cooler. In the future I'm positive that it will get changed to a remote oil cooler, but this will certainly work well enough for now.

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Then I went to powder coat it and some other parts, but made the unpleasant discovery that the only colors I have left on my shelf are Ford Blue, Chrysler Orange, and chrome. So chrome it is! As you can see, the finished product is really trashy. I have no idea where the bubbles came from, especially after cleaning it so well. Now it looks awful, but I don't care enough to strip it and re-coat it.

Ta da! Professional results every time when yours truly is involved!

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And then the PCV tube and clamp. Note that the tube installs with a little Viton o-ring. Then it's clamped into place. The top of the tube pokes through the engine shroud and then to ... I'm not sure. A PCV valve for sure, or maybe a filter-to-carb adapter. Something. I've heard it whispered that a Volvo PCV valve is exactly the right size. We'll see.

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A quick note on the cylinder heat shields. They sit underneath and would normally clip into place if the stock cylinders are used. Since these are not stock cylinders, I'm using stainless wire. Not classy, but it works.

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In modern times, whenever the word "EMPI" gets involved I get a little nervous. So it was again when I went to install the other cylinder head. The thickness of the copper head gaskets are supposed to be .040, but .035-.040 is fine. As long as they all match, right? Here's the current collection of head gaskets:

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Because the step has been removed from the heads and opened to 94mm, we're using 94mm head gaskets. But I quickly found that these gaskets ranged in thickness from .034-.047. They don't compress so it's a big deal to have the right thickness. In one of the packs I bought it contained, weirdly, a 90.5mm gasket and three 92mm gaskets. Right. After visiting my local VW shop this morning I bought yet another package. And this time each gasket was perfect - 94mm, .039 thickness. So it's a little example of how EMPI can make great parts, but with quite a lot of variation.

Then came a moment of panic when I went to trial fit the other cylinder head. It installed correctly but then the engine wouldn't turn over . W T F..>?

After removing the head and doing what I should have done before in terms of quality control, the problem immediately became clear. I accidentally used one of the 92mm gaskets and it disallowed one of the pistons to fully rise. This was the point where I re-measured all of them.

Once that was cleared up I moved to mocking up the second cylinder head. Observe that the heads are held onto the cylinders by way of six nuts on the top row, and six threaded studs on the bottom row. The top studs must be flange nuts. If just a standard washer is used instead the washer will bow out and become wiggly. To help prevent rust (remember the work where I had to use a nut cracker on each of these during disassembly?) I'm coating each stud with JetLube, torquing on the flange nut, and then installing an acorn nut to protect the threads. I splurged and bought 316 stainless fasteners from McMaster.

The bottom row holds the head down with dual-purpose studs. That is, it holds down the head but it also provides a stud to which the rockers are mounted. I spent some time cleaning each of the internal and external threads on these. They are hardened steel. Here's one goobered in JetLube.

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These require no special treatment for oxidization like the top row because they're always coated in oil instead of being exposed to the atmosphere.

This is the time where I tighten up my girdle. The pushrods rest in holes positioned on the pushrod guides, one per valve pair. Note that the "U" is only on one side and faces "You." U for You. Like an '80s Danish band name.

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Very important note: The service manual says to torque the head nuts down to 38-40lbs, but that's way too high. That amount of force can pop out the case stud and then it's a Very Bad Day. Because the JetLube I use is messy and very slippery, I'm torquing the top nuts to 30 ft/lbs and the bottom row to 32 ft/lbs. I can always bump it a bit if necessary.

I don't have the lifters or pushrod tubes installed yet because I'm waiting to do the rocker geometry. But here's what it looks like when mocked up.

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Just a few last notes for now.

I'm doing some passive work by soaking the lifters in some 30 weight dino oil. It isn't necessary but it makes me feel like things are still moving even when I'm down for a few days. This humble can normally contains the best coffee ever made. Admittedly I'm not a huge coffee drinker, but I'll lay this dead bird at your feet: if your opinion differs you should reflect on your coffee choices over long winter evenings.

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And here's the engine as of today. I'm running out of parts to assemble. Rad!

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You did get the small o-rings under the rocker studs (nuts?). right?

The engine's looking great! I can't wait to see how it fits in the car.

For the oil pump housing thats .002 too deep, here is what Jake told me to do a bunch of years ago. Took a little time but it worked.

Take a pane of glass and put some fine grade sandpaper on it (I used 800 grit). Using a good bit of oil, use that to slowly mill down the pump housing. Test periodically so that you don't accidentally take too much off. Doing this will get you exactly how much clearance you want at the oil pump.

