Feuling

[bill stipe]

I know I remember that name, but would someone enlighten us on (was it Jim) Feuling?  I found this center mount in a stash and it jogged my memory a little.

[deano]

What a smart guy! Jim Feuling had a tuning shop in El Cajon, CA,  during the mid '70s and mainly did off-road engines. In the late '70s, he opened up a large service center down with Corky McMullen in San Diego, and during that time, came out with the center-mount fan housing. He claimed that CB later "stole" his idea, but that's another story. He also came out with an anti-reversionary exhaust header system about '79, that Cyclone bought the rights to. Jim later moved to Ventura and did work with Oldsmobile on the Quad 4 engine. Ran Bonneville, set records, did aircraft work, and on and on. He passed away a few years ago from cancer. One of the smartest guys I have ever had the pleasure to know. Pure genius.

[ugly duckling]

cool story deano. i thoght also he made mechanical injection manifolds also i could be wrong.  thanks bill for showing the cool parts .  UD .

[WCB Hitler's Hot Rod]

Jim Feuling made some 4 valve VW heads... Read this...

Jim Feuling was an inventor, author, publisher, philosopher, pilot, motorcycle and automobile designer/builder/racer and leading-edge researcher/developer in the field of engine design and fluid dynamics. Jim founded Feuling R&D/Advanced Technologies in 1974. His experience with high-efficiency engines began at an early age. He started riding motorcycles at age 5 and flying aircraft at age 11. He tuned and raced his own motorcycles and won the California State TT Championship at 16. He graduated from high school in Honolulu, Hawaii, attended Southwestern College and The University of the Seven Seas. Jim served in the United States Army Special Forces. He subsequently began building and racing sports cars and off road cars. Jim scored many off-road racing victories. He was also awarded the prestigious SCORE "Mechanic of the Year" trophy in 1976. His racing engines, high performance components and inventions have been used worldwide, from Daytona to Monaco, from off-road racing to Formula One Grand Prix to the Indy 500. Jim¼s leading edge development work includes his company¼s R&D contracts with Chevrolet, Oldsmobile, Ford, Chrysler, Nissan, John Deere, Harley-Davidson and aircraft companies such as Cessna, Mooney and Quickie. In 1988 he received the "Outstanding Technical Achievement Award" from the National
Engineering Societies for his "clean sheet" design, development and manufacture of the 2.0L Oldsmobile "BE" Quad-4 racing engine used in the Oldsmobile Aerotech Research Vehicle (267.339 mph International Record, driven by A. J. Foyt). His radical design for the Oldsmobile BE 4-cylinder engine developed the highest specific power output of any automotive engine in history (over 1,270 hp from 121 cubic inches).

In addition to racing efforts, Jim also developed the engine for the American Honda high-mileage streamliner, capable of 500 MPG @ 55 mph, and developed the engine for the 2-place Q-2 aircraft, rated the world¼s most efficient. Another one of his highly-recognized products was the well-received 4-Valve cylinder head conversion for Harley-DavidsonÆ Evolution motorcycles. He began manufacturing his patented aluminum CENTERFIREÆ cylinder heads for Chevrolet 454 and Ford 460 truck engines. Jim was a member of the Society of Automotive Engineers, The American Society of Mechanical Engineers, The American Chemical Society, the International Society for Optical Engineering and a Senior Member of the Society of Manufacturing Engineers. He held numerous international land speed records and was a member of the prestigious 300 MPH Chapter of the "Bonneville 200 MPH Club". The Feuling name has been closely associated with ultra-high efficiency, small-displacement engines, but he and his staff had years of experience with engines and powertrains of all sizes, from motorcycles to Indianapolis racing engines to hard-working big-rig diesels.

Jim was a consultant to a number of educational institutions. He also served on the Board of Directors for the San Diego Automotive Museum and has served as a "Distinguished Speaker" in the SAE Industrial Lectureship Program. He was a very popular speaker and has made numerous presentations to SAE, ASME, IMA and SME. He was a featured speaker at the Superflow Advanced Engine Technology Conference on four different occasions; beginning with the 1990 Superflow Advanced Engine Technology Conference on the topic of "Overlap Phenomenon in the Four-Stroke-Cycle Engine," again at the 1991 conference, where his subject was "High Efficiency Sound Attenuation for Internal Combustion Engines." He addressed the 1995 conference on the topic of "Mechanical Octanes" and the 1997 conference on his "ULEV High Performance Engine/Vehicle."

Jim was involved in numerous cutting-edge projects including his radical W3 Motorcycle. A "detonation chamber" engine design, EZEV/zero emissions equivalent vehicles, electronic aerodynamics and his awesome Bonneville Streamliner.

