Okay gentlemen I am about to show my level of “VW newbieness” but I really need your help.

Tomorrow I will be going to inspect a Karmann Ghia, I am looking at buying, in person (it’s about a 250 mile trip each way) and the owner, who knows less about VWs than I do, cannot get the car to start and hasn’t started it for about five months! I have worked on standard Chevy and Ford engines (circa 1960’s and 1970’s) and their fuel systems but I have never touched a VW. I assume it must be close enough to a domestic V8 that I can fumble my way around. But the goal tomorrow is to see if I can get the car to start, at least for awhile, so I can decide how much it is worth.

So I plan to bring along some jumper cables, screw drivers and a can of carb cleaner. My hope is if it takes more than that it will affect the cost I am willing to pay.

So what I need is any educated experienced advice on what I should do or look for when trying to start this engine tomorrow. Really I am open to all suggestions.

For the most part it's the same. Just make sure it has fresh gas and oil. Sometimes starting something after sitting can do more harm. Looks like a 12v so you don't have to worry about blowing up anything...

How is the body? As I know first hand there are plenty of places rust will hide. And what makes things worse is that all body pieces have to be welded in, not bolted like our Beetle brothers.

Do you have more pics?

make sure you have spark, gas, and air.

Like he said....

These engines need few things to run. Fuel, Fire, air. Compression too but they will run somewhat even on poor PSI's

true that ... ask Ethan