Zach

Good point!

I didn't put them in now as it's just a mock up to make sure the crank can spin. I'll be sure to detail the proper install sequence when I have everything else ready. Thank you for pointing that out.

Hey Zach,

Thanks for saying this. The new pump should arrive today, but if it's not the right size I'm going to have to get creative. This process sounds like a good way to get it dialed in.

And if you want to start making reeds for woodwind instruments you can use the same technique minus the oil.

Hi Marcus,

Beautiful work on your build! A lot of what you're doing is very familiar to me because I was originally (back in ~1980) going to put a built Corvair in my 914 using much the same parts you seem to be using now. I had multiple cars, engines and parts, and my wife thought I was running a used car lot. I ultimately fell into the opportunity to buy a '78 911SC engine and trans, and went that direction instead, giving all my Corvair stuff away to a friend.

I do remember some of the issues with a reverse rotation engine, however, one of which was that you have to reverse the louvers on the crankcase baffle, otherwise the spray from the crank will pump oil out the breather because the louvers face the wrong way and you can't simply reverse the baffle plate front for back to fix it because the cover bolt pattern isn't symmetrical. Perhaps you're well-aware of this and have done something about it, but I didn't see any reference to that in your thread, and I'd hate for all that beautiful work you've done to run afoul of something so simple.

Regards,
Larry Hubby

Wait, WAIT...

First up, I'm super pleased to have you here on this thread. It would be great if you could tell us more about your project, even though it's gone. I'll bet that you're full of good information.

Second,

I'm 100% unaware about flipping the baffle plate. As far as I knew it only fit on one way, the stock way. I've read in the books that the main thing is to make sure that the PCV tube is mounted on the opposite side of the baffles. I haven't read anywhere about about this. Could I persuade you to maybe give a bit more detail and depth on this? I want to make sure that I understand.

Also, what did you do on your car about the thermostats and cooling flaps? On the Corvair, they point directly aft of the car. I'm not super sure how to tackle this but figured I would spend some brain power when the time came.

Welcome aboard!

Ugh. More oil pump drama today. I spent a week waiting for a "new" Melling oil pump to arrive from California. I figured it would be NOS in any event since nobody makes them any longer, except for Clark's, and theirs is mostly worthless. On the subject of the Clark's oil pump, not only is it .0015-.002" too short, but I measured the backlash today and there isn't any. Zero. It would bind for sure if installed. I perused some of the Corvair forums and found that numerous other buyers had the same problem going back at least three years. Great.

I sat around all day waiting for the new pump because they send signature required only. So I lost half a day waiting around. And to my surprise in the box was a s#itty oil old pump. In was in the NOS Melling box, but very poorly packaged. The gaskets were bent up and the gears were obviously used and worn. The driveshaft shows scoring and the gaskets have grease on them. Have a look:

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Also, it's worn down so far that the backlash is out of spec. So this too is worthless.

I contacted the vendor and was told again that they've sold many of them and insist that it's new. They made no mention of it being used, worn, or trashed. And obviously didn't even open the box before they shipped it.

<rant>
I'm getting tired of this "that'll do" attitude on the part of some vendors. I do understand that much of these parts are long gone, but I hate having my time wasted by someone else's laziness. The customer is not in charge of quality control.
</rant>

But one silver lining came of it. Playing around with the Clark's oil pump and my original oil pump, I found that by using the out-of-spec Clark's drive gear and my original idler gear that I can get mostly decent measurements. It's not perfect splitting the differences like this, but I am getting .003" clearance to the cover and .004" backlash, which is supposed to be between .002-.008".

Once mocked up it span very well and with proper gap. But then one last bit of bad news: having torqued on the cover so many times over the past week I managed to strip one of the threads even though I was only going to seven foot pounds. No biggie. I'll pop a big-sert into tomorrow.

I'm relieved that all this ridiculous oil drama is over. What a pain. Time to move on.

I remember the oil pump being one of the biggest PITA of the whole build. IT still leaks, but at this point I don't care. I will remove the engine someday and go over it to address issues that are revealed.

I think the Corvair vendor attitude, and the AC VW guys as well, of "Eh, its good enough" is due to the fact that most are not building to your level of build and just slap on the part and go and it usually provides enough service to not be an issue. A shame.

