The Cal-look Lounge

Sorry, used search and couldn't find it. It was the article of the build up on his 88 x 69 motor, with custom Engle cam, etc.
Dean, any impressions you want to share about that motor in the blue '67, I'd enjoy reading.

thanks
Jim

Jim, looking back at that engine build up, the biggest problem I had to over-come was getting those (early) Total Seal rings to come in. If I had the do-over, I would have kept the stock KS rings and that engine would have made a lot more power on F&A's dyno than it did. We had a lot of ring leakdown that never improved. The cam I ran was a special grind that Ron Fleming had Engle do, which was a 120/125 dual-pattern. They only made two of them. The intake had a W120 grind, and the exhaust had a W125 grind, to even out the flow differences (ratio) on the two ports. Worked okay on the 1700cc, but really worked better on the 1900cc (same engine with a 78mm SPG), and finally, on a 2074 (same with 92s). The other 120/125 cam went into a 82x88 biral cylinder engine F&A built for a midget engine. Made great power.

wow!

thats some interesting and unique , step child kinda motor!!

As a footnote to your post Dean, I used a couple of FAT's custom Engle 100/110 cams in our desert rails.....worked perfect.  No surprise since FAT
motors dominated short and long course off road racing at the time......but that's a saga on to itself.

Jim, it's on page 36 of the June 1976 HotVWs. I love that feature ;D

 ;)

  Ha Ha as I scrolled down and saw the article then the shot of the engine I said out loud to myself "awesome"
 Cool bring back Jim and thanks Fabian you got something old school brewing in that head of yours Jim?

I have the magazine with this article in it.  That was a very cool motor.

As I recall, Mike Billings built a similar 1700cc IDA engine when he was working at F&A, and his combo made more power than mine...

Say Deano, is that the same Mike Dawson that worked on your heads that also worked at Auto-Craft Machine?

Yes, Mike Dawson and I did a lot of cool things together. He was over at Brea Motor Parts back then, before he went to work at Auto Craft in La Habra. His dad, Jim was a super guy as well.

I worked with Mike at Auto-Craft, he worked on heads there,  was a machinist there myself. I believe he went on to work doing his own thing by the river. He had this bad ass yellow Baja bug that was lowered a bit in front. He let me drive it to check out the way his engine ran cause I was deciding on what to build for myself. Have you heard from Mike, how is he doing, if ya did??

Ted

Mike Dawson has been at JD Machine Shop in Lake Havasu City, AZ for years... Great guy!

Dean, thanks for sharing memories of that engine. The 1679 setup has lng been one of my favorites, ran a nice one in my Bus, though not tuned anywhere near yours. Closer was Bryan Wenzel's 14 sec. version in his stock '65 Bug

How was powerband with the 120/125 Engle? Do recall the carb setup, vents and jets?

Interesting, before we built Sheep his 1914/K8/Mary Pauter heads/IDAs/Crown 6lb, we were building him a 1679 with W125, Jeff D 40 x37 "D" ports, 48IDAs, etc. Still want to build it one of these days, maybe a second heart for my car.

From what I recall, that combo was a little weak on torque and I really did not like driving it all that much. A 78mm stroke went into that same engine almost immediately. Jetting? I think I ran a 145 main 165 airs, 37mm venturis, 65 idles, 32 degrees timing. I ran the crap out of that 1900cc for years, and finally, replaced the skatey-eights with ninety-screws for a 2074mm. I loved the way that engine ran and I never had one bit of problems, even at 11.0:1 compression. Many, many years later, the guy who bought it finally dropped one of those goofy 9mm/914 exhaust valves and did a lot of damage. Steve Tims fixed the head, and I think he found someone to fix the SPG roller crank. That engine is still kicking around at Glamis somewhere.