The Volkswagen wasserboxer is an overhead-valve (OHV), flat four-cylinder boxer

petrol engine A petrol engine (gasoline engine in American and Canadian English) is an internal combustion engine designed to run on petrol (gasoline). Petrol engines can often be adapted to also run on fuels such as liquefied petroleum gas and ethanol blends ...

developed by

Volkswagen Volkswagen (VW; )English: , . is a German automotive industry, automobile manufacturer based in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Established in 1937 by German Labour Front, The German Labour Front, it was revitalized into the global brand it ...

. "Wasserboxer", abbreviated as WBX, is a German compound noun where "wasser" indicates that the engine is

water-cooled Cooling tower and water discharge of a nuclear power plant Water cooling is a method of heat removal from components and industrial equipment. Evaporative cooling using water is often more efficient than air cooling. Water is inexpensive and no ...

, and " boxer" describes the arrangement and movement of the pistons.

Details

The wasserboxer features a

cast Cast may refer to: Music * Cast (band), an English alternative rock band * Cast (Mexican band), a progressive Mexican rock band * The Cast, a Scottish musical duo: Mairi Campbell and Dave Francis * ''Cast'', a 2012 album by Trespassers William ...

aluminium alloy An aluminium alloy ( UK/IUPAC) or aluminum alloy ( NA; see spelling differences) is an alloy in which aluminium (Al) is the predominant metal. The typical alloying elements are copper, magnesium, manganese, silicon, tin, nickel and zinc. There ...

cylinder block In an internal combustion engine, the engine block is the structure that contains the cylinders and other components. The engine block in an early automotive engine consisted of just the cylinder block, to which a separate crankcase was attach ...

, cylinder heads, and

piston A piston is a component of reciprocating engines, reciprocating pumps, gas compressors, hydraulic cylinders and pneumatic cylinders, among other similar mechanisms. It is the moving component that is contained by a cylinder (engine), cylinder a ...

s; and a die-

forged Forging is a manufacturing process involving the shaping of metal using localized compression (physics), compressive forces. The blows are delivered with a hammer (often a power hammer) or a die (manufacturing), die. Forging is often classif ...

steel Steel is an alloy of iron and carbon that demonstrates improved mechanical properties compared to the pure form of iron. Due to steel's high Young's modulus, elastic modulus, Yield (engineering), yield strength, Fracture, fracture strength a ...

flat plane

crankshaft A crankshaft is a mechanical component used in a reciprocating engine, piston engine to convert the reciprocating motion into rotational motion. The crankshaft is a rotating Shaft (mechanical engineering), shaft containing one or more crankpins, ...

with four main bearings. As in Volkswagen's earlier air-cooled luftboxer engines, the wasserboxer's three-bearing

camshaft A camshaft is a shaft that contains a row of pointed cams in order to convert rotational motion to reciprocating motion. Camshafts are used in piston engines (to operate the intake and exhaust valves), mechanically controlled ignition syst ...

is driven directly from the crankshaft by means of a small steel gear on the crankshaft and a larger aluminium gear on the camshaft, with the whole mechanism internal to the engine. The overhead poppet valves each feature two

concentric In geometry, two or more objects are said to be ''concentric'' when they share the same center. Any pair of (possibly unalike) objects with well-defined centers can be concentric, including circles, spheres, regular polygons, regular polyh ...

valve springs, and are operated by pushrods and rocker arms, which are adjustable to facilitate setting valve clearances. The wasserboxer also features a " Heron cylinder head" with "bowl-in-piston" type

combustion chamber A combustion chamber is part of an internal combustion engine in which the air–fuel ratio, fuel/air mix is burned. For steam engines, the term has also been used for an extension of the Firebox (steam engine), firebox which is used to allow a mo ...

s, in which combustion takes place within the piston area rather than a recess machined into the cylinder head. The cylinder banks consist of

cast iron Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content of more than 2% and silicon content around 1–3%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloying elements determine the form in which its car ...

cylinder liners inserted into the

crankcase A crankcase is the housing in a reciprocating engine, piston engine that surrounds the crankshaft. In most modern engines, the crankcase is integrated into the engine block. Two-stroke engines typically use a crankcase-compression design, res ...

surrounded by a water jacket, with a "rubber lip" style water jacket seal. The tops of the cylinder liners are pressed into recessed cut-outs in the cylinder heads and sealed with compressible metal rings to prevent leakage. The wasserboxer was available in two displacements — 1.9-litres and 2.1-litres. Both engines have the same

cylinder bore In a piston engine, the bore (or cylinder bore) is the diameter of each cylinder. Engine displacement is calculated based on bore, stroke length and the number of cylinders: displacement = The stroke ratio, determined by dividing the bore b ...

, but the 2.1-litre has a longer

stroke Stroke is a medical condition in which poor cerebral circulation, blood flow to a part of the brain causes cell death. There are two main types of stroke: brain ischemia, ischemic, due to lack of blood flow, and intracranial hemorrhage, hemor ...

. Some wasserboxers suffered from water jacket gasket failures, often erroneously referred to as head gaskets. Some design decisions, such as poorly placed sensors and a cooling system prone to leaks, may have made the engines more likely to experience this type of failure. Other possible explanations have focused on corrosion in the cooling system, and the use of phosphated coolant. The switch to water-cooling for the boxer engines was made mid-1982, because Volkswagen could no longer make the

air-cooled engine Air-cooled engines rely on the circulation of air directly over heat dissipation fins or hot areas of the engine to cool them in order to keep the engine within operating temperatures. Air-cooled designs are far simpler than their liquid-cooled ...

s meet emissions standards. The wasserboxer engine was only used in the Volkswagen Type 2 (T3). The previous generation Volkswagen Type 2 T2 was produced in Brazil until 2013, and changed to water-cooled

Audi Audi AG () is a German automotive manufacturer of luxury vehicles headquartered in Ingolstadt, Bavaria, Germany. A subsidiary of the Volkswagen Group, Audi produces vehicles in nine production facilities worldwide. The origins of the compa ...

-sourced inline four engines on 23 December 2005 in response to Brazil's emission laws.

Variants

All data from ETKA and Owner's Manuals.

Oettinger WBX 6 engine

Volkswagen contracted Oettinger to develop a six-cylinder version of the wasserboxer. Although Volkswagen decided not to use it, Oettinger sold a T3 equipped with this engine.

References

{{Volkswagen Commercial Vehicles Boxer engines Volkswagen Group engines Lists of automobile engines

Details

Variants

Oettinger WBX 6 engine

See also

References