Engine removal 1973 beetle

Answer 1

Get John Muirs -"How to keep your Volkswagen alive, A manual for the Compleat Idiot" and Bentleys "workshop manual". They have a huge amount of info, John Muir is a "real world" work-book and the Bently Manual is the VW "Official Workshop Manual" .

I'm going to tell you three ways to do it. One is the wrong way.

The first way is how I do it:

remove the battery

unhook the fuel line (plug with a pencil stuck in the end), electric wire to the coil from the front of the car, back piece of tin, and accelerator cable

put a block of wood on your floor jack. Raise it up until it just touches the bottom of the engine. Remove the four nuts holding the engine to the trans. Pull back on the engine until it clears the trans shaft, then lower it to two big blocks.

remove the carb and fan shroud, then pull the engine out from under the car. You don't have to do this if you're doing something like a clutch, where you can crawl under the car and do the work with the engine sitting under it.

The second way is similar, except that instead of removing the shroud and carb you pick the back of the car up high enough to clear the engine. You can use real big guys or a forklift.

The way NOT to do it is to get under the engine, drop it down on your chest, have a couple guys pick the back of the car up and a couple more drag you and the engine out from under it. I actually saw this done. Once was enough.