OK, my '69 Beetle with a 1600 DP has always had a fairly loud tap, tap, tap when running. I figured it was valve adjustment. I've done a couple of valve adjustments before, but the problem has persisted. Today, I decided to roll the Bug out into the sun, grabbed a 13mm and a flathead screwdriver and decided to do it all correctly and not hurriedly.
Cranked the engine around until the rotor lined up with the #1 notch on the dizzy and the timing mark that I had to add to my pulley (because it didn't have any on the correct side) lined up with the crankcase split. Then, I cranked it around another 180 degrees so I could do the #4 cylinder first. Huh? One of the valves is open. Scratching head. Well, crank the engine around some more until they're both closed. Strange. Oh well, go ahead and adjust valves, one cylinder at a time, cranking the engine until both valves are closed on the subject cylinder. Do all four cylinders, then check them again, tweaking when necessary.
Start the engine up and it's running a bit quieter than before. Good! Drive down the road and once it's warm...tap, tap, tap, tap. Any ideas? Only taps when it's warm. Cold, it runs really smooth. I would've assumed the opposite.
Oh, and the mark I had to make to the pulley along with the strange valve orientation? I found out that someone had put the dizzy gear in 90 degrees off. So, the #2 plug wire is on the spot where the notch is. The #1 is on clockwise next, then #4, then #3. That problem's solved, at least. I assume with everything lined up properly, as such, that this won't hurt anything else?
TIA,
Malcolm '69 Bug (Gus) '71 SB (Herbie)