Conference vmsnet::car$note:carbuffs

  Well, I finally got around to working on my diesel engine swap.  Saturday
  I removed the good 1.5 litre diesel from our '79 Rabbit parts car and
  started removing the broken 1.6 litre from the '85 Jetta.  Today I
  removed the head from the Jetta's engine (block and tranny still in the
  car) and expected a fair amount of damage.  There is a hole large enough
  to insert your fist in the back of the block...
  
  Surprisingly, there is no visible damage to the head.  The #3 piston
  looks cleaner than the rest, so maybe there was a head gasket failure,
  since the hole in the block is in line with #3.  Pistons 2 and 3 are TDC,
  but #3 has minor indentations where it impacted the valves.  The valves
  themselves look good, but I haven't pulled them to see if the stems are
  bent or mushroomed.
  
  The timing belt was broken, but not wrapped around the pulleys.  It does
  appear to be a bottom end failure which was kind of obvious from the
  start.  Hopefully next weekend I can pull the rest of the 1.6 out and
  pull the bottom end apart just for fun.
  
  Dave

I tore apart the broken 1.6 litre this weekend.  The damage was contained to the 
#3 area.  The con rod end cap was missing - it made the hole in the block.  One
of the bolts was broken in half, only the head and top inch of the bolt was still
in the connecting rod.  The other bolt was found complete and a little bent, 
sans nut.

There were lots of metal (not alum) flakes and shavings in the oil pan, oil 
pump inlet and #3 con rod oil passage.

All the other journals and bearings looked fine.

The cup (that holds the shim) on top of the #3 exhaust valve was broken by
the impact of the piston on the valve, but the cam looks okay.

For some reason one of the nuts holding the #3 con rod cap backed off.  This
allowed the con rod to move around and generate metal flakes (lots of score
marks on the side of the rod near the bearing area) which got sucked up
by the oil pump and back into the oil passage - unless the oil passage was
blocked by the shavings coming off the rod directly.  Once I tear down the pump
I'll see if there are shavings inside it or not.

Another strange thing is, on the top of the piston where it hit the valves.  The
marks left by the valves are *raised* areas on the flat of the piston.  I would
have thought they would leave indentations, not raised marks - why is that?

I've moved the accessories to the 1.5 litre and will put that engine into the
'85 Jetta this weekend.  I've left the oil filter bracket and brake booster
vacuum pump on the 1.6 since they might have been contaminated by the metal
flakes in the oil.

The motor mount for the A2 body bolts right up to the engine out of an A1 style,
I just had to clean a few mud wasp nets out of the bolt holes on the block...

Dave

>>Another strange thing is, on the top of the piston where it hit the valves.  The
>>marks left by the valves are *raised* areas on the flat of the piston.  I would
>>have thought they would leave indentations, not raised marks - why is that?

Dave,

Check it real carefully.  If the material on the top of the piston is fairly
hard and brittle, the valve may have protected the material directly under
it, but the flex of the surrounding areas of the piston as it was impacted may
have caused the material to spall off in those areas. 

Jim 

  I took a closer look at the head (and brought the piston to my local vw
  repair shop) and it turns out the piston did not impart the *valves* very
  hard, but it did smack into the head fairly hard.  The rings that look
  like valves on the pistons are actually the areas in the head that the
  valves recess into.  They are 'raised' because the rest of the piston hit
  the head and was pressed down.
  
  He showed me the trick for removing the valves from the VW (watercooled)
  heads.  Talk a large socket and a magnet, slip the magnet in the socket
  and place the socket on top of the valve spring retainer.  Whack the
  socket with a hammer and the magnet will suck the retainer clips out.  By
  the 5th valve I was doing it on the first or second hit.
  
  None of the valves were visibly bent, but I don't plan on using this head
  for anything but a large paperweight.
  
  Dave
  

A friend dropped a motorcycle magazine on my desk.  It has an article about
the Enfield Robin Diesel motorcycle!  They are being produced in England and
India.  They use a 412cc single cyl aircooled diesel (4 stroke), direct 
injection, all aluminum engine.  They produce 10hp@3600 and 14.5 ft lbs@2400.  
Maybe I've found something the Isetta can out drag!! :-)

Dave