Its alive! (Leon is nearly repaired)

TaKeN said:
If anything.. I'd be happy to know that a car I was buying with 80k on the clock, had a new engine in that had only done 38k..

Para, what bit of the engine failed please ? that sort of thing interests me :p and.. I would love some pictures aswell please :D

edit - you can never say please enough ;)
Click to expand...

paradigm said:
Pics and writeup to follow!
Click to expand...

;)

EDIT: He beat me to it.

I decided that it seemed dodgy and dishonest if I put the lower clock on the car, simply because all the car's bits had been worn for that near 100k more, so were in a worse state and would have made the car rather dodgy. The car stayed until it blew up a second time, then we scrapped it, so resale wasn't really an issue anyway. :)

InvG
 
Ok, diagnosis time!

Firestar came over today and helped me pull the old engine apart so we could attempt to find the cause of the failure. First we took everything off that was bolted/attached to the block, exhaust manifold, turbo, oil lines, coolant pipework, cambelt and associated pulleys.

We then whipped the head off, and took the cams out, cam chain tensioner, and chain out:

1.jpg


Then we whipped the head off, and were left with a sizable amount of engine parts, strewn across a tarp' on the garage floor:

2.jpg


3.jpg


So, we then turned the block over, and took the sump off, followed by the oil pickup and oil pump, as well as the splash guard from just below the crank. It was then that I discovered this:

crud.jpg


Not good, lots of fine bits of metal from somewhere, prominently around cylinder 3. Cylinder 3's bearing casing, and conrod look very scorched compared to #1, #2 and #4. Hmm.

So, casing comes off, and piston (with rod) come out, which shows us:

spun2.jpg


spun1.jpg


A spun cap! Fused from one side to the other, causing the seized engine, and scratching hell out of the crank at this point. All the other cylinders are fine, the pistons are fine, and the bores are unscathed.

So, it should be repairable without too much outlay. Certainly cheap enough for it to be worth my while repairing and selling as a full engine again!
 
And now, as a nice little (possibly sad) picture, I present you with a "MK2 Golf GTi" style, exploded view of a 1.8T :D

exploded1.jpg


exploded2.jpg
 
Just when your Dad thought he had his garage back! :p

At least its a bit easier to get to the freezer :p
 
Yeah, after having in bits, its in all honesty, not that complicated. Slightly concerned about getting the timing right but so long as its sold with the disclaimer "timing belt needs doing", then its all good :cool::p
 
As said, anything that is place specific is pre-numbered via stamping from the factory.

The only thing I have mixed up into a pile is the bolts :/ oops.
 
Hehe, we had serious fun pulling this apart, nice to see it can be fixed with a crank regrind / new caps and a rod, when we started to take the head off i still had my money on a piston to be wedged in a bore, everything is in very good order with little / no sign of wear.

Looking forward to the rebuild :)
 
Learning about it by pulling it apart was the reason for starting it! It was a bonus that it has ended up being repairable! :D
 
Thanks for the pics ! and write up !

Always interesting to see what happens when an engine fails.. IMO :p
 
I have full sized (3072 x 2304) versions of the pictures, including the exploded views if anyone wants to see them :)

Just give me an email address if you're interested.
 
That's a great thread thanks very much - I'm thinking seriously about getting rid of my 182 for one of these Leons. Which version of the Leon would I be looking at to get one like yours?

As much fun as the 182 is - i need something a bit bigger!
 
Its a MK1 Facelift Leon Cupra R (225).

They can be picked up for around £7,000 for an early '53 plater, or anywhere up to £12,000 for a last of the line '55 plate with lowish milage.
 
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