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VW Bus Engine Swap to AUDI 5E

Introduction

Once upon a time the engine of my 2 liter air-cooled VW Bus Camper from the '80`s broke down, and that was the catalyst to install an AUDI 5 Cylinder with 100 kW (136 PS). There is also a 170 PS Turbo model but I got a wrecked '82 AUDI 200 5E cheap. It had nearly 200,000 km on the odometer but a well-conditioned engine. I used most of the front part of the car including electric wiring, starter and other circuits, the mounts supporting the engine and some ducts. I bought the assembly kit from Winkler, which cost 2,750 Deutsch Marks without shipping. I received the whole kit including the bellhousing, a special machined flywheel for 240 mm disks, one adapter with ball bearing to mate to the VW transmission shaft, an engine support (which is a huge tube from left to right frame rail and going below the engine), and one complete exhaust system without catalyst and a set of some smaller parts. Additionally I bought a 240 mm pressure plate and its release leveler, both parts of an AUDI Quattro. That came to about 600 Deutsch Marks. Some other parts are needed to fit the engine to the vanagon. These are the air cleaner box and rubber ducts for fresh air used in an AUDI 80 or Rabbit. I also installed the cruise control from the AUDI 200. It is recommended to use the long transmission boxes from the high powered Transporters like those 4 or 5 speed ones from the 1.9 or 2.1 liter engines. It is possible, but not recommended to use the low-powered Diesel transmission system. Another solution would be the Porsche transmission, but this has not been tested. For me and my ill-equipped garage, it took two weeks to reassemble the engines from AUDI and the camper, and to put the 5 Cylinder in. The shipped exhaust system will find its place underneath the left midsection. Note: my VW is a camper and this special one has a 50 liter water reservoir at this place. I tried to use the original AUDI exhaust system. A lot of plumbing was needed to fit it into the center of the midsection and at last the pipe ended on the camper's rear left corner. Some parts had to be welded, like the new support for the front transmission mount and square holes for the engine support, which altogether allows a 3 cm lowered engine. In this case you have to raise the decklid by only 4 cm. This fits the layout of the intertior of the camper, and exept a small cut, nothing had to be changed. With this sort of space saving conversion to a high powered camper, I'm able to reach our holiday destinations with my growing family in a resonable time, even when towing the caravan.