I agree. I understand that I'm being a bit exacting about tolerances and quality. At some moments it's a big deal, others not so much. I hate complaining about this stuff. I need to understand that these engines went out of fashion long ago, but so did the Beetle or the 914. As I'm sure we can all attest some aftermarket vendors are great and others not so much. It's one of the things that really draws me to the 914 crowd, because so many people here are going out of their way to produce necessary parts at a high level of quality. That's such a huge benefit for us.

Little updates: I finally found a machinist who will flatten the oil pan and valve covers and that should be finished within days. After that I can install the lifters and then do the rocker geometry. Soon there will be a point where the rebuild will finish and fitting the engine will become the goal.

But I'm also rapidly running out of time. I'm trying to get this all buttoned up and sold before the end of August.

What do you guys think? Since my goal is to sell my precious 914 to some lucky and intrepid gentleman, should I proceed with fitting the Corvair engine and try to sell it? Or install the 1911cc Type-4 and appeal to a wider market? Time is running short and soon another pair of hands is going to have to pick up where I left off. Or at least that's my hope.

More soon.


[/quote]

I remember the oil pump being one of the biggest PITA of the whole build. IT still leaks, but at this point I don't care. I will remove the engine someday and go over it to address issues that are revealed.

I think the Corvair vendor attitude, and the AC VW guys as well, of "Eh, its good enough" is due to the fact that most are not building to your level of build and just slap on the part and go and it usually provides enough service to not be an issue. A shame.
[/quote]

follow your dream,,my dad built a 911 wheelbase corvair, then wanted to put it a 914, he then passed away,, I parted the corvair out...quick box ,saginaw gearbox, tele wheel column , 140 plus with tripple webers.. follow your dream ...the rest does not matter...God Bless

I have had your thread open in a tab for weeks. Such grace and finesse. We could all benefit from what you are doing. Thanks Marcus. Were it me, as surely it will be in some way, I would forget about end goals and do what makes you happy now. How wise that advice might be beats the heck outa me.
Warren

Hi Marcus,

I believe the baffle plate does fit only one way. The bolt holes, although they look close to symmetric fore to aft, aren't quite, and you also need, as you said, to keep the sloped side of the top part of the baffle toward the breather pipe. What I remember was that you had to literally reverse the louvers by hammering them into the baffle plate. You use a punch and a hammer to hit the center of the louver and get it started, then you can bend down the remainder of it with the blade of a screwdriver. Not pretty, but it keeps the oil in the crankcase where it belongs.

As far as my experience being very useful on your project, I never got my engine in the car, or even assembled, so it's highly questionable. I did build a front motor mount to fit it in the car, but never got to try it, so I'm not sure it worked. You certainly seem to be using good parts. The Otto Parts oil pan and cam gear retainer, the Crown transmission adapter, the nitrided crank, 140hp heads, etc. are all the good stuff. One thing I'm not sure about is using dual throat Weber carbs on 140hp heads. The second carb on each side of the stock 140hp setup was opened progressively and so was like the secondary barrels of a four-barrel single carb. My understanding was that this was done due to flow reversals in the intake runner that are quite pronounced under part throttle conditions. The center-mounted adapters for four barrel carbs that were popular for the Corvair had baffles that confined flow from the primary throats to the ports at the rear of the engine (in a Corviar), and the secondaries to the front ports. This was correct for one side of the engine, but not the other, and these things never worked very well if I recall correctly, and machining out the baffle made them work even worse. So, if the Webers open both barrels at the same rate, you might experience some rough running at low to medium throttle openings. If you have a copy of Bill Fischer's book, "How to Hotrod Corvair Engines", I beleive this effect is talked about in it. Crown Engineering had at one point some manifold adapters that fit the triple-throat Webers used on the 911 engines on the Corvair heads. You had to machine off the intake runners to mount them so that you had a true individual throat of carburetion per cylinder configuration, and of course the carbs are quite spendy, but it worked very well. No idea if such things are still available.

Regards,
Larry Hubby

Cool photos! Thanks for sharing them here for us all to see.

In the past I've followed my dreams to mixed results, but that's the way it always works out. Before I got sick there was always plenty of time to plan adventures. There was always something to do next year, something of which to look forward. Way back when I worked for the government it was great because I was always jetting off somewhere, and when that wasn't in play I was eating up time at grad school. I loved all that. The sense that something is always coming down the pipe.

But cancer changes that because it removes the possibility of planning anything. So really it's all about what's happening in the next few days, punctuated by a full medical calendar. Sometimes time passes so slow when relatively healthy, but now the months are ripping off the calendar. And so it is that the dream chasing period has ended and the quest for creature comforts and stability is the most important thing. On a long enough timeline that's how it works for most people. It's just that I'm hitting it sooner rather than later. So whether I like it or not, it's time to sell of my toys and let someone else play with them.

