Hi, I am in a tough spot right now and wonder if someone could help me. I own a 2002 audi quattro 3.0 v6. I bought it 3 yrs ago and still owe 2 yrs on it. I had the timing belt changed at 90,000 miles I now have 130,000 miles While driving to work on 128 5 days ago my engine overheated and seized. I had it towed to where I bought it and they told me they need me to buy a new timing chain before they even know what is wrong with it. I have a bad feeling about this and am considering buying a used car and calling this bad luck. It is a beautiful red station wagon kept in great shape and I took care of it like they told me too. Thanks for your help Kathy

 

Damn, that sucks.

When you noticed that it was overheating did you get an opportunity to pull over, or did you keep driving?

Timing chain? The motor is belt driven, not chain.

Who did the timing belt job? No warranty on the service/parts at all?

Honestly, if you overheated it to the point where the motor seized.. you're gonna be in the market for a new engine. Heck, if the timing belt snapped you're gonna be in the market for a new engine.

If it's not turning at all, either things got hot enough to weld moving internal parts together, or the timing belt went and internal parts in the engine crashed together and are likely jammed, bent & dented.

 

This car, which is the ex-wife's, is now in my yard. The engine turns but doesn't start. I just started looking for problems. Timing belts are frayed but not broken, I just managed to pull one spark plug out (busy with other cars) and it looks fine, I'll pull the rest tomorrow if it is necessary. Before I start looking is there a radiator cap on the radiator to check whether there is coolant still present, when I squeeze the large hose (return) it feels like it has coolant in it.

On another Audi related subject, had one here yesterday, 2003 A6 Quattro, that had very low fluid in the power steering resevoir but hesitated to top off with Prestone with Stop Leak due to compatibility issues. The owner didn't know whether it was okay or not. I sent him on his way with instructions to get to an Audi dealership to buy approved Audi hydraulic fluid Monday. For my own education because answers were vague on the internet, is Prestone or Lucas power steering fluid or Stop Leak compatible with the Audi fluids/seals?

 

The container I have says don't mix with other hydraulic fluid or power steering fluid. It does not say what type it is. For me, the cost was not worth risking damage to either the pump or rack. Probably a good choice on your part

 

No cap on radiator. But you should have a coolant reservior plastic tank on DS that you should be able to visually check to see coolant level. If this is dry then that's not a good sign.

 

Thanks for the speedy reply about the power steering fluid.

About the engine coolant level. It is hard to say if there was any fluid left in the resevoir because when the engine stalled/overheated on the highway a good samaritan van added water at the scene.

I have the upper timing belt covers off and can see that one of the gears on one bank is not aligned with what looks like paint marks on another gear from when someone replaced the belts at 90,000 miles. This belt is also loose so I'm thinking it jumped threw the engine out of time (big time) and loss of power and overheat ensued. Anybody know of any simple tests to prove my theory? Would anyone want to buy this as a parts car?

 

If you're just looking at just the cam shafts, you won't know for sure if they are aligned correctly because the crank may or may not be at TDC. You will need to ensure the crank is at TDC and see if the cams line up (Assuming the paint marks were true to begin with). Remember: depending on how the crank is aligned currently, you will may have to rotate the crank twice as there's one rotation for compression and one for exhaust.

A shreaded timing belt, loss of coolant, and an overheating issue points towards a water pump failure of some sort. I can't see a tensioner going and the car able to travel far enough to overheat. It would be pretty sudden and the ride would be over fairly quickly if the timing belt broke.

I would at least invest several hours to put the car into the service position so you can get a better sense of what's going on. Worst case you learn the engine's timing was thrown off and the engine needs to be rebuilt. You can then be honest to the next person who you sell it to and avoid any potential fights that will ensue from them finding out it needs thousands of dollars worth of repairs.

 

Oh, I wouldn't sell it without a full disclosure of the problems of the engine, at this point I'd just like to solve the mystery of what happened. Your water pump failure theory is the best so far given the description I got from the driver (ex-wife) about how the temp gauge went from normal to pinned in seconds.

If I strip the bumper, fans, radiators, remove the valve covers and lower timing belt covers will a failure of the water pump be obvious? If the timing is correct can I deduce it was the water pump and then just replace it and everything else Audi and others recommends replacing with a timing belt?

So appreciate everyone's help here. Last engine I opened up was a 1981 Chevy straight six.

 

It may not be obvious without pulling the pump from the block. If it was literally seconds, I'm going to have to say that the coolant leaked out. When you put new coolant or water in, does it wind up on the ground below the car within a matter of seconds?

In order to rule the pump either in or out, you will have to take the pump off of the block and examine the condition of the impellers on the back. They may have detached from the pulley. By doing this you also must remove the timing belt from the engine. Check out the timing before you remove it.

 

(I couldn't find a straight on shot of the front of the motor, so hopefully this is clear enough)

• A Water Pump
• B Idler roller
• C Eccentric Roller
• D Tensioning Roller
• E Hydraulic Tensioner
• F Bank 1 Intake Camshaft
• G Bank 1 Exhaust Camshaft
• H Bank 2 Intake Camshaft
• I Bank 2 Exhaust Camshaft

I think you'll be able to figure out what the failure is once you get it all apart. Check for play on the roller bearings, water pump & inspect the hydraulic tensioner to make sure it's functioning properly. If it lost a lot of coolant and there's not an obvious leak from the water pump..that's not the greatest sign.

Then you can check the timing, the 3.0 is a different beast in terms of timing compared to the 2.8, 2.7T and 4.2. So I can't say that I have hands on experience on how to go about setting timing on that motor.

You can follow this DIY & follow the steps up to the "Timing belt alignment to TDC (top dead center)" portion:
AudiWorld Tech Articles

Along with this illustration to help aid you in getting the motor to TDC:

I figure the lobes should match up when the marking on the crank/harmonic balancer lines up IF the timing is correct. But considering the current no-start, it likely won't be.

It depends.

Your best bet if you intend to fix it, is to get a belt on there, get everything re-timed and perform a leak-down test. Being honest, I've never performed a leak-down test myself so I'm not 100% sure if it needs to be re-timed for it to be done properly, that's just an assumption on my part. Hopefully a more knowledgeable member chimes in with the answer.

If it did skip timing then it's very possible that you have some bent valves in the head or even possible piston damage(these are all interference engines). Many have escaped with just a few bent valves, or even no bent valves(a bloody miracle).

Hey, I'm usually lost staring at most non-Audi/VW motors, lol.