- Thu Mar 25, 2021 12:08 pm
#49302
I missed what displacement your engine has. The HP numbers are impressive. As I´m German, the first tuning book I read was about Beetle engines. "Jetzt mache ich ihn schneller!" meaning "Now I make it go faster".
For many years I shared a workshop with a VW specialist. I learned how sensitive these reliable engines become when you change anything. The 1600cc 50HP engine for example was on the edge of what the design could reliable deliver with VW material and mineral oil. Later, when I had to do with 356 engines, I understood how different these nearly identical engines where. Looking into air cooled 911 shows you how much thought goes into any material used to build high performance without water. Nothing of that good stuff was used in VW engines. So, the best you can do is to replace any part from the beetle, as you did. VW even used other engine halves, made from magnesium on it´s works rally Bettles, the "Salzburg Käfer".
That was when I lost interest in the Type 1 flat 4. Simply to expensive. In the US you have taken that engine to other levels than we, in Germany, ever did. 70-90 HP from 1800cc was the most we did, because emission laws forbid tuning since 1966. Legalizing a tuned engine was extremely expensive and without speed limit most of these engines just burned out on the Autobahn. They where only made for short bursts of power, not endurance racing
My neighbor has a very rare, street legal, fuel injected 130 HP 2000cc in a 1970 looking beetle (is a Mexican build one). Rare, because only the engine cost more than a new Rabbit GTI at that time. There may be 5 of it in Germany. It´s injection is a variant of the Race winning Weber Marelli ECU (you find two of it in any Ferrari F40), which can do anything (and more) than a Speeduino can. Maybe I can find the tuning map I extracted from it some years ago.
To me, retarding ignition from 4800 with 4° / 1000 rpm would make more sense, as that is about max. torque and you would end with 26° at 6800 rpm. Maybe check your documentation.
Use some thermo sensor before you change anything, as your engine is to expensive to fool around with it. On the other hand, that could find you the extra push the injected throttle bodies should deliver.
For many years I shared a workshop with a VW specialist. I learned how sensitive these reliable engines become when you change anything. The 1600cc 50HP engine for example was on the edge of what the design could reliable deliver with VW material and mineral oil. Later, when I had to do with 356 engines, I understood how different these nearly identical engines where. Looking into air cooled 911 shows you how much thought goes into any material used to build high performance without water. Nothing of that good stuff was used in VW engines. So, the best you can do is to replace any part from the beetle, as you did. VW even used other engine halves, made from magnesium on it´s works rally Bettles, the "Salzburg Käfer".
That was when I lost interest in the Type 1 flat 4. Simply to expensive. In the US you have taken that engine to other levels than we, in Germany, ever did. 70-90 HP from 1800cc was the most we did, because emission laws forbid tuning since 1966. Legalizing a tuned engine was extremely expensive and without speed limit most of these engines just burned out on the Autobahn. They where only made for short bursts of power, not endurance racing
My neighbor has a very rare, street legal, fuel injected 130 HP 2000cc in a 1970 looking beetle (is a Mexican build one). Rare, because only the engine cost more than a new Rabbit GTI at that time. There may be 5 of it in Germany. It´s injection is a variant of the Race winning Weber Marelli ECU (you find two of it in any Ferrari F40), which can do anything (and more) than a Speeduino can. Maybe I can find the tuning map I extracted from it some years ago.
To me, retarding ignition from 4800 with 4° / 1000 rpm would make more sense, as that is about max. torque and you would end with 26° at 6800 rpm. Maybe check your documentation.
Use some thermo sensor before you change anything, as your engine is to expensive to fool around with it. On the other hand, that could find you the extra push the injected throttle bodies should deliver.
- By Toms wknd
- By PSIG