Volkswagen EA827 engine

The EA827 family of petrol engines was initially developed by Audi under Ludwig Kraus's leadership. Introduced with the B1-series Audi 80 in 1972, it went on to power many Volkswagen Group models, with later derivatives of the engine still in production into the 2010s. This is a very robust water-cooled engine configuration for four- up to eight- cylinders. In Brazil, this engine was produced under the name AP (Alta Performance, "high performance"). One defining characteristic of the EA827 was that the auxiliaries were all powered from an intermediate shaft off of the timing belt; this was because longer rubber belts were not a reliable option at the time the engine was originally designed.

There was also a range of EA827 diesel engines, sharing the 88-millimetre (3.46 in) cylinder spacing with the spark ignition petrol engines. An evolution of the EA827 engine called the appeared in 1995 and gradually replaced the earlier version. The new model eschews the intermediate shaft, has a toothed belt driven water pump, a distributorless ignition system, and uses a crossflow cylinder head.