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Date:         Fri, 1 Mar 2002 09:17:08 -0800
Reply-To:     David Marshall <vanagon@VOLKSWAGEN.ORG>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         David Marshall <vanagon@VOLKSWAGEN.ORG>
Subject:      Re: Golf motor with Diesel Mounts intake manifold questions
Comments: To: FrankGRUN@aol.com, albell@uvic.ca
In-Reply-To:  <89.14485c80.29b09bce@aol.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

I have a Golf Digifant II manifold sitting here with 7/16" shaved off of the runners and new flange area built up - yup NOT cheap... no no no not cheap as it took the fellow twice as long as he thought to do the aluminium welding due the the extreme variances in thickness of the intake manifold so he always had to be adjusting the amount of heat he was using on his TIG.

The manifold is sitting here... I just have to do some slight de-burring and I will attempt to fit it in there this afternoon.

You statement on the A1 manifold is correct - it will fit, but the throttle valve is pointing in the wrong direction and the throttle valve will slightly interfere with the side wall - the thing to do would be to weld a larger A2 throttle valve opening on the 'correct' side of the intake manifold and block off the old opening... this is option two if the expensive shaved manifold doesn't work.

RPI in Vancouver used to sell Audi Turbo manifolds for the Rabbit users out there with an intake runner removed... I haven't really investigated this route yet.

David Marshall

Fast Forward Automotive Inc. 4356 Quesnel Hixon Road Quesnel BC Canada V2J 6Z3 mailto:info@fastforward.ca <mailto:info@fastforward.ca> http://www.fastforward.ca <http://www.fastforward.ca> Phone: (250) 992 7775 FAX: (250) 992 1160

. Vanagon Accessories and Engine Conversions . Vanagon, Transporter and Iltis Sales and Importation . European Lighting for most Volkswagen models

-----Original Message----- From: FrankGRUN@aol.com [mailto:FrankGRUN@aol.com] Sent: March 1, 2002 12:55 AM To: vanagon@volkswagen.org; vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com; albell@uvic.ca Subject: Re: Golf motor with Diesel Mounts intake manifold questions

David,

Sorry for not getting back to this post earlier but I had to finish a design for a microanalytical laboratory to analyze organic compounds in melted water surrounding a cryo-robot we are proposing to profile the Martian polar cap!

I just got back to this question tonight and would like to offer some information from the perspective of my notes and the warm study (containing the computers).

In a message dated 2/23/02 9:57:45 PM, vanagon@VOLKSWAGEN.ORG writes:

<< Volks,

There are quite a few of you out there who have installed an 85 - 92 Golf /

Jetta motor into their Vanagon using the Diesel motor mounts. As most

people know the intake manifold will not fit as it will hit the drive side

wall of the van. The common solution to this was to pound a dent into the

side wall to make it fit.

The question that I have is: How deep of a dent did you have to make into

the side wall?

Well, actually I didn't make a dent, I cut a hole! After pounding away for some time, confronted with visions of brutality and the wimpiness of my efforts, I went out and rented a serious disk cutter. The problem was that the "dent" requirement was right at the edge of the top of the frame rail. My measurements suggested that I was going to have metal to metal contact at that point within the oscillation range permitted by the motor mounts. So I cut a 50 by 100 mm slice out of the engine firewall area, and I notched the frame rail cutting a segment 25 by 25 by 100 (or so) mm. I then cut and welded in a piece of angle iron into the frame notch and added a sheet of 1/8 inch thick viton sheet to cover the hole after the engine was in place. This eliminated any air or water introduction to the compartment other than was the case before the surgery. I also painted the exposed metal ends with black epoxy marine paint in lieu of the corrosion threat. Note that my numbers are the same as Alistair's probably due to the fact that those were the numbers he forwarded to me so many years ago.

What I am thinking of doing is modifying the intake Golf manifold by shaving

off 12mm to 13mm off of the surface that attaches to the head to give me

that much more clearance against the side wall. In doing this I will have

to build up the aluminium around the intake runners where it enters the head

as 13mm back from the original surface is quite thing and may not make a

good air seal.

Comments, suggestions and measurement as all welcome!

The cut 'em off and reweld the flange approach is an interesting one but it seems very labor intensive and therefore costly at least in the LA area. But another suggestion.

As I have been making a variety of pieces for my Audi 3A Turbo adventure/project, I have been accumulating a depressing number of poorly sorted parts. As part of this cache, I have an intake manifold from an 87 CIS Golf, two Audi 3A intake manifolds, two 3A exhaust manifolds, a Golf turbodiesel exhaust manifold, a Quantum turbodiesel intake and exhaust manifold, etc,. etc., etc. In studying these pieces several points are obvious:

1., The intake manifold and 8V head for the Audi 3A are clearly superior to the VW 8V non crossflow units (not a positive statement about the cross-flow head and manifold, I just haven't looked at them). This superiority comes from the repositioning of the fuel injectors back into the intake manifold from the head, and the larger area of the intake ports. The fuel injectors are almost perfectly oriented to the intake valve.

2. The intake manifold for the '87 VW Golf CIS car extends 7.480 inches from the surface of the head. That is, if you took a plane perpendicular to the intake manifold surface at the head, that plane would contact the outermost surface of the manifold at 7.480 inches (190 mm.). The edge of the throttle body is towards the head by about 1 inch (will measure exactly this weekend).

3. This same projection on the Audi 3A manifold is just 5.510 inches (140 mm). The Audi manifold has two inches less projection out from the head as compared to the VW unit. The Audi intake should clear the engine compartment by just around 1 inch.

4. Finally, the height of the top of the intake manifold castings above the main intake manifold flange bolts is exactly the same for both manifolds.

5. My suggestion: Use the 3A 2.0 L block for the best conversion. It's intake manifold will accept CIS injectors for the superstitious CIS troops, and the modified injector insert I posted some time ago will permit the use of Digifant injectors, fuel rail and connectors.

6. If this is unsavory, I note that the pre '88 Audi 5 cylinder engines use the same intake manifold geometry as the 3A, but have the older port cross-section as used by VW for all the 8V non cross-flow heads. These manifolds are very cheap in the bone yards. Cutoff the 5th cylinder feed and weld a blanking port in place.

7. I was also told the intake from a VW Fox would fit w/o bashing. (did not verify this). However the Fox manifold is said to flow poorly with a significant power reduction.

Hope this helps,

Frank Grunthaner


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