Well been to VW today and they were really doubting it being a head gasket, but after all the work I'ved had done they then said its either faulty work (in so many words) or the head gasket. Only thing is VW are quoting 200 more for the job. I'm booking it in for an hours diagnostic with them.
ah ha! spoke to me mate that works at my garage and it was the PD injectors. I'll be booking it in with VW some time next week so I'll be posting on how it turns out. I can only hop that my garage has made an honest mistake with the water pump. Or anything cheaper than head gasket.
Hmmmm the apparently only VW can deal with the PD injectors but they seem standard on all newer models going by this.... http://www.channel4.com/4car/news/news-story.jsp?news_id=429 yet the garage were making out they were something special :S
mmm true, but made it sound like my car was a 1 off with them, which was believable for me as mines an import and thought maybe it had slightly different parts. But I dont see how the cooling system is affected by the fuel injectors. Come monday and I'll call in the garage to find out.
Roll on Thrusday. Cars booked in at VW Lindvale garage for a 1 hour dianostic. Watch this space, will let you know what they say.
righttttt, had the garage explain about the VW guy today....... quite a different story now they explained it properly. So a Ex-technician voiced his experience to the garage when he had popped in about my car. And he said that only VW have the kit to reset and play with the PD injectors. Since they have to be removed to do the head my garage can't/wont do it! Picking up car tomorrow and dropping it at VW for the Dianostic still.
Why do they keep going on about the injectors ???? What have they got to do with it using water ? Sounds like you need to find someone that knows what they are talking about..... The injectors dont need to be removed to do the headgasket,they only need removing if you decide to have the cylinder head skimmed.(i decided not to bother with mine as it had'nt overheated or anything). I've just finished putting mine back together, and guess what it's not pressurising anymore. I'm off to manchester tommorow so i'll let you know how it goes on after a blast down the motorway... Jason
Yeah - no idea where the injectors would come into play unless it's had some nasty fuel - deffo a last resort to replace these as they're not cheap at all! Interested to hear what VW say today - Try and speak directly to a technician if you can and get as much info as posible!
Ahhhh so injectors would need to be played with if it needs to be skimmed, which knowing my luck it probable will. VW found nothing yet, I called home on way from work and they were doing a coolant test of some sort, had a black thing sticking up from the resovoir tank. Bit annoyed with them though they were calling me up asking how to get it to over heat, I told the truth about my speed and said they can't repucate that as they don't even have a rolling road! Even my last garage got it to over heat on there rolling road. Picking it up at about 5-40 so I'll report back here once I'm home.
At last a conclusion (well kinda) It's confirmed that it is the head gasket! Lovely VW also managed to find several over problems too...most are just general servicing though like brake pads, tyres but there's a warped brake disc, leaky CV boot, broken exhuast bracket too, so cheap things really apart from the rubber.
Cool - at least you know what it is then... HG seems to be a common weakness of the AJM engine for some reason... What mileage is yours on?? What price did they quote for the HG job?? Mine's rapidly approaching 80k and I was planning to wait for the next cambelt interval (120k) and get the clutch done but also wondering now if I should add the HG to the list as I'd rather change it before it 'goes'
Mines on 106k now, although I'ved had cooling systems pretty much saince I had it at 97k so was probable weak when I bought it. They quoted 677 but this includes another new cambelt, so without that it knocks it down to 577 which is a more reasonable, especially since they would only want the car for a day (or so i understand as they quoted for 4 hours work) The garage that turned down the head gasket only did the cambelt 4000 miles ago so thats guranteed! Going to check out a back street garage block that specialises in VW over the next few days thats been highly recomended see what they would charge.
Seraph - ask any VW or AUDI tech - they will tell you that the AJM is the only TDI engine thats known for blowing HG's, my local dealer has had about 5 of these and that was a year ago... I have no idea why this is and as you know most of the engine is the same between the PD TDI's...
ive heard of a fair few pd engines with HG problems. odd thing was, i had 3 different 130 pds in A4s... one of them went well past 150k miles and no, no HG issues
Matt, i've never heard of a 130 or 150 having problems just the 115... If you google it you will get hits all over the place... i'm not particuarly worried as loads of these engines are on the road but it looks like you need to keep a careful eye on the cooling system. Again, I would like to know why they go...