Those photos of your dad? He looks like he's having a blast.

Warren, thank you for the kindness.

I feel like I'm already dumping out my purse for everyone to see. But yes, it's all about the now and soon rather than long term. I promise you I'm not graceful in any meaning of the word. Instead, I've just had way too much time to adjust. Long ago when I was living in Moscow as a student I overheard some babushkas at a magazine stand gossiping about Yeltsin, who was on his way out of both power and lifespan. The phrase always stuck with me, even though I can't now conjure the Russian translation. The woman said, "Yeltsin! Always dying but never dead!" The idea being that it's super bad manners to take more time than you really need. Now I really understand that. Gulp.

When it was my turn at the stand, I bought an orange Fanta and a Playboy. The nipples on Russian Playboy pinups are airbrushed out, just FYI. How's that for graceful?

Alright. The oil pump is finally finished. It took way, way more work than I wanted but it's all assembled now. The solution ended up being a little Column A, a little Column B. Using my flat glass plate I ground down .001" off the original oil pump idler gear in order to make it the same depth as the new drive gear. Then I polished and polished and polished both mating surfaces and went through a dozen gaskets getting it all just right. Or at least I think it's right. Doubt is a devil.

I also fixed the both stripped threads on housing side using Time-Serts, which are my favorite insert - especially for jobs like these with tiny clearances. Anyway, the oil pump is finally finished. Hoo!

You may have noticed that the oil pump cover has two holes in it. This is an aftermarket cover sold by Clark's, and if desired, can be purchased with much longer oil pump gears for high pressure applications. Those gears have a shaft that would fit into these bores. I left the doors open to the possibility for this later if the engine ends up with both a remote cooler and filter. But it might not be necessary. I understand that high pressure does not equal high volume, but I'm not a fluid dynamics expert.

Crappy focus, good thread repair:

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Somewhat polished:

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Also finished is the Cover of Many Uses. This was a surprisingly long side project, but if I had more experience I would be less surprised. Experience > surprise.

It didn't help that I did all the work out of order. If there was to be a next time, I would do it in this order:

First, prep all the mating surfaces by which I mean find any means necessary to make them flat and clean. There are many of these surfaces on the cover. The big one is the rear side of the cover where the the oil channels are and where it mates to the engine case. This photo shows a step during the polishing phase, again using my big glass plate and increasingly finer sandpaper. Because I'm physically weak, this really sucked.

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I noticed that the oil pressure valve was a little sticky because the valve itself is a spring loaded tube, but the bore was rough from the original casting. So I made a ghetto polishing tool for which I'm finding ever more uses. It's a screwdriver surrounded by Scotchbrite. Below I'm checking for smooth operation by means of another screwdriver.

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Easier to polish was the front mating surface for the soon-to-be installed seal.

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The Cover of Many Uses has two parts, upper and lower. The large lower section makes a home for the distributor, oil pump, fuel pump rod, oil pressure valve, and one of the two oil bypass valves. The smaller upper section is the home for the oil pressure switch, fuel pump, and oil filler tube.

On my cover, these two mating surfaces did not match well. There was a .020" rock from one diagonal side to the other. It wouldn't have been so bad to sand them flat except that this steel fuel rod tube is in the way. Sadly, I don't even need it because I'm using an electric fuel pump. I tried to tap it out but it didn't want to budge without heat, and since I already powder coated it torching it was out of the question. I pulled out a blue sharpie and sanded and matched over and over seemingly forever until it finally squared up.

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Next on the list is the installation of the oil bypass valves. There are two of them. They are the same and much better made than the originals. You can see where the old ones were peened into place. But these ones have a much better fit. I just used a socket to drive them into place after cleaning the bores.

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Finally, here are the mating surfaces of the cover nicely matched and polished with the valves installed.

Modern oil filters have bypass valves internal to their construction, so apparently this engine gets three bypass valves. If that proves to be a problem, I can always shove that poor nickel right back into place. But I doubt it will be a problem.

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Next is an easy one. Just the fuel pump block off knob. I somehow ended up with two of them of differing makes, so I chose the round one. Like every other seal on the engine it has a Viton o-ring. Just a tiny bit of oil and it fits into place.

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Then it's time to install the first of two large seals. This one installs into the cover on the pulley end of the crankshaft, the other one will cover the crankshaft gear on the transmission side.

