Hi guys, looking to buy a vr6 for my wife, she's seen one she really likes and on the photo's the body and interior look great, only thing is its a 1997 and its done 165k miles,and not sure of the service history, just wondered what a vr engine is good to?
timing chains been done? I looked at getting a VR last year I looked at loads and just couldnt find one I liked that seemed good enough so I gave up.
2.8s are pretty tough and can handle some high miles, i know of a few hovering around the 200k mark now. A friend of mine had one with nearly 200K on it, a AMD remap an few other mods and it made over 200hp at various rolling road days. Its the 2.9s that suffer from bore wear and the piston rings tend to let an allow some serious smoking to take place, but the engine will continue At 160K id expect a receipt to show the cam chains and clutch have been done. Its likely at that millage it may have had a head gasket in its time to. Other than that the thermostat housing an "crack pipe" can fail and cause overheating an water loss. One thing to point out though is that there isnt a definate life for the cam chains and it isnt the chains that fail it is the tensioners so some engines have the rattle before hitting 100k others like a friend of mines laster 190k and werent noisy. You need to listen to the right hand side of the rocker cover for tapping an clicking noises- imagine marbles in a tin pot, what happens is the chain tensioners wear out and start to break apart, you really dont want a piece of tensioner getting stuck in the chains as that is GAME OVER for the engine hence its best to get them done sooner rather than later. Budget 500-600 for chains an clutch an other service items. dave
Mines on 148k and not had chains done, still on same clutch as well!! Nothing wrong with big miles at all..........i know a fair few on similar miles to mine, well would do being on VR6 owners club ...lol. My chains will be done at about 150k tho as im just waiting on a ported/polished head