His hobbies included surfing, scuba diving, motorcycles, paranormal phenomenon, UFO¼s, Nikola Tesla and traveling to historic and mysterious places.

After his passing I was going to buy the VW 4 valve engine he designed but instead decided that it should be sold to SCAT industries about 6 years ago.

[deano]

I forgot all about the 4-valve VW head. Made serious power on a 400cc one-cylinder VW test engine (1/4 of a 1600). Thanks Steve for just a taste of how smart Jim was.... wow.

[ugly duckling]

very cool. heck of a guy. thanks kid for that. they dont makem like that to often.    UD  

[Eric Ellis (57HotrodVW)]

...I was going to buy the VW 4 valve engine he designed but instead decided that it should be sold to SCAT industries about 6 years ago.

I believe that this is the motor in question, along with some related details from an archived website belonging to it's former owner, "Searoy" (who I believe was planning to put it in the ex-Doug Harvey/JCL Fastback, which he purchased after it was badly wrecked):

What you're looking at is a one of a kind engine.  It was originally built by a man named Jim Feuling, a rare genius of our time who passed away suddenly on 5 December 2002.  We will all miss him.  I'm extremely proud to be able to campaign this unique engine in my race car, and put it to the use that it was meant for.

As of the moment I haven't cracked it open yet, or even test fired it, so the details are a little fuzzy, but suffice it to say that it is guaranteed to be interesting.  Here's a quick list of what I know: 
 
 VW Type 1 AS21 magnesium engine case

2232cc displacement, 92mm pistons x 84mm crank

Dual Hilborn 40mm fuel injection units

Feuling Motorworks Harley Davidson 4-valve heads (1330 castings)

Jim Feuling custom anti-reversion headers

480hp @ 6500RPM (approximate)

Details of the engine are sparse right now.  The information contained herein is a combination of what I have been told by the previous owner, what I have discovered during investigation, and my own speculation.  Once I crack it open I'll be able to better determine what's going on inside, but you know, right now I'm really tempted to just run the thing like it sits.

It was evidently built in the late 80s or early 90s as a curiosity by Jim Feuling.  During that time he was investigating and testing the development of 4-valve heads for the Harley Davidson EVO engine.  He realized that the stud pattern was similar enough to the VW boxer that a mule motor could be built with just a few modifications.  The engine above is what resulted.

More on the heads on the Heads page.

The case as a Brazillian cast AS21 Volkswagen fuel injection piece, probabaly cast in the late 70s as a replacement block for old VWs that gave up the ghost, and was an off-the-shelf $100 part in it's day.  It is magnesium and appears to be well taken care of.  There is no evidence of heat or leakage or any ecessive wear.  It's not the typical grease and dirt covered VW from the barn or field you find in a used car lot!  The oil was drained at some time in the past, but nothing smells afoul in the filler.  I've seen rebuilt engines that weren't as nice.

The intake is an off-the-shelf Hilborn 1800-V-4-C injectors setup, well, a pair of injector setups.  Although the pump is missing at this time, they are plentiful on the used market, including their mount.  On the picture you can see in the center, where the factory VW fuel pump would have been, is the engine mount for the fuel pump.  It uses a standard Hilborn pump bracket and a Gilmer belt setup.  I may decide to change this to a cam driven unit off a 2-stage oil pump, but I would like to test this engine the way Jim left it first.  Who am I to second guess Jim?  I am not certain of the size of pump required, whch as you may know is a critical issue with Hilborn mechanical fuel injection.  I suspect that it requires a #0 pump, but both smaller and larger pumps are possible.

The cam is unknown.  Undoubtedly it is a specialized grind for just these heads.  I'll mike it it to get the details, but will likely filter the results.  Hey, I can't give away ALL the secrets!  However, I suspect that it's extremely mild, relying on the heads to flow enough to make the power, and not working the valve train hard at all.  Jim was known for making gas engines that pulled down low like diesel engines, and you can't do that with a lot of duration.

The crank is a big unknown, but what we have guessed is that it's an 84mm.  It's got a single billet gland nut, so how it held up to the reported 480hp I don't know.  I can only imagine that it is wedgemated, and might be a custom piece made to Jim's specifications.  It's bolted to what looks like a stock weight flywheel that's been balanced, has a Stage 2 KEP plate on a stock-looking disc.  You can also see the dsitinct lines in the flywheel where the clutch disc was gripping.  There is absolutely no indication that a clutch was gradually applied to the flywheel for a vehicle take off.  This was a dyno motor only.  The crank pulley is a billet unit with a hand written "TDC," likely by Jim's hand in green Sharpie, with a punched groove to mark the spot.