These come in two varieties in terms of the seal material. It's a flat steel ring with either Viton or another type of black material. I'm not sure which is better but I suppose they both have their benefits. I chose the Viton one but if it leaks I can always swap it out. Once installed it pushes right up against the oil slinger on the crank.

Since this is Viton, I'm using Gasgacinch to seal it. If it were the other one, I'd use moly grease like the manual states. Viton is great but I've read it's best used where it doesn't seal a moving part. We shall find out.

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Then it's finally time to install the cover.

Again I'm coating these gaskets with Permatex High-Tack. In the photo below the first gasket slides over the four bottom studs, but the rest of the cover is held in place by seven bolts. On this subject, nearly all of the bolts on the engine so far are longer than the originals. Most of the time the bolts were threaded in maybe 3/8". Sort of surprising given steel fasteners into aluminum blocks that already have very deep threads. So I'm taking advantage and using longer bolts. The four nuts on the four bottom studs are only temporary. Later, these nuts will be removed and replaced with the front engine mount plate.

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Be very sure to coat the brass distributor gear with grease before proceeding!

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Then pop on the cover and torque down four nuts and seven bolts. Again, I'm using JetLube on the bolts to prevent corrosion and angry fits come disassembly.

Then on goes the top gasket and finally the top part of the cover. No idea why I didn't get a photo but the top cover is held down with another five bolts. This engine is a marvel just for the sheer number of fasteners!

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With the Cover of Many Uses now installed, the alternator and belt pulley can be installed. Or they could if I had them. Still tracking them down. Also, the harmonic damper can be installed but I'm waiting to mix up some clear paint for it.

Okay -

The last bit for today is just some notes on the distributor. Here is a lovely HEI unit mated to a long shaft just for the Corvair. You can buy them from Seth Emerson, one the authors of the Performance Corvairs: How to Hotrod the Corvair Engine and Chassis . The website is www.perfvair.com.

Originally I wanted to use a stock distributor and throw a Pertronix Ignitor II into it. Or even cooler, a Mallory Unilite. But this distributor has plenty of obvious modern features as well as having a smaller overall outside diameter, so hopefully it will fit easier into the engine bay. I priced out rebuilding an original distributor but when all is said and done it's more expensive. This new HEI unit costs $200, so it's more than a fair price in my little opinion.

With either distributor the drive gear needs to be swapped for a reverse drive gear. Clark's sells a kit for this, which includes two thrust washers - one of which has offset keys. If you use the stock distributor you must replace the original thrust washers with these. But on the HEI unit I don't think it's necessary and I know it's not possible. The idea as I understand it is that the thrust of force against the gear and cam is now opposite due to reverse rotation, so the thrust washer needs to be replaced with a mirror image of itself.

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Anyway, here it is as of today in mock-up.

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So right now I need to get some missing engine tins, an alternator, a belt pulley, starter, and a few other bits. So it's coming along. But likely nothing further will happen until the oil pan and lifters return. This concludes the broadcasting day.

Hi Marcus. What ring gear will you be using? If 130 tooth then you will probably find that a 911 or 1.4kW VW 9-tooth 25mm diameter pinion will work. The 911 has a 33mm pinion at rest length - which would mean your ring gear would need to be 35mm back from the starter mounting face when fitted to the flywheel I think)

Dave

I'm pretty sure I read somewhere the Corvair engine was the most expensive engine that GM had built at the time.

Not surprising, considering all the aluminum castings.

Making great progress! Love the updates.

That engine would look cool just left on display.

Hello there. Yes, I'm using a 130 tooth ring gear on the flywheel. That's stock for the 914, yes? Thanks for doing this legwork for me. This is such great information - thank you for making all the measurements! Following your advice I'm on the lookout for a 911 starter, or perhaps a modern high torque starter. Maybe something like this?

https://www.amazon.com/STARTER-PORSCHE-1967...3/dp/B079VVN6TN

I don't like to buy from Amazon, but it's a good photo. I'll likely buy from Pelican or similar.

We saw a guy driving one of those MANX SRs last week. Hadn't seen one in decades. I knew they used the VW bug pan and typically the bug drive train, but wondered if he stuck a Porsche motor in it because it sounded like a flat 6 when he pulled up next to us at a stop light.

My wife asked him what motor he was running, he said Corvair ... and we noticed a small Chevrolet bowtie emblem on the rear deck after he passed us ...

