Club 80-90 Forums

So time to put it's heads on!!! First of all clean the edges of the water jacket with a solvent the same on the mating faces on the heads.

Next remember to put these nice green seals in, I used a bit of silicon grease to help them slide into the head recesses.

make sure all the nuts are ready and their threads really clean.

Also I put some copper slip on all the head stud threads, you don't want any binding while torquing as it's only going to 50NM

Now you need to get the sticky bits ready, I had victor reinz reinzosil and the yellow silicone from the gasket set,

next I put the yellow stuff ready on the nuts for the first side,

As you can see I had also greased the top sealing rings with silicon grease and stuck them into the combustion chambers. Next Reinzosil around the inside of the rubber jacket seal.

Then put this in place working it around the lip and pushing it into place, run a bead around the head sealing face and spread it out with your finger, Just enough , you don't want to block any coolant passages!!


Next offer up the head and push the liners home as far as possible.

Then screw on the nuts finger tight with the head nice and square on.

Next tighten the nuts using the sequence from Haynes or Bently keeping the head square on to the liners, Once the liners are fully home you are ready to torque to 10NM

Turn the nuts slowly as you will see the head studs bending and twisting as you do, You want the nut to move not the stud to twist!! Once they are all at 10NM I took them all up to 30NM before finishing off at 50NM and then going round them all twice to check they were all correct. Thats it done.

Now repeat on tuther side.


Now I fitted the oil pump using the thicker gasket first then the pump with gears greased to prime, then the thin gasket with the small holes in followed by the plate. I used stainless cap bolts with Dowty washers rather than the special nuts and studs.


Done, Please note I will be using telescopic pushrod tubes which makes putting the heads on less fiddly!!!

I was thinking of some chrome rocker covers, anodised gold push rod tubes (scat big mouth) but what colour should I do the inlet manifold. I am thinking maybe yellow to match the gold tubes? or black or just make them silver like they were when new? Mounting bar will be black, as will the alternator bracket and oil filler as well as coolant pipe from pump to elbow. The coolant pipe from pump to T/stat will also be black if its not rusty!!
The tin will be sprayed silver to match the heads on the inside and painted black on the under/outside.
Colour co-ordination was never my best thing!!!

well after a brief second rebuild and a new piston due to a fluke washer jumping down the spark plug hole, It is in and running. These Kolbenschmidt tappets sure seem to drain down quick with valve spring pressure on them!!!
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Tomorrow I will take it for a drive. Unfortunately the lambda sensor seems to have packed in so I can';t keep an eye on the mixture!!!

looks great
Fingers crossed its good.

Intested as to why you fitted the oil pressure remote T piece to the high pressure switch location?


( waterpump pulley bolts loose )

As for why I fitted the T piece to the high pressure output, I have another one in the low output but blanked off. This is where I plug in the proper pressure sensor if I am concerned but I suppose I could have switched about.

After doing those videos I took her for a spin, tragically she spluttered to a halt aFTER 7/10 of a mile. A nice man pushed me off the junction I waS BLOCKING. Then I started her up on petrol which she didn;t like much!!! She would not tick over but flew further up the range!!! So obviously a fuel problem on gas. Now the vaporiser was coated in a layer of ice could I have had an airlock and frozen up my gas? It still wouldn't go on gas 15 mins later. And petrol remains a problem at tickover. The carb was working perfectly before I took the old engine out!!! Today the vaporiser warmed up nice and quick with coolant and she ran on gas again but mixture still weak.(dare not go for a drive) I had this problem before with the old engine 2 months ago and it suddenly resolved its-self. Even if I undo the Bias a whole turn there is no real improvement. If I screw it in a whole turn the tickover becomes lumpy so I guess it really is too weak. I reckon a quick check inside the vaporiser maybe needs to happen and also a check of the carb jets and choke mechanism.

