Despite my lack of updates i have actually been working on this thing.
I put the motor back together with oem vw thrust shims supplied to me by my brother in law, new rod and main bearings, primed, back on the airplane in a 2 weeks, ran it but was getting odd oil pressure readings, came back a few days later and installed a mechanical gauge, ran it, oil pressure is good, did a 15 minute 1500-2000 rpm run in, drained the oil, and it was absolutely full of little square chips....unusual, not your typical bearing chunks, little 1mm x 1mm squares
off she came again, opened it back up, for some reason the original (steel) cam drive gear was eating the original (aluminum) cam gear?? what the heck ? maybe the drive gear has some damage I did not/can not see? the bearings all look ok, no out of the ordinary wear any place else, strange
Well its open, what to do....how much money to spend.....Well one of the main vw retailers has a site wide sale, i believe it was 20% off on orders over 1000$.....i guess decision made for me, New crank, new better rods (and and lighter...nice), new performance camshaft, new lifters, new straight cut cam gears, new mains, new rod bearings, new cam bearings, new jugs, new pistons, new oil relief pistons, a full rebuild minus heads
no pictures, it still just looks like an engine
seeing as i was going to be down longer while i waited for various parts i decided it was time to see if i could improve the cabin heat/carb heat muffs, it would only blow luke warm air on the ground, and just not freezing air in the air, no good for winter flying
my idea is to have the air in contact with the hot header tube longer with some baffling to slow down the air flow and hopefully heat it up better
cut some circles out on the plasma table, cut in half and welded to the header tubes, i put half as many on the carb heat side, i dont want to much restriction, just a little more heat. There is an aluminum shroud around the whole works not shown.

Also decided it was time to add oil filtration, at least if something goes and i catch it, hopefully the oil filter will strain out the damaging chunks from flowing through the engine again. I had to drill/tap the oil pump outlet for a plug, use an aftermarket pump cover with an outlet, and drill/tap one of the galleys for the return, it is all plumbed with 8an PTFE braided hoses with an fittings, and fire sleeved. You can also see the heat muff in the video....and where i used brake clean to wipe off some oil, of course the paint came with it. I may yet wrap the heat muffs in exhaust wrap to prevent the 80mph air from cooling them and the air withen, i will wait to see how they perform
And after a long struggle I managed to get it started and running for the 20 minute obligator flat tappet cam break in, hopefully with the struggle to start it i didnt wipe every little bit of cam lube off the lobes, only time will tell if i end up with a flattened lobe
it was a struggle keeping the cht's down during the break in with no cowl on, but i managed it, now i need to finish the annual, as well as test out the oil temp sender in a pot of boiling water, it always reads very cold, even on the 20 minute run in i never saw more than 150f. Its likely i just have the wrong calibration in the efis or a bad location for the sender and need to move it. But something to check in any case. Also the cabin heat its HOT now, burning hot, hopefully it stays warm in flight.