Looked similar to this one

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I'm not surprised. I know way more about Mopar than GM, and I know that costly expense and time were the main problem for engines like the 426 Hemi. Very complicated engines build by specialist hands.

GM was and is an anomaly to me in terms of this engine. They clearly live up to their reputation for not spending any penny they didn't absolutely have to spend. This engine is so cool on so many levels, but there are no shortage of examples on cost cutting. Maybe they cut more costs because the engine was already expensive to build. The aluminum castings certainly come to mind. I keep finding never ending places where I could have cut more aluminum casting flash. Despite all the time I spent with a Dremel, I'll bet there's another cupful of flash I could have removed.

Thank you for the goodwill. It helps keep me going.

You might be more right than you know. If this engine doesn't run perfectly it may very well be a display item for a long time.

Good find! That thing looks like a weekend vehicle from Logan's Run. That is, if they were allowed to leave the domed city.

Ah, the never-ending malleability of the Beetle. I have three Beetle projects in my driveway. My neighbors *love* me. One of the frames is shot in terms of pans and rust. If I were working with a longer time frame I would love to convert it into a Formula Vee car. When I was in Berlin a couple of years back I saw this example at a VW dealership.

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I have a real love/hate relationship with the Beetle conversions like the Manx, Baja, etc. and the mmm... vehicle.. in your photo. I love the Beetle and how it's a great platform for so many other cool vehicles. But in modern times my opinion has changed to preserving them instead of cutting them up.

Having said that, I really would have loved to build up a Formula Vee, either VW or Corvair powered. A trashed frame like mine is the best starting point. It's the same argument for motorcycles. Breaks my heart to see nice originals cut into cafe racers, but it's okay if the bike was already decrepit.

One note about the orange Manx in your photo. The exhaust looks very much like what I want to do. The easy part about a Corvair engine in a 914 is that the exhaust is very easy to access. My plan is to use very simple headers and pipe it right into a 914 exhaust. But not the Monza-style one on the Manx.

I'm wondering about a subtle cue for my GM-powered 914, too. Maybe a hatch emblem or something.

Anybody want a Beetle project?

Here's a mini how-to on alternator modifications. Huge gratitude to DaveO90s4 for sharing his discovery about the pulley - it will make an important difference for the belt alignment.

From 1960-1963 the Corvair used a generator. From 1964-69 it used an alternator. You can buy very expensive bespoke alternators just for the Corvair (I've seen them on eBay for $600) or even go high dollar and rebuild the generator as an alternator. But my project funds are dwindling and I never wanted to be the guy with alternator bragging rights whilst showing off the engine in a parking lot.

So here's the cheap way out.

Amazingly, the alternator to be used is the venerable GM internally regulated alternator that you can buy at any any flaps. Three cheers for continuity (heh)! Mine is a 64 amp alternator picked up locally for $58. All that's necessary is to swap the front cover with a period Corvair cover, swap the bearing assembly, and then most importantly swap the alternator fan with a 1964 only fan/pulley one-piece assembly. I bought mine from Clark's for $22. I put out a want-ad on a Corvair forum but they don't separate classified ads from discussion, so it immediately devolved into a discussion about how magnetos work. Ugh. The pulley isn't in the Clark's catalog. I just called and asked. The front cover was cheap also.

Here's the FLAPS alternator:

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And here is the 1964 only one-piece pulley / fan combo unit:

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You can see here that the old front cover has it's mounting holes right at the bottom, instead of the more modern cover with its holes 180 degrees apart.

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Here is the bearing assembly. It's just three screws, a sealed bearing, and a retainer plate. The bushing is there for looks. But on that subject there is a thick bushing that won't be used. Just use the two smaller ones to get the right clearance.

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Here is the bearing assembly pressed into the Corvair front cover. Somewhat troubling was that the bearing was easily popped out of the new cover just with my fingers. I used a press to insert the bearing into the Corvair cover.

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And here it is mostly assembled. Pay no attention the bolt at the bottom. It's inserted the wrong way; it should insert from the other side. All four #10-24 2" bolts match perfectly to the new alternator housing. The fan spins great.

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But some info on that fan. Forever and a day the wisdom about reverse rotation engines has been to also utilize a reverse fan on the alternator. Since the alternator doesn't care which way it spins, the fan should blow cooling air in the most efficient way, so while the alternator doesn't care about direction the fan should. Ideally that means the blades should be flipped 180 degrees. On a normal alternator setup without this '64 only pulley/fan assembly a common reverse fan would be installed. But there aren't any reverse '64 only pulleys. Every other pulley after 1964 had a separate fan and pulley, just like the very first photo above.

