Well just diagnosed a broken timing belt.... however it broke after being parked and car would not start. Had it towed home. Wondering how much damage may have been done by turning the car over with the starter? I'm guessing valves. Hopefully pistons were not damaged.

The next question will show my ignornace on this engine... Can you pull the head/valve assembly with the engine in the vehicle and have the valve work done or is this a pull the engine type of repair no matter what?

Any idea how much new valves and machine work might be?

 

Your pistons will probably be fine. Usually catastrophic piston damage only happens when the belt gives out on the highway at high RPM's or something like that. If the valves kissed the tops of the pistons you can take the nicks out with a scotchbrite pad. You're probably looking at exhaust valves, maybe some machine work on the head, new head and valvecover gaskets, and as long as you're in there you may as well do a full timing service with cam seals, a new water pump with a metal impeller, and so on. You can leave the engine in the car to do the work but you'll want to put the car in the service position at the very least. When i did my timing service i took the core support completely out of the car, I found it made my life much easier and only took an extra 15 or 20 minutes of work.

 

Thanks for the info CCA4. I did a quick search of parts and related prices. Here is what I came up with (I'll see how this copies in from excel):
Item site amount
Timing kit fcp euro $179.00
head gasket parts geek $30.00
valve cover gasket parts geek $40.00
exhasut valve parts geek 15 X 4
$60.00
hydrolic lifters ?? ??
machine work head ?? $150.00


$459.00 Total

Are there 4 exhaust valve on this? What does machine work on the head typically cost?
Wow that kit from FCP euro really has a lot in it! On the valves it says hydrolic lifters should be replaced at the time new valves are installed. Is this accurate?
Any other major items I'm missing?

Thanks guys.

 

The 1.8T has a 20 valve head, five (three intake and two exhaust) per cylinder. I would wait until you get the head off and take a look at it before you order the valves so you know which ones you need. Seems like every thread I've read about a timing belt snapping has bent exhaust valves, but the intake valves are just as susceptible.

Replacing the lifters couldn't hurt but I don't know if it's absolutely required. Hard to say what you'll need as far as machine work, depends on how much damage the valves did.

 

I hate to suggest this but....I bought a 2000 Beetle with the 2.2 and a broken timing belt a couple years ago. Same thing, belt broke when she tried to start it. The teeth were pulled off down at the crankshaft gear behind the pulley.

I figued all I had to lose was some time, so I put a new T-belt on and started it up. Ran great.

Chances of being as lucky as me aren't great, but if it really did break at start up, there is a chance the valves were out of the way and nothing happened.

 

Send some of your luck this way please mtroxel! That is my plan.... tear into it enough to get to timing belt and see what we have. A friend of mine said he could do a leak down on the cylinders. Check it all out.... If it passes slap it back together and give it a go. If we find something wrong in the head or the block then re-evaluate at that point. Waiting for it to get above zero for a bit and some time, then will begin the tear down. Thanks for the help... I'll keep you updated.

 

Yea do let me know. That seems like a good plan. Throw a belt at it and do a compression test.

 

in order to do a compression test it would need to be put back together

 

got the timing belt off tonight. Kit will be here Wednesday. Can someone explain to me how to reindex the timing? The belt had stripped some teeth on the crank sprocket.

 

The crank gear should have a key way in it, so you can only put it on one way. Put the bottom end at TDC for cylinder #1 and the bottom end timing marks should line up. Then just swap the old busted cam gear for the new hotness.

Timing the head might be a bit more complicated. Are the intake and exhaust cams still in time with one another? count 16 links between rollers on the cam chain at the back of the head. There's also a way to set the head at TDC for cylinder #1, but I've never done it before so I don't know how