I don’t call a torque converter a CVT, but I know what you’re saying.
Isn’t John DeLorean the guy that got caught red-handed in that sting involving drugs . . . ?!
Yes he was. He’s dead now.
There is no first gear in a CVT. Limp mode in a MOPAR is second gear and reverse only, which rely on hydraulic control and not the electronics.
The VW “boxer” style engine was prone to exhaust valve head breaking off on one particular cylinder that wasn’t really in the air cooling stream enough. Mine broke on my '66 Squareback, ruined all four pistons in a couple of heartbeats – I think it had mileage in the 70,000 range.
But, his house and its surrounding property live on, in an even more prominent role than when he owned it.
The programming on the CVT makes it raise the revs at a given speed if it thinks the transmission is getting to hot. So on a long mountain uphill with two adults, one kid, and some camping gear in the car, the revs creep up from 4000 to 5000 to 6000 RPM in the space of 30 seconds or so. So if, say, your SO is driving and not paying attention to the tach, it can overrev. There’s a transmission overheat light, but it only comes on AFTER it’s already reducing the gear ratio. Really dumb design.
A Patriot as a taxi??? They must be replacing ball joints monthly!
Subarus used to be popular among the rural mail carrier crowd here but the nearest Subaru dealer being 90 miles away kind of squashed a lot of that.
The majority around here now use Jeep Cherokees or Patriots.
As for the VW air cools dropping valves that was a problem due to the exhaust valves running so hot in an air cooled engine.
An exploding engine was also preventable IFvalve lash checks were carried out as recommended. If an exhaust valve was found to be tight then that was a sign that things may be about to scatter. If the tight valve was caught early (again, the recommended interval) and brought into spec then it would usually be fine.
Valve lash being out of sight, out of mind generally meant that the lash was ignored until Armageddon hit.
Gotta admit, that’s a stupid design, but cars’ve done that for 30
years. With all the bright boys working on computer systems, you’d
think one could fix such a curable condition. I’ve always thought,
for critical items (overheat, oil pressure) they need an audible
alarm. If near fail, shut the vehicle down. If they can beep for
dumb reasons (a bag of groceries is in the passenger’s seat) how
hard would this be?
It was an inherent and known problem on the VW engines up to around -70. It was always on cyl. 3. It was caused by the oil cooler partially disturbing the airflow in the fan housing for that cyl. That’s also the reason that the distributor had a 7 degree advanced timing on that cyl. compared to the 3 others, but they broke many times anyway on engines if you “abused” them.
Around -70, they moved the oil cooler and the problem almost disappeared.
What also quashed it was their discontinuance of the availability of right-hand drive Subarus in The US. By removing their right-hand drive vehicles from the US marketplace, they lost part of their market, although it represented only a small fraction of their US sales.
There were actually quite a few rural mail carrier left hand drive Subarus around here. With 500 stops a day that leaning over and out the window would get old quick.
As for VW and dropped valves, I respectfully disagree. In the late 70s at one of the VW schools they addressed this issue and not only blamed it on neglected valve lash but also with other factors such as a loose or worn generator belt and a stuck thermostat.
The air cools that came into the shop with dropped valves had dropped them in cylinders other than 3. With the ones that were detected early the problem (once out and torn down) was found to be stretched valve stems and/or neglected valve lash. Air cools are high maintenance and only 1 out of 1000 ever got proper maintenance.
My only question is how do you have 7 degrees more advance on only one cylinder? I would like to hear an explanation for that one seeing as how it’s contact point, vacuum advance, fixed distributor.
Easy. The cam for no.3 on the axle in the distributor has the opening point 7 degrees earlier than the 3 others.
As in degrees between opening point counted from cyl.1
Fireing order 1-4-3-2
90-83-97-90
That would certainly make a difference, but I think that is/was a difference from here to over there.
I have no recollection what so ever from my apprenticeship as a VW/Audi mechanic through 4 years in the late seventies of any recognized problem with stretched valvestems.
I spent about 15 years with 2 VW dealers in the 70s and 80s and valve stem stretch is not a rare thing with air cooled engines.
On a trip to Sturgis SD some years ago I came across a Harley rider broke down in NE CO. He was a member of a well known outlaw club and had just had the engine on his 1939 HD rebuilt in Lubbock, TX the week before.
What should have happened is that after 500 miles the valve lash should have been rechecked but it was not done. This led to him sitting on the side of the road. I helped him because he had only one leg and was riding a sidehack rig. I told him I stopped to help so he could put the sawed off shotgun under the blanket away.,…
No compression on either cylinder. With the valve covers loose I found both exhaust valves tight as could be. Way tight. This was due to the new valves stretching during break-in.
Unfortunately, I could do nothing for him because after I adjusted the valves there was still practically no compression due to both exhaust valves being burnt out. He said don’t worry because he had some buddies that would be coming through at some point and they had a vanl so I felt a bit better about leaving him anyway.
I think he meant retarded timing. As I recall, it was cam timing… gave it its odd lope.
Valve lash wasn’t the only problem, and it was more common in the bus (heavier load). Moving the factory cooler helped. Monitoring oil and head temps was a bigger help. Foot glued to the floor, our '66 bus could do 70… 68 after engine replacement. Take it out on a long distance trip, thru 110 degree days, and you were gambling… paid off near Detroit @ 45K miles. Fortunately, you could buy a new engine for around the cost of a ring job on some cars.
Even a brand new water-cooled fuel injected motorcycle, like mine, calls for valve adjustment after the first 500 miles, and every 8,000 miles after that.
Having owned this same model before, and knowing how little adjustment is actually necessary, I got the initial adjustment done at about 1,200 miles, and every 10,000 miles after that. It’s the one thing on my Honda Shadow, other than fluid changes, filter changes, and brake pads, that is actually required for maintenance. If it had self-adjusting valves, it would be, in my view, the perfect motorcycle. Fortunately, I’ve found a mechanic who will do the valve adjustments and brake pads (which I get done every 10,000 miles) for $130.
The air cooled engines are much more prone to valve stem stretch than liquid cooled ones.
There was one case of an aircraft engine inhaling an exhaust valve but the pilot was lucky in this case because it happened on the ground.
As for lifters, Harley has been using hydraulic lifters in their Big Twins since 1948 and clean up through the year to date models. Adjust them and forget them. The hydraulics on my 1950 Panhead cop bike are part of the pushrods themselves.
The exception is the Sportsters and the 45" flatheads which were still manufactured up well into the 70s on their ServiCars; or meter maind trikes. Those still had mechanical adjusters.
It was very common for the '60’s and early '70’s VW engines to fail ~ 45kmi by several mechanisms, 1)
the stem of a No; 3 exhaust valve stem would burn through just below the valve head and the loose piece would jam between the piston and head, wrecking both and sometimes more. 2) the studs holding the cylinders and heads to the center case would stretch and break, necessitating replacement of most or all of what was on that side - piston, cylinder, head, valves, etc. as happened to my dad’s -61 bug. The good news is that one could recruit a couple of friends to help remove the engine on a weekend morning and have it back on the road the next evening. Some owners replaced the studs and valves preemptively every 40 Kmi. or so. Eventually they cooled the engine better and strengthened the studs.