This is where DaveO90s4 did some brain thinking. He found that using the later standard sized pulley dropped the belt in relation to the idler pulley. The belt should run along the both pulleys on the same plane. But the alternator pulley is of a smaller diameter and it had a tendency to throw the belt on his engine. But with this pulley it has that large guard and a larger diameter pulley to equalize the run.

I would never have known to do this. Maybe someone out there in fabrication land can manufacture a reverse '64 only pulley, but according to racer lore it should work just fine.

I found this helpful table detailing the Corvair generators and pulleys, but the short version is that Part #3848042 is what you need.

https://murfy.us/doku.php?id=timtechcorvair...:generatorcodes

Also, a sad note about the Ford roller rocker tips.

Unless I find some way to modify them they won't fit. It took me a bit to figure out some trouble. But the gist of it is that the roller tip rockers are slightly taller from the round base to the top. So if I cinch down the adjuster nut to where the shorter pushrods are correct, it seizes.

It seizes because the bottom of the rocker makes contact with the face of the mounting stud. It just can't go in any farther because there's no clearance. The stock rockers still leave maybe .030" of clearance. So it appears that at least in my application the roller tips won't work.

If I had the time and money I'd buy the good roller rocker kit from Clark's, but I'm short on both. So stockers it is. It's a bit of a pisser but at least I have a workaround.

Stock rocker:

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Ford rocker:

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Pleased to be able to pass on any snippets of info I've gleaned along the way.

Had you inclination you could remove the blades from the '64 pulley (leaving the spot welds in place) to yield a flat-ish rear of the shroud, and then sandwich the later model alternator fan into place. I doubt the thickness of the sandwich would affect belt tracking.

Or just leave the '64 pulley as it is. That's what I'm going to do. - so as to give me time to fit the new starter to the 914, fix the electric windows in the 911, replace the water pump in the 944 etc etc....

You did well with that purchase from Clark's. Mine cost more than twice as much, then exchange rates, then shipping. The tyranny of living upside down... But at least mine's fixed and I learnt something I could pass on.

Cheers

DaveO

I had to do the same damn thing. Ended up with stockers. The rollers came with their own special studs, did yours?

Man, this build is so right. Mine looks like a tossed it all together comparatively. Things that you did that I would definitely do once I get into this thing again in the future is all the work on the oil pump and the cover of many uses. What a raging bitch those things were to do. Still leak. I was under pressure to get the bus moving under its own power and out of where I was moving from. Now, Im just too bogged down to really mess with it. This will be a classic thread.

Yup, did this as well. Waaaaay cheaper and available parts. Only special piece is the cover. I kept mine normal corvair rotation since I mated it to a two speed PG.

Right? I spent $90 including the alternator. Otherwise you get to spend $300. It never really hit me that you were using the Powerglide. Intersting..


Current status:
* I'm *stilll* waiting on the machinist to finish the oil pan. Can't installl the pushrods, tubes, lifters, rockers, etc untill it returns.

* Sorting out starter ideas.

* Working on small stuff, like painting the harmonic balancer.

* The builder I hired three months ago to rebuild the Type-4 engine hasn't even started yet. Sigh.

....starter ideas...

I received and installed my new starter yesterday. It is 1.4 kw (OEM 914 is 0.8kW). This is a high torque model that allows the user to rotate and set the housing in multiples of 20 deg to get best body / solenoid clearance. And was manufactured to set the pinion length to precisely match my unique ring gear depth.

That was $500 - but not bad for a brand new more powerful starter that fits perfectly.

My hot start woes are now solved.

Built by CA Performance in Melbourne, Aus.

I'll email you a photo Marcus.

Cheers

DaveO

....starter ideas...

I received and installed my new starter yesterday. It is 1.4 kw (OEM 914 is 0.8kW). This is a high torque model that allows the user to rotate and set the housing in multiples of 20 deg to get best body / solenoid clearance. And was manufactured to set the pinion length to precisely match my unique ring gear depth.

That was $500 - but not bad for a brand new more powerful starter that fits perfectly.

My hot start woes are now solved.

Built by CA Performance in Melbourne, Aus.

I'll email you a photo Marcus.

Cheers

DaveO

Hopefully that's $500 AUS?

Hello. Apologies for the late update.

There are only a few updates to report since I'm still waiting around for my oil pan to return. Despite assurances from a local machinist that surfacing the oil pan would be no big deal, I returned many weeks later and he hadn't even moved the parts off of his office floor. Typical.