Ignition appears to be a typical 009 with an MSD Blaster 2 coil.  I would not doubt that the distributor was worked over by Jim, or that either the rate or amoount of advance has been changed.  I need to find out details on the ignition because I'm swappinng it out for a Vertex Magneto before I hit the track.

It sits on a custom engine stand and mounts with engine plates front and back.  I doubt it's ever been off of that stand since the case was bolted together.  That'll change, when it's hanging off the back of my Fastback on a Vanagon automatic transmission bellhousing.

The heads are cast aluminum of unknown alloy, and evidently were part of a larger lot of casts, since "Feuling Motor Company 1330" is cast on one of the cooling fins, which are massive and deep, inteded to cool a big Hog in the highway wind without a fan like our precious little dubbers.  There are 4 valves per cylinder, 2 intake and 2 exhaust.  I do not know yet if it has two intake ports or one large siamesed one, but I suspect that there are two, because there are simpler ways to get this much fuel and air into the heads if there were one siamesed port.  The exhaust port is siamesed however, and is buried in cooling fins beneath the engine.

Looking at the rocker covers, if you are familiar with Harley Davidson heads, you can see the familiarity.  Unfortunately since I am NOT familiar with them, I'm in new territorry.  The plugs are DEEP into the heads, such that it would appear the chambers are very shallow.  The plug wires are custom.  The plug covers you see on the outside are filled with another plug cover on the side just to get to the plug, which is perhaps a total of 6" long.  They are in line with the bore of the cylinder.

There are in fact 4 individual heads.  One side of each head is machined flat to fit up against its partner, and each is stamped with a number to keep track of the cylinders.  The pushrod side of the heads is the side of the head that was machined.  How movement from the VW pushrods are transferred into the HD heads is a big question.  The pushrod area of the heads, being the side that is machined, is difficult or impossible to get to already, and is on the wrong side of the head to match up with the VWs.  Exactly how the "mystery boxes" at the bottom of the heads do this is unknownn

The fuel injection unit is two sets of Hilborn 1800-V-4-C injectors, with 4 butterflys and nozzles per head.  They appear to be off-the-shelf Hilborn units which, similar to the heads, have had one side milled flat to match up to its partner.  They are also stamped with cylinder numbers, so I imagine that they are port matched and specific to their perspective position.   Each bank shares a throttle shaft.

Nozzle sizes and even butterfly valve sizes are unknown.  Bypass jet/pill sizes are unkown but are unchaged from the last time they were run.  The Fuel pump is missing, as is the bracket, but the mount is attached in the conventional location, where the VW factory fuel pump would have been were the AS21 case milled for it.  The size of pump required is critical and unknown.  Chances are it is a standard P150 #0 pump, but I will keep an open mind during the investigation.

Bypasses in place are the #4 valve, or primary bypass, the #S valve, or secondary bypass valve, and an #R valve, or enrichment valve.  The enrichment valve is curious to me since Hilborn lists it as a turbocharger specific valve.  I suppose it performs an enriching function, as the name suggests, but details are not currently available to me.  This is my first foray into Hilborn fuel injection, and I have not aquired the prerequisite experience, education or reference material yet.

There is a machined aluminum plate between the injectors and the heads, likely to facilitate the mating of injectors to heads despite the very different stud pattern.  It also likely raises the mounting surface of the injectors up where boxer engines normally are, not down in the fins like Harley Davidsons are.  It too is stamped with cylinder numbers corresponding to the numbers on the injectors and the heads.

What you see above is a custom made exhaust setup by Jim Feuling.  Remember a few things as you look it over.  First, those tubes are not excessivley large, about 1 3/4" outside diameter.  Those heads have two exhaust valves, and likely flow significantly more than even the wildest aftermarket racing heads for VW air-cooled applcations.  That means the velocity in those pipes is likely much greater than typical race heads, and I would bet fall into what most other head porters categorize as "restrictive."  What goes in must come out, and there are a pair of what I think are 40mm throttles feeding each cylinder, and what I would guess are a pair of 36-40mm intake valves.  That's a lot of flow for what some would otherwise classify as restrictive.  Something to think about when you order that 1 5/8" header for your 1915 street motor.

Also notice the little bubbles or bulges on the primary tube about 6 inches down  Those are the anti-reversion chambers as described by Jim Feuling in numerous magazine articles of the era.  Normally you see them as a part of the exhaust flange, but in this application it was necessary to pull them down out of the cramped space of the port to where they could be effectively implemented.  They are nothing more than a venturi inside a slightly larger chamber.  There are already cut-away pictures on the web, so don't go expecting me to cut mine open for you.   

