As someone once said, "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing."  I
appreciate that more and more.

In my life I've done 3 or 4 complete or partial rebuilds of engines,
just trying to be careful and clean, but not necessarily knowing too much
about the "why" of what I was doing, and not having the tools and
knowledge to take careful measurements.  All these rebuilds have been
sucessful.

Now, having read the list for 3 or 4 years, having read Watson's book,
having amassed a few more measuring tools, I'm having a devil of a time
doing my two Vanagon engine rebuilds.  That's because although I know a
lot more than I did, I don't know it all and those "gaps" in knowledge
are causing difficulties.  Also, I've learned that any source of
knowledge and information can have flaws, mistakes or omitions, so I'm
especially cautious.

The question for today is "deck height."

Watson states that deck height, with the barrel shim in place, should be
.04" or more.  This is a blanket statement without qualification for
various "styles" of Volkswage engines.

Measuring the deck heights of one engine (with the standard barrel shims I
received with the new P&C's) I get .017" and .015" on one side and .017",
.024" on the other for an average of .01825".

Measuring the deck heights on the other engine I get .021" and .022" on
one side, and .026", .033" on the other, an average of .0255".

If I shim these sucker up to something closer to .04" I sure knock my
compression down, unless I make other adjustments.

So, is Watson wrong about the deck height required for Vanagon engines?

Did the manufacturer of the P&C's send the wrong barrel shims?

Any ideas, volks?

Once again, TIA.

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Tom Young               young@sherlock.SIMS.Berkeley.EDU
Lafayette, CA  94549    '81 Vanagon
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