So I sent it off to Tom Stark instead and it should return soon.

In the meantime I have the following resolved:

1. Pushrods have arrived
2. Idler pulley is finished
3. Crank pulley is finished

There's nothing left to do until the oil pan arrives. That and rustle up some strong labor to get the engine out of my spare room. The Engine Room.

My engine didn't have an idler pulley along with most of the other ancillaries. I found one on eBay for cheap and finally got to cleaning it. The bearing is no longer made, but there is one that's very close. The shaft of the new bearing has a smaller OD that the original, which is a bit of a bummer. But I used a bit of Loctite 608 bearing retainer and pressed it on. It will work fine.

Here's a photo of the original with a visible part number.

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And a comparison of the old and new pulley pulley.

Click to view attachment

And then a reference measurement for the distance between the pulley and retaining bracket. This is a bit sloppy because there are no parallel surfaces, but hopefully it's good enough; from pulley edge to bracket is .401-ish."

Click to view attachment

The bracket was another one of these little items where I spent way too much time playing about. The bracket is cast aluminum, so my first thought was to polish it and clear-coat it. But the Dremel polishing didn't work out at all, so instead I pulled out some needle files and removed all the ugly casting leftovers. Smooth surfaces are better. Then I thought about electrocleaning it, so I used a pair of stainless electrodes and some heated 85% phosphoric acid and ran some current through it. Didn't work. That's worked in the past on pot metal but this particular material wasn't having any of my scheme hatchery.

So I gave up and powder coated it chrome, just like the sad oil cooler adapter. But this one came out better. It's a bit ghetto. I would have preferred polish and clear coat.

Here it is assembled:

Click to view attachment

As you can see I'm off by a couple thousandths but in my defense a big hydraulic press isn't a precision instrument. Nor are my clumsy hands. I should have made a temporary gauge block.

Click to view attachment

As ever, my cat Mouse keeps me company. She always wants to be where the action is, even if that means dozing from her shop perch. She's just my speed.

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Another bit of trivia is the finishing of the harmonic damper. I bought it years ago and it was starting to rust a little, so I cleaned and polished it. Feeling crafty, I carefully painted a stylish orange stripe along the timing mark. Afterward I gave it three coats of 2K clear to seal it up. Not very interesting, but it is very nice looking.

Click to view attachment

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One final note for now.

I bought my pushrods (or "push rods") from Smith Brothers here in Oregon, in Redmond.

Those guys knew exactly what I needed. They said they do many Corvair pushrods. They can make rods any size to within .005" lengths. All they needed to know was what length of pushrod and what the valve spring ratings are. They arrived two days later.

One of the nonstop troubles I've had with this project is unreliable shop service, excluding those I've singled out along the way who do great work. But locally I've had a miserable time getting anything accomplished. So I was super pleased when these guys pulled right through for me.

I'll get a photo of the rods tomorrow. The Golden Hour is over for today.

Just a quick note about the pushrods from Smith Brothers.

The measurements are 5/16" outer diameter with 0.083" wall thickness. I don't know what the wall thickness of the factory pushrods are but I might slice one open to find out. The stock pushrods are also 5/16" OD. The rods are made of 4130 chromoly steel with heat treated ends. The spray holes are the same as factory with two on the valve end to act like a lawn sprinkler. The valve ends are rounded just like stock, but the lifter end is spherical unlike stock.

Here's the build card:

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Lifter and valve ends:

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.. and contact info:

Click to view attachment


I'm hoping to get some strong men in tomorrow or the day after to move the engine outside. Getting anxious to start it!

I was hanging with my new neighbor/friend last week when his Dad was visiting from Michigan. It so happened that he used to work on the corvair engine line, so of course I brought him next door and opened my bus engine lid for him. Cool guy and a fan of the engine. Small world.

Hey peeps. I'm *still* waiting for the oil pan work to happen. It's the very last part before I can try to start it up. It's like waiting for Godot.

But since I'm otherwise trying to sell my 914 before the winter arrives, maybe someone out there might be interested in taking over this project and popping into their own car. Just throwing the idea out there. Let me know.

I'll bug the machinist with the oil pan one more time but I absolutely *hate* being that kind of guy. Plus he's doing me a huge favor. Just really want to hear it crank up. Or explode. Whichever way it goes it will be cathartic, and I'm all about catharsis these days.

-marcus

Man, I just decided to go SVX power in the bus or I’d be all over this. Can’t beat a well documented and assembled corvair motor.