Date:         Mon, 17 Jul 1995 11:12:32 -0700
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         eugp@uclink3.berkeley.edu (Eugene C. Palmer)
Subject:      Re: Engine log, part 100

>Eugene- Are you really running it at 18-20 deg btdc static?  I'm not going 
>to tell you what to do, but I'll tell you where I run mine at 7.5, with a 
>009.  I measured how much the 009 advances the timing- around 28 degrees.  
>That would make for 35.5 deg total davance.  I have heard that total advance 
>should never exceed 35 deg.  I hope there is some logical discrepancy here.  
>
>About oil temps- The highest mine has gone is 200.  That was in a stop and 
>go intersate thing for 25 min.  It seems to run around 180 on the highway @ 
>65.  I am wondering if there is a difference in where we are measuring our 
>oil temp's.  Mine is in the sump plate.  Where is yours?   
>
>CBridge@vt.edu
>Chris Bridge
>71' camper


Chris, wow, thats one big camper.

18, but not static, so it includes at least 2 degrees advance from static at
1000 rpm.  
Additional information that is relevant;

Semi-hemi domed heads, ported and polished, CR= 7.2:1 on four barrels of
intake, which can generally run more timing.

78 x 90.5 means bigger cylinders which as a rule, generate more heat.

Oil temp sensor is at the pressure regulator location in the case, after the
external cooler, before the internal.

Both my Haltech manual and Berg state that a low compression four cylinder
gas engine can use as much as 50 degrees of ignition advance, my setting of
48 degrees total advance does not violate this.

I think I can burn most any loaded VW bus engine up on Anderson pass at
midday, it's a 6% grade for about ten miles, almost three thousand feet of
climbing.  There are a couple of passes in Vermont that may be better than
half that, Sherburne just above Killington, and the one south of 'le Lion
Crouch' (Camels Hump) if memory serves me (I hiked most of the Long Trail
when I was a teenager).  We really should have pulled over.

I drove across the country years ago in a '71 bus and the guy who prepped it
tuned it up at 9 degrees btdc on an 009 distributor and told us to use
premium.  We did, the car ran great all the way across including the truck
following act down hills.  I didn't even know what a valve adjustment was.
I certainly agree, a stock engine with stock compression should not go over
7.5 degrees, if that.

I built an engine a while back that had 6.8:1 compression (.060 barrel shims
and stock single port heads), dual Dellorto FRD 34 carbs and the same
Stinger distributor.  It never went higher than 220 degrees, even climbing
hard out of Death Valley in August, loaded, at 115 degrees outside air temp.
It was timed at 15 btdc.  Damn valve guide failed or I'd still be using that
engine.  Should've used new heads. 

Eug,
'71
builder of race bus engines that break,
coulda broken Bobs bug engine too.