Well problem was solved by swapping the vaporiser, it looks like a couple of the diaphrams have become porous in the old on. So now we have gas!!! I took her from a 45 mile run today, she definately has a bit more poke and the engine sounds under less stress than the old 1.9. The only problem is these damn tappets. I used a brand new set of kolbenschmidt ones and I polished up the bores nicely so the would run freely, The camshaft is new also.
BUT it seems you can never get all the tappets on one of these engines quiet!!! I only have to leave the engine stopped for a short time and the tappets under spring pressure seem to drain down!!! It means every start up one cylinder or another has poor valve opening and tickover is uneven. After a mile or so things even out but still you can hear a couple of noisy tappets.
Because without fail a couple of them drain down straight away , by the time you get the rocker covers off to set them you have at least a couple of squidgy ones, so you are forced to try to set them 1.5 turns against the tappet spring pressure instead of having the usual pumped up feel.
These tappets have the usual spring in the base and then the cup/piston with the ball valve in, on the top of which sits a small black washer with a broken circle pattern pressed in on both sides, one side a bigger diameter pressed pattern than the other. After this the pushrod cup goes in then the clip. When I dismantled them to charge with oil some of them had the black washer a different way up, Having looked at it it looked like it would perform the same task either way round but perhaps it is critical? Does anyone know? Most of them had the smaller horseshoe pattern facing the pushrod cup, but some it was the bigger horseshoe pattern? If there is no problem either way round then these tappets are just as ******** as the last set which were like the old vw style from heritage.

Have you checked oil pressure is good at the low pressure switch?

I'm guessing Bought from BW maybe give them a call.

I would have thought others would have complained if they were that bad normally.

Trouble with tappets is the first thing you have to do is take them appart so there is always the question from tbe retailer if it was done properly, I'm not saying you didn't but they will be thinking tgats a possability.

Now this is interesting!
I just did a top end DG with new heads, barrels, pistons and those KS followers. I had loads of problems trying to get them to behave. Two in particular just would not shut up. Thankfully the engine had all telescopic pushrod tubes, so I was able to remove the rattly ones and put known good old ones back in.
On dismantling the dodgy ones, one had a disc that had a severe bend in it! It was rock solid before fitting, as were half of the new set, so I only dismantled the softer ones for priming prior to fitting (I now do it on all of them regardless - lesson learned!). I reported the problem back to BW who immediately sent out replacements, which I primed and fitted, but they still seem to drain down much more quickly than the old style. Owner reports it now stays quiet if parked on level ground, but any slope and it's back to a morning rattler for the first few mins. It's so smooth and quiet after that (even more so with his NOS 2e3 fitted) that he's happy to leave it like that.
Has anyone else fitted these KS tappets (from BW or elsewhere) and had similar issues (or not)?

@123-jn The engine has done around 800 miles now and the tappets are much much quieter than when first built. Stick with yours and get some miles on it, and hopefully your tappets will bed in nicely like these seem to be doing.

Thanks for the advice that was very interesting. My problem is that It wont tickover after start up because the tappets are so drained down!!! I have to hold the throttle down a bit and being an auto that is a right pain!!!! It doesnt seem to be any particular tappets , just whichever have the spring pressure against them when I stop. Unless I take the cover off straight after a run to adjust they are all slack!! And after turning the engine over to do the first cylinder some of the rest have gone slack. I pre filled and set all of them and it just doesnt work for long enough once they lie down!!!

You fitted telescopic tubes so could you fit the old tappets for now?
This is exactly the reason why I am not using fixed push rod tubes again.

yes im thinking i may phone bw for advice and in the meantime tart up an old set with solid centres and run as solids. im just concerned that the new cam needs to wear in on a nice flat set of tappets.

I could lend and send a set of used hydraulic to try/ tide you over but they would be untested.

I have 3 sets of used ones, one set is trash, really concave bases, second set is quite concave bases and the third set are in the 1.9 and it is an odd set of various bits but It may be worth a swap. I really though a brand new set of german lifters with a new Cam would be perfect from the off, how wrong I was!!!

The only thing German about most bits is the box.
last step of the process in Germany and you can call them German.