"Steve Grauman" <oneactor1 (AT) aol (DOT) com> wrote

Someone on forums.vwvortex.com put a WRX motor in their Vanagon. Sounds
like it kicks butt!
http://forums.vwvortex.com/zerothread?id=1252551

Yea, the "Vanagon S", there's an article about it on the site. Nice to have a
Vanagon with real-world power, but no Subie-powered VW's for me. I'd probably
replace the 2.5 litre Audi-sourced engine the Vanagons ran with Audi's 2.2
litre turbo-5. Either that, or see if I can fit a 24-valve VR6 in there. Do it
up with Schrick cams and intake manifold, a custom exhaust and a GIAC chip and
you'll be making around 230Hp with a flat powerband and no turbo lag.

"Steve Grauman" <oneactor1 (AT) aol (DOT) com> wrote

Hey, if you feel bad about dropping a Subaru engine in a VW, you should know
that the basic design for the Subaru flat 4 was a copy of the engine from a
Lloyd, which was a German car company in the 40's and 50's. I also recall
reading that some of the tooling for the early Subaru engines was bought from
NSU, another German car company. All of these German car companies had produced
air-cooled engines similar to the VW's.

So...a Subaru engine is really not that far removed from a VW. I had a few older
Subaru's, and while they were watercooled, the similarities between them and the
aircooled flat 4 VW engines is striking.

Not to mention...that WRX powered VW looks like FUN!!!

--
Tony Bad

02 Jetta Wagon
01 Eurovan MV
91 Jetta 1.6 Diesel
86 Jetta
79 Rabbit 1.5 Diesel (semi-retired for now)
Schwinn Continental 10 Speed
Radio Flyer Pedal Car (my daughter made me add this)

Yea...I've heard most of that stuff. There's just something about Subarus that
continually dissapoints me. I test drove the WRX before I bought my GTi, and
despite being quicker 0-60 and having AWD, I couldn't get into it. Same with
the Forester XT I recently drove, which is ridiculously fast for a vehicle of
that size and type, but I just came away feeling indifferent. The Turbo version
of the Baja looks interesting though. I'm amazed that they aren't selling more
of them to compact-truck buyers. As indifferent as I am about Subies, I can't
believe anyone would buy a 6-cylinder Ford Ranger or Chevrolet S10 for about
the same money as a Baja Turbo. In any case, I'd love a 90' or 91' Vanagon
Synchro to rebuild (I want it to be CLEAN, I'm really anal about the smallest
imperfections) with a 24-valve VR6 or an Audi 2.2 Turbo 5. I wonder how hard
it'd be to get a Carrera 3.6 motor back there....

And NSU was bought by VW ;-) So there you go, good connection.
"Tony Bad" <SpamSpamSpam (AT) bakedbeans (DOT) spam> wrote