Cylinder head damaged by company - help!

[pasbogdan]

It was there...If something is broken on a client component usually he gets phoned and asked if he wants a repair(this brings more money to company).Also if the client is the "little money,much repairs" type he is also announced of the extra repair needed and he needs to say yes or no.If they broke it when they were finding center of the hole it should have been a max 30 min job to get all studs out and reface that.And say to client they did something extra for free if all studs were out and client was happy,maybe payed something extra,maybe got you other clients.I am sure company manager knows all that but the man ho scored it said no word.Or if had been already scored,again company to blame for not calling.

[montez]

I took the head back to the company and they said they saw the mark but did not know if they did it or not. They then said that they would remove the studs and send for the face to be machined as they cannot mill accurately on an angle in their shop. They then started to be more apologetic and saying that they are sorry for my inconvenience and leave it with them and they will get it sorted in the next couple of days. Can’t say fairer than that to be honest, even though they were not happy when I asked if I could have it in writing that they would rectify free of charge. They said they would not write it down as they have a warranty and do not want to be getting a bad reputation locally. He was the owner of the business so I did not push it.

[Ross]

I think every professional makes a mistake here and there, it's how those mistakes are dealt with that matters... if mistakes are too frequent or they are not dealt with properly then it's time to go else where. Sounds like they're sorting it out for you, well done for not being fobbed off

[montez]

The nightmare continues, I have had an apologetic call back from the company who say they have just rewashed the head and pressure tested it again as he noticed a crack on the exhaust port which was cracked. He say that the crack is through to the water ways and is leaking when pressure tested. They say that they will give me all my money back and are extremely sorry for the whole situation, they even said that if I got another head they would help me swap my cams and valves over.

Can the block be welded and die ground back or is it a new head?

[twoqu]

Probably didn't pressure test it before then!
Oh well at least they have been thorough now.
Sounds like something Steve H had as I recall. I believe that was repaired but who are you going to trust to do it?

[Rusty]

SteveH is in Brissol, so should be able to put you in touch with the place that may have fixed his.

Or

Time to speak to JP perhaps?

If if can be fixed then there are some skilled people on here who will tell you.

Converting the 7A head seems to be quite common now, so you might find one of those instead.

I think you should name and shame this place, their service and skills have both been severely lacking and I'd want to avoid them, given the saga above.

[montez]

The company are now being very helpful, they have stripped the head down for me to get it welded and will put it back together for me when I have had it done. They will then re check for squareness and make some plates up to fully pressure test the block with boiling water as they are only vacuum testing at the moment. They have refunded me all my money and will finish the job off when I have had it welded. I have been put onto a local guy who specialises in aluminium and titainium welding for the motorsport industry, he has previously done a good job on my friends head for his cosworth.

The company are not in Bristol so dont worry, they have seem to seen the error of their ways. I know they should told me about the issue in the first place but they are now doing everything they can to help me.

Here are some pics of the ports,

[SteveH]

Nasty! I'd ditch that head if you can afford too. I've never seen a crack like that in an Audi head, mine had an issue with porosity which was fixed by welding. I also had the head ultrasealed to fix any other issues with porosity. Sounds like you've had a bit of a nightmare with this over the past few days. Hopefully the fix will be a good one and you wont be charged for it.

[twoqu]

I guess there is no harm in getting a quote! Looks difficult to get a repair.
Out of interest what cylinder is it on? Is it on more than one?
As suggested, as you are square financially, might be policy to source a better one to start with.

[montez]

I think that it is between cylinder 2 and 3 as looking at it from the front. I don’t understand why the car was not running way worse than it was, it was only in the last week that I was getting a lumpy idle, still producing plenty of power and 1.4 bar of boost. I will see if I can get it welded as the bloke I am seeing seems to know his stuff, he will tell me if it can’t be done. I don’t really want to go down the route of a new block as I am about to move into a new place and money is going to be tight for a little while.

[stocious]

was it just skimmed or did the "straighten" before they skimmed it.. was your car smoking at all, before hand

[montez]

They skimmed it, said it was very slightly warped so they took the smallest amount off just as a precaution. I was not getting any smoke from the exhaust. Maybe a very small amount of steam when first starting but I put this down to cold mornings. No steam when warm. I was losing about a litre of water every 500-1000 miles but even that had stopped recently, but that may have been due to the blocked waterways in the head gasket.

[europeanme]

excuse my termanology, but my what a big crack you have there....

I'm afraid I'm with Steve on this one....if you can ditch it and get another do it...to run the risk of building it all back up and then having it smoke would be a nightmare....

I'm using a converted 7a one and its spot on...

just my 2p...

[montez]

I have got a specialist welder on the case who used to work for Cosworth welding the damaged blocks as they came off the production line. He wanted to test the alloy so that he can get the best match for welding, he was then going to die grind the port back till he found the end of the crack to make sure that he knows it has full penetration in the weld. He is then going to grind the ports back to shape to match. He says that it can be done and he has sucessfully done much worse in the past. It is not a guy just putting a few beads of weld over the top and grinding it back. I am then having the head fully pressure tested and checked for squareness.

[Rikki Kitto]

That's determination for ya well done fella, good luck with the results.