Aircooled VW South Africa

I actually just found no lrp petrol available
I have 1600 vw beetle
What are my options

Please help

use unleaded
the vw engine was made to run unleaded unless it was butchered by some monkey during a rebuild.

Hi

Where do you stay? There is an additive from WYNNS that you can buy at most fuel stations. You can also buy Valve Ease.

Hennie

What is that additive called?

You guys recon unleaded will be ok no big damage to the engine wear en tear etc ?

What does the additive do ?

Stop worrying about additives and what fuel you use, just throw in petrol and drive. Nothing to worry about.

Like Tony and Sean said, just use Unleaded.

I have been using unleaded for 4 years and just pulled the motor this weekend. No damage anywhere to the valves, seats nor pistons.

Muds

Great thank you




Freddie Booysen
72 lowlight
74 beetle

When I bought my '72 1600 Beetle, the previous owner warned me to only use LRP. After extensive searching on the 'net, I realised that it was a load of bollocks and that unleaded is perfectly fine. And it has been. Not one problem and it goes better on unleaded.

Would unleaded be suitable for all beetle engines? Even a 1500 on a 67 Model?

Rowan wrote:Would unleaded be suitable for all beetle engines? Even a 1500 on a 67 Model?

As far as I know, all vw aircooled engines, have hard insert valve seats, so yes, they can run on Unleaded.

Herman

retrovan wrote:

Rowan wrote:Would unleaded be suitable for all beetle engines? Even a 1500 on a 67 Model?

As far as I know, all vw aircooled engines, have hard insert valve seats, so yes, they can run on Unleaded.

I would double check that. I don't know when VW heads were made unleaded safe, but I suspect it was only in the early to mid-1970s, ie, twin-port engine era.

I know that very early engines of the split and oval era were not made for unleaded (it didn't exist back then). From my interactions with vintage VW collectors in Germany, they run unleaded and add a lead additive to every third tank of fuel.

You may be right, but I am basing my statement on the fact that we do not use hi-octane in South Africa.

Here is a verifying statement from vw-resource.com


In his "Compleat Idiot" book John Muir admonishes us strongly to NEVER use unleaded fuel in a VW engine. Of course now we can't buy anything BUT unleaded fuel in the U.S. Volkswagen has stated that all of their heads from about 1966 on have been made with hardened valves, seats, and valve guides. For this reason the aircooled VW engine does not need lead (or lead replacement) to protect the engine from Valve Seat Recession (VSR) and so the octane number is the only consideration. If your heads have been rebuilt, then the machinist probably used the good silicon-bronze or aluminum-bronze valve guides. Also, the valves need no rubber valves seals (as they point spring-end-slightly-down to drain excess oil off), and so get plenty of splash oil on the spring end, which is enough for the valve guides.

Unleaded fuel should be just fine for the VW engine. The octane number of unleaded IS sufficient, provided you are using the "standard" VW compression.

Other makes are known to have a problem, have not heard of any vw aircooleds with problems.

Maybe guys like Arno, or Impi or Jurgens, can tell us of motors that have died because of unleaded.

Herman

I use unleaded or LRP... depending on what I can find. I cannot really notice a difference between the two. My Beetle runs the same on both.

For guys in Pretoria, Moot area, the Shell on Nico Smith street & 33rd Avenue still has LRP...

Maybe we strat a thread indicating where LRP petrol is still available.
The Total garage in Pierre van Rhynefield, Pretoria

Kafer74 wrote:Maybe we strat a thread indicating where LRP petrol is still available.
The Total garage in Pierre van Rhynefield, Pretoria

Go ahead, start the thread