[Vwdiesel] 1981 n/a Jetta

[LBaird119 at aol.com]

In a message dated 10/1/2006 11:33:47 PM Pacific Daylight Time, 
vbriggs at stny.rr.com writes:

> I'm competent at engine rebuilds, I rebuild several old vw and porsche 
> air cooleds every year and have rebuilt more than a few V8's, just 
> never opened up a vw diesel block. I know I've heard through here about 
> the minor cracks around the valves.  Are there any issues with cracks 
> at the crank journals ?I figure I'll do a compression test prior to 
> pulling the head off just to see where I'm at for a starting point. 
> Does the bentley have diameter specs as far as crank journals and the 
> like. On your advice I'll probably have the head and block magna fluxed 
> to check it out completely.  does anyone know what color the stock 
> blocks are, I think they are black like the gasser, but I might get 
> creative and go with something a bit more flashy to spruce it up a 
> little. It will be an entire winter project, so I'll have time to do it 
> right the first time { I hope }
> 

  Never saw any cracks around the crank journals on the 
VW diesels.  They have a pretty stout bottom end.  Quite 
impressive really.  Block cracks come radially from the 
head bolt holes.  Usually from previous rebuilds where the 
holes were not CLEAN before reassebly.
  Cracks between the valves are usually a non-issue.  
Magnafluxing would be a tad pointless on an aluminum 
head but I'm sure you already know that.  ;-)  Don't think 
I've ever seen any outside cracks other than between the 
valves.  I have one head that was cracked from coolant into 
the exhaust port somewhere.  Never did chase the crack 
down but it leaked out the tail pipe as fast as I poured it in 
the reservior!
  Blocks are VW diesel green from the factory.  I painted 
my Rabbit's red when I rebuilt it ala Porsche S.  Have any 
extra Porsche 2.2 S engines lying around?
     Loren