Hello, I have recently purchased an older bug, and have found by removing the flywheel, that the dowels connecting the flywheel to the crank have been broken off. All but one is broken in half, and one had come out of the crank hole and bored itself horizontally into both the crank and the flywheel, leaving only half of the original depth of that one hole. This caused the flywheel to "eat" into the transmission housing, and lock the starter. When I purchased the car, the owner told me that the engine had locked up. As soon as the starter was removed, I realized that this was not the case. My question is this: Since I already have the engine out, should I go ahead and tear it down to inspect the case, or since everything appears to still function fine (meaning that the crank does not appear to broken, and the engine has good compression) could I just replace the three dowels that are missing and remount the engine with a new flywheel, leaving one dowel out?
Jan 25, 2006 at 6:02 AM