Headgasket on the way out - what should i be paying?

[PoorMansPorsche 0]

Garage have quoted me £400 and another £50 to do the cam belt at the same time - does this sound reasonable as i havent got a foggiest idea !

 

Its a 1990 Valver

 

Cheers

[quicky1980 0]

my local said about that too. but if your good wiv a spanner it can be done relatively easy.

I have done it after many hours of cursing.

[PoorMansPorsche 0]

a spanner? thats one of those spangley metal thingamejiggys??

 

I wouldnt like to risk it !!!

[Tom B 0]

I'd be asking for a breakdown of the costs, like how much the head skimming is, how much the parts will DEFINITELY be and what guesstimation of labour they're using, charged at what rate.

[PoorMansPorsche 0]

they are being a bit vauge at the moment as to what the exactly they are charging because they said they were not sure how long the skimming will take until they get the head off but we have used them many times before and they do always give a through breakdown of labour and part costs and if i seem to remember the hourly rate was quite reasonable.

 

I didnt even know about skimming until they told me because me in my ignorance thought it was just a case of whipping the head and the old gasket off and bunging the new one on! and £400 seemed alot for that !

[quicky1980 0]

When i changed my head i rebuilt it. So i was able to have it skimmed while all the valves where out. The cost of skimming was about £30 if i remember right.

im not sure if you can skim a head while parts are still attatched (doubt it really). So you got to think about labour time to strip the head too.

i guesse a mechanic can get a head off in 3-4hours strip it in an hour. rebuild it will take slightly longer so hopefully about 11hours labour so on the guesse they charge £25+vat labour then labour costs should be about £275+vat if all goes well.

head gasket kit and bolts from a good supplier will be in the region of £50 -£70 and skimming about £30-50. both inc vat

I would say then that, the quote seems good. Hours of labour depends on my experience of changing my first head. And this also included me changing the cam belt.

hope this helps

[h100vw 0]

They should have the head off in under 2 hours easily.

 

The head can be skimmed with the valves in usually, taking the cams out should have all the valves out of harms way. You can certainly do this on an 8V, it's a while since I looked at a 16V.

 

The headset from GSF would be sub £50 and £50 tops for a skim. £50 extra to do the belt isn't bad, I am surprised they don't insist on doing the belt and tensioner anyway. A lot of places wouldn't warrant the belt after it has been de-tensioned, leading to an increased risk of failure (loss of reputation).

 

If you were handy then you could do it for just over £100 all in. If you're not then £400 doesn't see too bad.

 

Have we had the 'who says it's on it's way out' conversation already?

 

Gavin

[FTM1975 0]

i recently spent £414 fixing the head, re skimming, new bolt set etc and also had the cylinder seals replaced!!!!!!!

[davidwort 0]

I didnt even know about skimming until they told me because me in my ignorance thought it was just a case of whipping the head and the old gasket off and bunging the new one on! and £400 seemed alot for that !

 

It'll only need skimming if the head surface is warped and 16v's are a bit sensitive to skimming, in fact I think VW state the 16v head can't be skimmed, but you can probably get away with it.

On my 1.8 engine the headgasket went between two cylinders and all it needed was a new gasket.

 

I'd expact to pay:

best part of half a days labour

20 quid for the headbolts

approx 35 quid for the gasket set

coolant 10 quid

timing belt and tensionner 30 quid

 

If you do it yourself you'd need a torque wrench and spline tool set and a straight edge to check the head for warping

 

David.

[ben16v 0]

will skimming a 16v head make any difference to compression etc?

 

i paid 500ish for head gasket failure a while ago... if it were now i`d try it myself and just get someone more knowlegeable (sp?) to check over the timing etc after

 

ben

[davidwort 0]

will skimming a 16v head make any difference to compression etc?

 

depends how much you skim, you can't go far because of the inlet valves.

 

take a look at my cyl-head:

[ben16v 0]

depends how much you skim, you can't go far because of the inlet valves.

 

 

ok, for example, i had my head skimmed assuming with the valves still in as there was no mention of removal,

 

the car had defo not overheated so i`m thinking minimal warping if any

 

what would the outcome if CR was increaded due to skimming.. would you get a bigger bang and more power?? if that makes sense?

 

only asking cos i`ve had good power runs on my standard engine (bar k&n and exhaust)

 

and skimming is the only other thing thats happened to it

 

ben

[ben16v 0]

i take it that head HAS been skimmed??

 

certaintly doesnt look like a lot of room for error or enough to make any difference to the compression

[davidwort 0]

i take it that head HAS been skimmed??

 

certaintly doesnt look like a lot of room for error or enough to make any difference to the compression

 

It hasn't been done to deliberately increase compression, only a tiny amount as part of the general headwork if anything, this one has only been ported:

[ben16v 0]

ok, didnt mean youd done it to increase compression, just that it looks like the max amount of skimming but that wouldnt really affect the compression

 

sorry to clog up the thread Brett :oops:

 

what i was wondering is that would it be possible for skimming my head to have increased the power from my engine?

 

or am i just lucky :lol:

[davidwort 0]

...

what i was wondering is that would it be possible for skimming my head to have increased the power from my engine?

 

or am i just lucky :lol:

 

yep, a bit I guess.

[PoorMansPorsche 0]

forgetting the skimming - once the headgasket is replaced am i likely to notice better performance because ive done less than 1000 miles in the car in the 6 months ive had it and ive always thought it wasnt as fast as i thought it should be - i think its even slower than my mk 4 golf 1600 (0 - 60 10.8) and its definately slower than my mates well old E30 2L Auto Beemer (hasnt even got the 150 bhp engine just the old 125 bhp one)

[ben16v 0]

brettloveday, wouldnt think you`d notice any improvement in performance from before the head gasket went to after,

 

just keep an eye on oil/water temperatures

 

getting it all timed up properly will get the best out of the engine

[h100vw 0]

ok, didnt mean youd done it to increase compression, just that it looks like the max amount of skimming but that wouldnt really affect the compression

 

sorry to clog up the thread Brett :oops:

 

what i was wondering is that would it be possible for skimming my head to have increased the power from my engine?

 

or am i just lucky :lol:

 

upping the CR will gain power but the timing and fuelling have to be correct. A higher CR may also mean having to use better pertol if you don't already.

Gavin

[PoorMansPorsche 0]

I put a K & N on and that didnt make a blind bit of difference but bugger knows when the oil was changed last so getting them to do that and the oil filter as well

[gaz the geezer 0]

once you get the engine back together again it would also be a good idea to get a few hundred miles under your belt and change the oil and filter again, when the head comes off and the gasket is scraped off you tend to get particles of gasket / carbon go down the oil return drillings, if the person doing the job for you actually gives a t*ss then this will be minimal, whatever the dilligence applied to your head build i`d def give it another oil change.

[chubbybrown 0]

Maybe its not needing skimmed,

it might just be the gasket !

as long as its not over heated why would it have warped ?

 

have you changed the coolant lately ?

[PoorMansPorsche 0]

fill it up with water everytime i fill up with petrol (say every 250 miles) - although putting anti freeze in stopped it using water til the warning light came on the whole time - oops