If moisture is a factor in how an engine runs....... Normally you think of ground connectins, spark plug wires and so forth.....anything associated with electrons. Btw way, on my list of 30 to 50 things to check to make a waterboxer engine run right........is the fuel itself. Hardly anyone ever considers the fuel itself that I know of, not even pro shops. A couple of months ago - there was a 1.9 waterboxer vanagon here that must have had half a gallon of water in the fuel tank. But where moisture makes it run better or worse - you think about electrons usually, and if they flow where they should, and don't leak where they shouldn't , generally speaking. Scott www.turbvans vanagon specialist and vanagon engine conversion specialist. More........... And with a properly really well running good Subaru engine in there..... One that holds a set up and a tune nearly indefinitely - and some of them do, especially the early 2.2's with a really sold conversions ......if you had one of those for a few years, And got better mileage, way more throttle response, more power and another 1,000 rpm to play with, in retrospect you would just laugh about waterboxer engines. Just laugh and laugh and say why are you messing with that converted air-cooled design with early 890's technology ? No comparison baby. And a vanagon is SO worthy of more modern engines. The systems in the decade and half newer tech of a Subaru engine are......... no kidding, twice as strong and twice as accurate. A waterboxer engine doesn't even have a crank or cam position sensor. The ECU does not really know where the engine is, just that it's turning - via the distributor. The turning distributor is the only way a waterboxer ECU knows the engine is turning. It knows rpm of course, but not crank and cam positions. Not very accurate. The fuel injection on a waterboxer is not sequential - the ecu just fires the 4 injectors as one big injector. Subaru is sequential of course. An SVX engine has two crank position sensors ( not cheap either, but you almost never need one ) and one crank position sensor,3 sensors telling the ECU exactly where the engine is . And knock sensor ignition so it can't ping, and you never set timing - timing control is fully integrated into the ECU, and there is no distributor to wear out - another place electrons and something mechanical meet - a weak area - Subaru's just don't have that part..........and 4 valves per cylinder and a big swoopy intake manifold.......really, here we are driving our Vanagons in the 2000's with a early an 80's tech waterboxer pushrod engine ( that have joke 'head gaskets' ) ...............when you move up to a 90's era Japanese engine ...........there is just no comparison, baby, just none at all. Can be expensive yes, - conversions , but the vans are worthy of it. A good running 6,000 rpm 4 cylinder Soobie engine, is just ORGASMIC to drive in a good vanagon. And there are other good modern engines to fit into them of course. I'm partial to the similarity of the opposed four aluminum engine - that was the original spec from when they invented the VW bus in 1948 or whatever, all the way up to 1991 Vanagon - rear mounted, opposed aluminum 4 cylinder engine. It matches the original concept just perfectly, and looks like it was meant to be in the engine bay too. Could not fit better. And once dialed in well with a solid conversion job ............you don't even work on them much often after that, not the ones I build anyway. Takes me a LONG time to get them nigh perfect sometimes too. On the other hand, I've fired up a new conversion...... And there was not ONE issue, from the first time I fired it off. People ask me if they are easy to work on in the vanagon - two thoughts - one it is WAY easier to work on the Subaru engine in the vanagon than in the original Subaru car ........and.....once dialed in really right - you don't work on them much quite often. They can be so smooth you have to look at the tach to see if they are running at idle. I think I made my point ! lol ! Scott
-----Original Message----- From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com] On Behalf Of pickle vanagon Sent: Friday, May 16, 2008 11:07 PM To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM Subject: Re: hesitation/bucking (was: Re: tested Oxygen Sensor, and...) Just to add to what I already wrote. |
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