Well this can't be good

[farkman]

Hey Guys,

Good to see the site is back up and running.

Several weeks ago I had a bit of bad luck with my 94 Golf 1.9td when my engine decided to stop running. After ripping the engine apart
I finally found the cause of my misfortune. The #2 swirl chamber fell out of the head and proceeded to beat up the head and piston. The engine had about 280,000km on it at the time. Here are some pics:





I bought a 1991 Jetta today that has a 1.9td in it. I'm going to swap the head from that to my Golf.

My question is does the piston look like it can be reused or is it trashed? The deepest marks are about 1/16"-3/32" deep. Does
anyone know how thick the tops of the pistons are?
Should I be worried about the connecting rod being damaged and breaking later on from the impact?
Can I reuse the timing belt? It only has about 10K on it and looks to be in good condition but I don't mind spending $40 on a new one.

I only need the car to last another 10-15,000km when I'll be getting a Mk4 Jetta TDI, but I wouldn't mind it lasting longer to use as a winter beater.

[Vincent Waldon]

Just my opinion: the head and piston are toast...  and the connecting rod is highly suspect.

If the timing belt came off cleanly and hasn't gotten any oil or solvents on it then it's probably just fine... the damage that occurred would not have stressed it much.

[8v-of-fury]

The head is toast.. but you could probably squeeze atleast 10k from that block the way it is IMHO... Hey the blocks toast anyway might as well try it!!  (I know i'd be the first to see how far i could get the block... lmao) just be prepared when it dies. lol.

do it, do it, do it, do it, do it!!  If the piston still makes its full travel to where all the other pistons reach then it will still make significant CR with the new head. also if it still makes it all the way to the top then you know you didnt bend the rod

[hamradio]

That head is trashed, as well as the piston, IMO.  The whole face of the piston has now been turned into one big irregular quench area, and it probably will lower compression a bit in that cyl.  Not to mention the piston itself is probably cracked.


Why not just drive the jetta?

[8v-of-fury]

a 91 jetta from GTA.. probably rusted to hell.. lol is the car your dd? If not.. try and see how much you can get out of that block

[farkman]

8v

Why would the block be toast? The cylinder walls are fine, there's no scoring or marks on them. It doesn't look like the rod is bent,
that piston still comes up to the same spot as the other pistons, but I'm still worried that it got stressed and could crack at any time. I was going to file down the high spots on the pistons and run it, that's what dr. diesel said when I e-mailed him.

I guess I got a few options:
1) put on the head from the jetta and pray nothing happens, not likely.
2) swap one rod and piston from the jetta into the golf, reusing the rings and swap the head. Preferred choice.
3) complete engine swap from jetta to golf. Don't really want to do this.

As for the Jetta, the body is okay but needs some work on the transmission and steering. I'd rather not deal with all that. The golf
is my only car but not really a daily driver, I bike to work most days so I might put on 3-400km a month. It's really a matter of convenience for shopping and carrying larger items.



 

[Vincent Waldon]

2) swap one rod and piston from the jetta into the golf, reusing the rings and swap the head. Preferred choice.

T'were mine, and I had another vehicle in mind for 10K klicks from now, that's what I'd do.

There's no pictures of the cylinder walls, but I'd guess your block is OK... even if slightly bruised.  

[farkman]

Vincent,

Thanks for choosing #2  .

I don't have pics of the cylinder walls but I've spun the engine around and there are no marks on the walls. It looks the same
as the other cylinder walls which, by my amateurish judgement, look to be in very good condition. There's a small step at the
tops of the cylinder walls, about .002-.004.

One thing that's been going through my mind is why the swirl chamber fell out. It actually cracked right at the piston diameter
(I hope that makes sense). I did install new, bigger nozzles from smog about 10-12k km ago when I changed the t-belt. Could these
higher flowing nozzles have caused the swirl chambers to crack from increased expansion/contraction? I was planning on installing
these injectors on the jetta head.

[madrogers]

It would be faster to swap the whole engine out  that would take all the unknonws out of the problem. put your new belt  onto the 91 engine and away you go  . start by pulling the engine from the 91 and you will see how easy it is to do.

[Dakotakid]

By chance....did you ever use ether to get this engine started. Or, did the previous owner use starting fluid?

[Rabbit on Roids]

my engine dropped a valve and totally F***** over one cylinder. cracked the piston, CRUSHED the rod, messed the head up and scarred the cylinder wall. i took a rod, piston and rings that were laying around at my grandpas, honed the block, took the mangled parts out, put the new ones in, put the engine back together, and thats where i stand today. it runs like a friggen champ. just take the broken stuff out and put in used stuff. it will work fine.

[farkman]

Dakota,

I never used any starting fluid, don't know if the previous owner did.

Rabbit,

Good to hear that the same repair worked out for you, gives me a lot more confidence to going ahead with this fix.

[Rabbit on Roids]

i dropped an exhaust valve into my engine tho. THE WHOLE DAMN VALVE! when i pulled the head, i was greeted by a valve head sticking up sideways out of the piston. and the head, lets just say that its probably beer cans right now. i seriously didnt think a crank could crush a rod like this one did and still be fine. but its still straight.  and there were even a few chunks missing from my block, but i just cleaned the burr off where it broke. made sure it didnt catch on anything. im pretty sure that hole has slightly less comp than the rest, but it runs just fine after the engine builds a little heat.

[farkman]

Just a quick update.

I was lucky enough to find a cheap mk2 Jetta that had a 1.9td swap. The engine was the only good thing on the car but that's all I needed. I swapped the cylinder head and one piston and rod onto my engine and put her back together. I was going to reuse the old piston rings from my engine but the only one that would come off was the 2nd compression ring. The top and oil control ring were stuck due to the piston getting squished in addition to a nice crack through half the thing. It doesn't seem to be burning any oil so far, so fingers crossed.

Thanks for your help, guys. I'm going to be parting out what's left of the Jetta so message me if you need anything from a black 91 Jetta or the bottom end of a 1.9. I'll be posting stuff in the for sale section as well in a few weeks.

[RabbitJockey]

?  why not just swap over the jetta entire engine?