Exact dimensions and measurements of the exhaust are not avaiable yet, and I am very interested in what exactly they turn out to be, and how they compare to the available knowledge base regarding exhaust deisgn.  They are more like the design described by Larry Windmer than "convention."  Don't know who Lary Windmer is?  Shame on you.

The bungs on the upper section of the exhaust pipe are for individual cylinder exhaust gas temperature sensors, a feature which I will be making good use of.

[Eric Ellis (57HotrodVW)]

More...

[j-f]

There was a Scat 16V engine at EBI last year.
The owner is Jean-Luc Lempereur. A Belgian VW engine tuner.
I don't know much about this engine.

[Eric Ellis (57HotrodVW)]

There was a Scat 16V engine at EBI last year.
The owner is Jean-Luc Lempereur. A Belgian VW engine tuner.
I don't know much about this engine.

I wonder if that may be the same engine - note the engine stand and related text from Searoy ("...It sits on a custom engine stand and mounts with engine plates front and back.  I doubt it's ever been off of that stand since the case was bolted together...")

[j-f]

If I meet the owner I will ask him the story about the engine.
Maybe he just buy the heads?

[nlvtinman]

It's been a couple years back now, but I was at the auction where his widow was selling off some of Jims cars and bikes.
He had some great original performance Mopar's. I remember he had a farily clean original paint /4 speed '70 Roadrunner with a 6pac
But I was taken by his bikes with his 3 cylinder "Harley" style motor he developed.  Another avenue for his creative abilities.

[Taylor]

I work with his nephew here in vegas...  when he first told me I was shocked  and I started going on and on about innovative his uncle was and how smart..........   he knows nothing about cars 

[Lids]

Feuling Alternator Stand and tinware $1000!!!!!!

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/classifieds/detail.php?id=879523

[Zach Gomulka]

I put a Feuling stand on ebay a couple years ago. Pretty sure it didn't top $15

[Nico86]

Feuling valve covers on the left.

[xavier]

Guys,

there is a center mount gen stand currently on TheSamba...for $85!!!

GOGOGO!!!!

Xavier

[Stripped66]

I wonder if that may be the same engine - note the engine stand and related text from Searoy ("...It sits on a custom engine stand and mounts with engine plates front and back.  I doubt it's ever been off of that stand since the case was bolted together...")

Searoy sold the engine to Tom Lieb at Scat; I don't think there is any doubt it's the same engine.

I'd be interested to hear if Jim Feuling and his history was mentioned with the display of that engine, or if Scat displayed it as if it was an example of their own technology.

[bugnut68]

Feuling Alternator Stand and tinware $1000!!!!!!

http://www.thesamba.com/vw/classifieds/detail.php?id=879523

I'd be interested in knowing if the design Feuling came up with is identical to the crap sold on the aftermarket now, or if it had some meat to it (vanes inside, etc.).  All the center shrouds I've seen have zero vanes and I've heard they don't cool an engine worth a hoot.

[dave t]

I will take a pic of the inside. Thanks Dave T  but here are a few others.    , , , , , ..

[Torben Alstrup]

Hello.
Feuling was a VERY talented guy,who had no fear in trying a lot of new things. But the centermount fan shroud was one of the few things he worked with that didnt perform that good neither then nor now. But it looks super cool 
I would actually think that with some more R&D it could work good. butIi do not think the times are for it.
T

[bugnut68]

What a smart guy! Jim Feuling had a tuning shop in El Cajon, CA,  during the mid '70s and mainly did off-road engines. In the late '70s, he opened up a large service center down with Corky McMullen in San Diego, and during that time, came out with the center-mount fan housing. He claimed that CB later "stole" his idea, but that's another story. He also came out with an anti-reversionary exhaust header system about '79, that Cyclone bought the rights to. Jim later moved to Ventura and did work with Oldsmobile on the Quad 4 engine. Ran Bonneville, set records, did aircraft work, and on and on. He passed away a few years ago from cancer. One of the smartest guys I have ever had the pleasure to know. Pure genius.

I find it interesting that someone as revered and respected as Jim Feuling came up with the center-mount fan shroud, as it's my understanding that those shrouds are extremely poor in their cooling efficiency... unless his original design had internal differences from the shrouds seen today through Bugpack and CB? 

EDIT: I did not realize until re-reading this thread that I previously already posted in this thread.  My apologies for any redundancy.  Lol.