Well, I tore it apart today and as it turns out, the belt is indeed stretched, it seems. I can turn it about 100 degrees sideways by hand, now that I'm able to get a good grip on it. I'll be ordering a timing belt kit and doing it up. The timing is about a tooth off if I can trust the stock marks. Also, there's some oil residue around the area, some of it wet, but not a ton. Should I be worried? What could it be if so? Can I spray degreaser around that area and clean it and/or should I be worried about the degreaser getting into places that it shouldn't?

 

Good, thats what i figured it can only be given the faults you had.
The best way to get rid of that extra oil is to pick up a couple cans of brake cleaner at any auto parts store. That stuff just melts oil. Don't worry about getting the cleaner anywhere, it shouldn't hurt anything. The oil is most likely coming from your valve cover gasket and cam adjuster seal, you should order that along with the timing belt kit.
As for the timing, there is a trick. The cam mark you can always see, there is a notch on the pulley and a notch on the valve cover these you must line up. The crank pulley is the tricky part. The timing mark is only on the crank pulley, but you have to remove the pulley to get to the timing belt. So what i do is line up the crank pulley first, remove the pulley then use some white out and mark one of the crank teeth, and mark part of the engine block right above it. That way you will know if the crank moved on you when installing the belt. When installing the belt, the crank tends to turn on you so it may take you a few tries to get it right.

 

The lower timing marks is on the crank pulley and on the lower timing cover. Or is the mark on the timing cover not accurate? Or are you saying to line those up then mark it on the block before doing anything else? As for the crank turning, can't I put it in reverse, E-brake on, and maybe even have someone step on the brake, so that it wouldn't move? Or would it still have enough play to mess things up?


Also, it seems the previous owner must have done this job before, or tried to, because it was done really poorly. Pretty much every bolt that I had to remove for the front carriage was loose, and some of them are missing. Is there any place with a reference of the bolts or do I have to go to the hardware store and match them up?

 

Right, line up the timing marks for the crank pulley and timing cover. Once thats lined up pull the crank pulley off and mark one of the crank teeth against the block. This is because when you are putting the belt on you won't be able to see if the crank moved until you get the pulley back on and notice you fucked up. It just saves you time and headaches.

As for the hardware, if its just random bolts you can get them at any hardware parts store. If its a special bolt (green in color) like the ones that hold on the lock carrier, you can get those at the dealer for pretty cheap.

 

Got the timing belt kit yesterday (finally) and I was looking through the stuff and it has seals for the camshaft and crankshaft. I've been looking for instructions on these but all I see is discussion between people that say they don't need to be changed on VWs and people who say to just do it while you're in there. I think I'd like to just do it, but is there a DIY guide anywhere for it?

 

If you're a 1.8T then here you go: http://www.audiworld.com/tech/eng35.shtml

 

thanks but that's not what I'm looking for. It doesn't go into replacing the camshaft/crankshaft seals that the kit included.

 

No info on replacing those circular seals that come with the kit? I would like to use them since I paid for them, and I don't want them to leak down the line when I can replace them now.

 

Try www.audidiy.com. It has links to a lot of DIY's. I just simply found the TB one and didn't look at any others.

 

So many problems, so many problems. I found that the hose going from the crankcase vent to the big T valve was disintegrated. Pulled off the intake manifold and was cleaning up and noticed this. Is this a bad thing? It's at the back of the engine under the intake manifold. I don't know if it goes to inside the engine or if it's some sort of bracket or what.