New Rabbit Diesel - has issues

[tthayer]

Hey forum people:
I've been reading up quite a bit on upkeep of this new rabbit of mine, and the forum here has been extremely helpful. So I give you my thanks!

Now, the 1.6D in this beast seems to have some issues. The headgasket appears to be shot. There is no coolant in system, and most of the oil leaked out somewhere. There is a decent slick running down the back of the block from the headgasket, so that's my first and primary guess.
I pulled the valve cover off (with great difficulty) and found the #1 head bolt had sheared off and had been tossed into one of the oil catches. None of the head bolts are budging yet. I've PB blasted them and am going to give it another shot this weekend to see if they'll come easy this time. I'm going to take the head to a machine shop to get tested and hot-tanked, but I suspect that it is pretty severely warped.

The upside is that the IP looks like it's in great shape. No leaks and tight as a drum. If the headgasket and the IP were toast, I probably would have passed on the car.

Given the sheared head bolt and the fact that the bolts aren't giving a milimeter, would it be a safe guess that the previous owner tried to re-use the stretch bolts?

Here are some pictures:
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=178038&id=510163760&l=bccde599d0

[tthayer]

I was able to get the bolts to loosen after letting them soak in PB Blaster for about 4 days. The bolts all came easy, minus the dead-headed one.

I lifted the head as much as possible, but this one stud is going to prevent me from lifting the head without first removing the intake manifold. Baby steps!

The gasket underneath is entirely intact and lifted right off the block, which I was not expecting. The pistons are clear on top, but we'll see if any damage was done.

[8v-of-fury]

Given the sheared head bolt and the fact that the bolts aren't giving a milimeter, would it be a safe guess that the previous owner tried to re-use the stretch bolts?

Or trying to do what you are doing and not using any penetrating oil, shearing one bolt off, getting it stuck and saying eff it lol.

How is the body and interior? more pics sir

[tthayer]

The head finally came loose and the gasket has been replaced!

I was able to get the head to clear the engine bay by rotating it around on the broken head bolt. Luckily it was the #1 bolt, so it could pivot out towards the front of the car. If it had been a rear bolt I would have had to take the intake off first.

The head and the block are smooth and flatter than pancakes. Valves look fantastic, and there are only very small cracks between the valves. The block is also intact. I cleaned out the threads in the block and chased them a few times to make sure the the bolts would seat far enough. The timing belt went on way way easier than the last VW diesel I worked on.

One huge problem I just ran into, though:
The previous owners filled the engine with water instead of the right anti-freeze mix (presumably because it was consuming it all through the headgasket). Now that the temps in Portland have dropped below freezing, the remaining water appears to have frozen solid. It doesn't seem to have caused problems in the block, but my thermostat housing has cracked and I suspect that the water pump will have problems too. I started filling the system with straight anti-freeze to start melting the ice and didn't notice the thermostat housing issue until the radiator had filled up about 75%.

I neglected to take pictures of the headgasket replacement, but I will document the process when I get a few minutes. The Bentley makes it out to be a much more complicated process than I think is really necessary. For instance, it is not necessary to remove the camshaft belt from the crank if you mark your timing on the belt and the cam and IP. Loosening the tensioner and tying off the belt near the top of the crankshaft will prevent it from shifting on the crank and you can push it off to the side until you need to slip it on again.

[burn_your_money]

Up until 2 days ago I was running pure water in my car due to a huge leak. It was suppose to be off the road before the snow got here but life just got in the way. I recon that it froze up solid at least 5 times. The last time it overheated (I buried the gauge) I added straight coolant. I plugged the block heater in and by the morning everything was thawed. No adverse effects either. It's still leaking like a sieve though. The moral of the story is that your waterpump is probably fine.

Did you recheck your timing? Mark and pray is a risky operation, especially considering how easy it is to do it properly.

[tthayer]

The timing mark is at the arrow in the bell housing and cylinder #1 is at TDC. I did that just in case I munged something. I haven't started the engine yet, so we'll see!

[tthayer]

It looks like what I thought was the thermostat housing is actually just a water flange. The frozen coolant is all thawed now, so today will be the day that I start this thing up.

[tthayer]

It runs!
Timing may be off, and I'm pretty sure I have a bad injector or two, given their incessant weeping and crying all the damn time.

Here is a video of it billowing white smoke.

Rabbit - First run

This was after about 10 minutes of run time. The coolant was pretty hot, but I haven't felt the bottom hose to see if the thermostat is opening up.

[burn_your_money]

I like your car

Yes your timing is certainly off. It looks and sounds like it's off about a tooth. Pump is probably around 0.60mm

[rallydiesel]

It's great to see another old diesel resurrected!

[tthayer]

burn your money: You were right! I wish I'd seen your post before I dicked around in the freezing rain for 3 hours. Ah well, it's nice to be able to solve a problem on your own from time to time
I brought the flywheel to TDC and made sure the cam was lined up. The fuel pump was one tooth south of normal, so I slipped the belt off, turned it, and slipped it back on. Re-tensioning fixed a rattle from the timing belt, too. The white smoke pretty much disappears after a minute or so now, and it belts a healthy dark cloud when it's gunned.

Now I get to fix the electrical issues. The headlights don't work as of yet. Also, the headliner is falling off completely and the seatbelts were detached by the previous owners for some reason. The relay for the rad. fan is nowhere to be found. I have a Bentley to help me along, but I think the non-engine related issues are going to be more time-consuming.

[8v-of-fury]

Non-engine stuff always takes way longer! I did alot of engine work one day.. then it took me three times as long to do the back brakes..

Nice rabbit good luck to you Good Sir !!