HELP - Sick V6 TDi

[S2central.net]

Just looking at elsawin here for details on removing the left head - what a ball ache that is... have to remove aircon pump and the primary CAT to get access to bolts for exhaust manifold. Total **** of a thing... Other side isn't so bad in that regard but boy am I overdue some good luck now.

[Pirvu Eugen]

Actualy you can't clean right all that dirt caused by the EGR without the heads off.
Off..you will have alot off work to do!
Goodluck!

[S2central.net]

Have had to take a break from the rain... was wet thru to my chuddies. The light is so poor its taking longer than I would like. Its not a job you can rush of course. Drivers side cams look worn too but nothing like as bad as psgr side. Will endeavour to post some pics while I dry out and inject more coffee. Might have to take a pre-emptive strike with Lemsip and whisky later - damn car/weather will be death of me.

Oh and things are so bad I had to let the missus take the S2 to ASDA today - think she was more stressed about it than me - but she was grinning when it fired up. I told her not to race anybody

[GazzaG60]

lol

yer missus is redlining it back as you think about the next bolt.

[S2central.net]

To add insult to injury. I've had to come inside to calm down... The tensioner for the timing belt has just rounded out as I was trying to move it into the rest position. So now I have to get the ribbed belts off and the crank damper and then cut off the timing belt... Then it's more money for a new tensioner, belt and other shyte that didnt need changed.

The manual is hilarious for the job - all those lovely clear pics taken with radiator and condenser out of the way. It's so hard to see and access the belt hardware. It really needs two sets of eyes to give best chance of avoiding problems plus all the up - down to and fro on your is really time consuming.

[maddagent]

Mate that is just bad luck -

if i thought I would be of any use to you I would offer to come give a hand, but other than holding or moving something i don't know what i could do!

Seriously hope you get it sorted, karma will reward you in the end!

[S2central.net]

Both heads off today. Had some much needed help from ace mechanic brother in law. He had recently done this job on his own passat and knew some tricks for the zorst manifolds. Gotta buy some more bits tomorrow so should have everything by Tuesday for a rebuild on Wednesday if all goes to plan.

That tensioner hiccup cost me a belt. I had forgotten this is only one way to move the hydraulic damper to locked position as when you get the roller tray off you can use a 8mm key in the tensioning roller. The one I damaged allows you to get the toothed belt off the camshafts without removing crank damper so its not the end of the world.

Plan tonight is to get the heads stripped - 1st appearance shows no bent valves so it must been the timing was so badly affected by cam and follower wear. Looks like #6 hasnt been burning cleanly for a long time and this was one cyl with follower jumped out of place.

Gonna be a late one tonight with careful head stripping and cleaning.

Lots of pics here http://gallery.me.com/nugentp/100043

[s2driveruk]

sounds like you're making good progress which is the main thing...

Nice to see the IM coated in gunk, its filthy stuff ain't it

That lobe is well rounded off, what a nightmare, good luck getting sorted ready for the refit!!!

[S2central.net]

Slogged it out to 1am last night - wanting to see state of the valves. Unbelievably, none appear to be bent... I have all cams out then filled the ports with thinners - easy expecting plenty leakage in at least one cyl from the left bank, but they are all fine. Amazing - it must be the valve timing is so bad with the cam/follower wear that I was getting blow back - looks like cyl 6 is worst be some margin.

So I have the valves all removed from right bank and all seems good. I am leaving the fuel injectors in place and giving the heads a good clean as I cannot be doing with refitting a durty head. Sure it adds to the time factor - but how else do I know all the oilways are clear. Added some more pics earlier today.

[Jas11n]

Good going Paul.
Kudos for doing the work yourself

[Fat Audi 80]

bloody hell! I have just seen this, what a nightmare. Big respect to you Paul for tackling this yourself!

I think I would have cried all the way to my nearest Indy...

Best of luck with the remainder of the work.

Cheers,

Steve.

[S2central.net]

Another late session last night... stripping the left (psg side) head and things got more interesting.

All valves came out nicely except one of exhaust on #4. I was fearing the worst, but it tapped out with some persuasion from a punch. The reason it was stuck fast became quickly apparent - there was a lot of coke/carbon build up on the valve stem - much higher than it should be and it was causing the valve to bind in the guide.

The root cause of course is the bad timing caused by camshaft/follower wear - allowing exhaust gasses to coke up the valve much more than it should. The guide itself cleaned up fine without any drama and I was able test its smoothness with another EX valve temporarily.

Both heads cleaned and degunjed of that diesely EGR crap - looking sweet now. Just waiting for small things like camshafts to arrive today so I can get on with things. I have the valves to clean next and so forth.

More pics uploaded to the gallery now if anyone cares to see the internals.

The head design is very clever - there isn't a traditional inlet or exhaust camshaft... each cam drives one EX and one IN valve per cylinder - there is a bizarre port shape to achive this crossover effect. It throws you at first when you look at the cam lobes as they don't line up where you expect until you see how the beast is arranged.

Oh the other little drama - found by myself - but not caused by me, was that ALL the glow plugs on one head have been poorly threaded into the head - they were TAF to remove and the difference in threads was amazing compared to the other side. Clearly hans or franz was having a bad day when he built this head. I labelled each plug with tape to make sure it threads back into its own illicit thread without causing more damage - fingers x'd.

[S2central.net]

Images 1249 and 1250 in http://gallery.me.com/nugentp#100043 show the dirty valve pretty well. The valve closest to front is the culprit. Compare to the 2nd one behind it for where the carbon should have stopped.

There's some nice pics of before and after cleansing on there too - takes fecking ages to do. I am happy it is clean and I will give it a second go with the air line thru all oilways etc on the build up, but you really need to clean once to get the worst muck off, then clean a 2nd time for for the perfectionist approach - but its not like its a race engine.

Tell you what - I am so glad I pulled the valves out though... even though they were all sealing well - proving none bent, I had a niggling doubt that something else was wrong. Then when I remembered the headsets would include new VSOS I decided to invest the time on checking them.

If I hadn't then I would have rebuilt the damn thing with that stuck valve !

[S2central.net]

Forgot to add - the EX manifold is quite a sexy bit of kit... it has internal flanges to separate the flow from each port into a nice compact collector. I gave this a quick clean as it was oily and then used a hot air gun to blow it dry - the nozzle fitted perfectly into the collector and then I could get a sense for how even the flow of air was from each port.

Another thing - the EX manifold nuts on these are *brilliant* - MUCH improved from I5 engine. I hope they are same thread to match I5 studs as I will be using them. I'll post a pic to explain - they aren't expensive either as I bought some thinking the old ones would be destroyed in removal as is the norm with any >10yr old I5 engine. That was a nice surprise along the way.

[maddagent]

Gret photos mate and fair play to you tackling that yourself!