VW Crankshafts

To make this more useful I'm talking about a replacement for a 1970 VW Camper Westfalia van. It is a 1600cc engine newly built (the case) in Brazil with most of the rest of the parts machined in the U.S. primarily in California.

If you get a kit to build the engine yourself at home it might be useful to have the people there assemble the crankshaft for you. Also, there is a 14 part 5 star rating on assembling both the crankshaft and older VW type engines on Youtube that you should check out.

Watch carefully about heating up the parts you are putting on the shaft with either an electric hot plate and putting them on the shaft with Welders gloves(gauntlets) so you don't get burnt. Another way to heat the parts might be in the oven. However, if you do this be sure to have the crankshaft sitting on newspapers or something on a table nearby because the heat won't last long enough to run all the way to your workshop or garage unless this is the same place your oven or electric hot plate are located. Also, if you are doing this in the kitchen be sure to notify other members of your household when you are making critical moves of 30 seconds to 5 minutes in installing pieces on your crankshaft as there usually is no margin for error if you want it to work properly as an engine later.

It is much easier if you have the company you buy your engine from to assemble the crankshaft for you if you have that choice available. However, watching the 5 star rated 14 or more part youtube series on asembling an older VW engine is incredibly useful if you are attempting this for the first or second time or are just reviewing it after not doing it for several years.