davidwort

It's heavy and the driveshaft splined bolts are a chore to undo, always ful of crud, so many and so time consuming, but it's not that bad a job otherwise, some big bolts round bellhousing and a small cover underneath that fills a gap between block and bellhousing, for some reason that's a fiddle IIRC starter has to come off and it's bolts hold the front engine mount bracket in place so the engine needs supporting from underneath. I've done this a few times at home, helps to have a cross engine bay support or crane to support the box, or a strong mate with some rope :lol:

not sure if you've sorted this yet, but the sequence I do this is: 1) slacken nut on long bolt that mounts the pump bracket to the alternator bracket (one that's about 15cm long) 2) slacken the two 13mm bolts inside the alloy bracket that mounts to the front of the engine block, plus one easily visible at the front, these all go into pump body from gearbox end of bay towards pump 3) remove belt tensionning bolt , T shaped think with two 13mm nuts, one on front one of side 4) pump should now swing back so crank and pump pulley touch, now remove belt 5) swing pump forward again remove two 13mm bolts from inside that front alloy bracket on engine block 6) remove nut/bolt from alternator bracket (the long one) and pump will be free (still has long narrow flat steel bracket bolted to it), rest it on the front cross member on a rag or something. 7) get underneath and remove the two long bolts that go straight up inside the front alloy bracket into the engine block, with these bolts out the bracket comes off and you have access to the thermostat housing, got a feeling there's a third bolt to this bracket too 8) thermostat housing/flange has rad hose connected to it and 2 10mm bolts, with the engine off the stat will shut so a fair bit of water is trapped in the engine even when you pull the bottom rad hose off. This will piddle out when you unbolt the housing. Always fit a new rubber o ring to the housing, but these can be a fiddle to hold in place whilst holding new thermostat up and also attempting to put water flange back on, you need at least 3 hands :lol: Much easier to do with a new pump off the car and upside down. Don't over tighten these little bolts, they'll stop turning when the seal is compressed and the ridge on the plastic flange is up tight against the water pump. hope I haven't missed anything oh, refitting is reverse of removal :lol:

yep, you need to remove the alloy bracket on the engine block that the pump mounts to, as it's over the bolts for the stat housing, fiddly and time consuming but not too bad. Worst bit is getting at the two 13mm bolts hidden inside the bracket that need slackening to move the pump and take the drive belt off. You need to slacken everything apart from the bolts that hold the pump body to the flat steel bracket it pivots on, oh, and remove the adjustment/belt tensionning bolt altogether it just gets in the way.

should be OK, I've used petrol before too, but I'm sure I used redex once as I had an old bottle in the garage and no intention of putting the stuff in my tank :)

I'm sure you can just use your 16v bits, it's only the carrier that's slightly bigger that's all. ..yep they are the same just checked, carrier bolts to hub N 901 740 01 M12*1 5*35 caliper to carrier 321 615 141 M8*21

when I asked GSF for a new cap a few years back the blue one was what I got, didn't seem to have anything else.

tends to be gloss black (A1 LO41 ) and metallic black (?) on a 1989-91 car, G60's seem to have the metallic version most of the time with quite a few of the 16v's (like mine) on the plain gloss black

yeah, my drive shaft has lost so much paint due to corrosion the thing slides up and down. Never noticed any vibration at any speed though, I wonder if the big lump of iron on the subframe could be removed too, that's supposed to be some kind of harmonic damper too.

back right of upper manifold section

11 years and I still love it :D

After intermittantly doing this on cold mornings for a few minutes over the winter the dash gauge went permanently to MAX with the LED flashing this evening after a good run with it reading fine, it once came back to normal then went off the scale quickly again. The sender is OK as I swapped the connector over to the ECU sender (same part no.) and the problem persists. Is it likely to be the gauge itself or perhaps the voltage regulator on the back of it?

you can get away with it once (re-stretching bolts) but it's not advisable, they are designed to be used once only and a snapped head bolt in the block could be a real PITA

torque settings can vary from one manufacturers bolts to another, should be around 40NM then 60NM then 180 degrees to stretch BTW, a golf or passat haynes manual will have the info and should set you back less than a fiver from e-bay.

I've had my 16v for 11 years and in that time I've spent about six grand on it, but that's everything, including a gas flowed head (600 quid) and a brand new TSR engine block conversion costing 1500 quid. So it's actually not that bad considering I've replaced all the bushes, suspension components, radiator, exhaust, PS pump and hoses and all service items including timing parts (several times), filters, brakes and even tyres. I keep a pretty good record of all the bit's I've bought and when they were put on for service reasons as much as anything, it's a pretty long spreadsheet :)

Says 2l 16v in the description. not from the 'recent posts since last visit', I've never noticed that before :)

Which engine? Favourites for lumpy idle can include vacuum leaks somewhere on the inlet side (vac lines, manifold gaskets etc...) or (on a 16v) bad lambda probe, dodgy injectors or injector seals. Ropey idle valves usually result in sticking revs too high, not coming down to idle properly or occasionally dipping at idle and possibly stalling.

I believe the VW workshop manual actually states removing the old bearing destroys it.

no, sorry, I have 256mm 16v brakes and the factor supplied pads for that spec but they were too thick, checking in the haynes manual the 16v pads including backing should've been 16mm or something but the ones in the box were 19mm I think, from that I've guessed that what was actually supplied was G60 pads despite the packaging list of applications :roll: They were branded pads, can't remember exactly which, but not Pagid, VW or the ones GSF/ECP do, but I guess they are equivalent quality to the better quality ones that GSF do.

only one VW pad part number for G60's and VR6's AFAIK, just make sure you don't get supplied 16v pads by mistake, they look very similar but the pad material is several mm thicker when new, I had this problem but the other way around, ordered 16v pads from a factor and they were too thick to fit in my calipers despite the box listing them as for Corrado and Passat but not mentionning G60.

It'll fail with the warning lamp on, you could remove it but apart from that being pretty dodgy if your car was inspected after an accident I'd rather actually have working abs.

spoke to my dad this evening, they've had a bunch of cars (in some cases on the back of a recovery truck) into their place in Milton Keynes this week, seems like the problem is pretty massive. From their experience this week it's mainly small engined Pugs, renaults and vauxhalls and the odd merc. Apparently the nearby renault dealer sold 40 lambda probes today alone! All the local dealers have dead cars on their forecourts waiting for parts. Strangely they've not had any VW's at all. I didn't realise how sensitive the sensors are to silicon, apparently it's to be avoided at all costs anywhere it could get into the engine, e.g. manifold gaskets. Some cars are way more costly to fix too as they have multiple sensors, apparently one merc has set back a customer 1200 quid including all the fuel system drain etc... :shock:

particularly when they are siezed solid as they often are!

never heard of any major differences in 1.8 16v engines, some of the later cars used different ancillary pulleys and had the smaller 42mm inlet manifolds but nothing that affects the use of heads on different blocks.

Thinking about it I'm sure flusted is right, the cams are lifted out together, TBH it's a while since I stripped the head down and I've only ever done the cams with the head off the engine on a bench. I'm surprised I can remember any of it at the moment, I've got flu from hell and a lovely chest infection from it :(

keep your eyes peeled for any audi 80 sports or coupes breaking, I've had a couple of senders off those from a scrappy nr me for a fiver a go, sadly I don't have one at the moment though.