Better start at the beginning. '01 A4 quattro, 1.8T AWM, automatic. Nearly all of my coolant leaked out from a loose thermostat housing. I took it to a garage to get the thermostat and housing replaced, and when I picked it up they said, "you may need a water pump," (whatever "may need" means)...when I started it up I noticed it was a rough start and white smoke coughed out of the exhaust. On the drive home, the temp gauge went steadily up until it reached the red about a block from my house - I shut the car off and didn't start it again until I had the parts for the water pump job. Unfortunately, when I tried to start the car a couple weeks later to move it into a better place for the tow truck, it turned over and over but wouldn't start. At the garage, they found I was getting zero compression in all cylinders. Their prognosis? "You're screwed. Need a new engine."
Now am I out of line to think this sequence of failures is rather extreme? When I turn the ignition, it sounds absolutely fine - no continuous "weeeeee!" sound or anything - in fact it sounds like it's simply out of gas. I've read up on possible culprits, such as bent valves from the timing belt skipping a couple teeth, and a cracked head. Now, due to the prior issues with no coolant and severe overheating, I'm leaning toward a cracked head. I seriously doubt the timing belt skipped - it never really had a chance to. This leads me to the actual point of this post: What to do? Do I really need an entire new engine? If the head is ruined, can't I just find an AWM head and replace it? Is there a chance that the block is cracked too? It's cast iron so that would really shock me. I'm currently unemployed and I'm gonna need the car when I find a new job, so I must get it running. But unemployed = broke, so I need to do it as cheap as humanly possible. ANY advice, comments, speculations, good-natured insults, and questions are very welcome.

-jason

 

if you take the intake manifold off you can get a glimps of 75% percent of the valves on each head! this is a head ache to put the vaccum hoses and fuel pressure hose back together unless you make some sort of labeling, its about a 2-3 hour job...take a **** ton of pictures as you go that clearly show the route of all hoses if you so choose to do this. A cracked head could cause these issues tho the heads on these vehicles are fairly strong from what ive heard. the far more likely scenario would be that the head gasket is ruptured. replacing this is a easy but time consuming as ****!

****my guess would be something regarding them not puting the coolant back in properly or they contaminated the coolant by mixing it with another product, ive heard this can cause major problems, but the fact of the mater is in order for them to change the housing they had to remove some of the timing compenents including the belt and may not have had the proper tools to do so causing the valves to bend (in some severe cases bent valves can damage the head) ask to see there timing tools and if they do not have the audi timing tool then thats what the problem was THEY fucked up your car. and in this case you can (with reasonable grounds) sue the shop. they should be insured dont let them give you any bs.

trick ive learned coming from a family of lawyers is to not go in offensively go to them calm and just ask questions without insuations, take pictures of the tools they used and try to get an invoice in writting of what they used this will be very important in the long run, i cant stress this enough you must document what you get from them its the only way you can avoid the "i never said that" quote.

 

i would confirm for yourself you have zero compression. its a start but i seriously doubt youd register 0psi across the board

 

You would have to have no valves to register 0 compression.
If you had white smoke out of the exhaust then you had coolant in the combustion chamber and the only real ways of getting coolant into the combustion chamber is with a head gasket issue or cracked head. If your car is stock, I doubt the head it cracked, now the overheating in excess could cause an issue but I would still lean toward just a head gasket. Who did your water pump? If you had been in a closer state I could help you out since your unemployed.. Let me know if I can help you out further..

 

OP has an AWM, you're talking about the 30v which doesn't apply in this situation. Timing should not have been touched for a thermostat, even for a 30v, so that's out of the question barring a freak occurrence, such as something falling between the belt and crank gear and causing it to skip. (Yes it did happen to me)

First thing, does it sound normal cranking over? As in, does the starter sound like it's loaded when a piston hits TDC or is it an even pitch all the time? Second, get a leakdown test done, it'll tell you exactly where there is a combustion chamber leak, if any, and how severe it is.

Connect a scan tool and see if there any any codes too.

My guess would be blown head gasket though, but the mechanic that did your thermostat must have been half-retarded if he didn't notice that afterwards.

 

[QUOTE=Mad Cow;1434471] Timing should not have been touched for a thermostat, even for a 30v,QUOTE]

your kidding right?
the belt has to be removed in order to reach it otherwise you cant get the housing off and without that off you cannot access the thermostat. at least on the 30v

just did this job a week ago, and if the guy didnt take your belt of he would have had to stretch the **** out of it which would have caused the same problems.

 

+1 for real tho

 

[QUOTE=Expplucky;1434480]You can definitely wiggle it out, it's not easy but I did it when my motor blew and I was tearing it apart, just to see if I can. If you can stretch a timing belt with your bare hands you must be the Incredible Hulk.

 

There seems to be some confusion amongst the repliers - my engine is the 1.8t AWM 20v, NOT the 2.8 30V. Also I forgot to mention that all the spark plugs were soaked in oil. And yes, the car is stock.

expplucky - I bought the coolant for the job to be sure they didn't use the wrong kind. Also, if I don't have the money to get the car fixed for a few grand, I don't have the money to hire a lawyer to sue the shop, especially when their culpability in the situation would be far from certain in a court of law. Thanks for the advice just the same.

sincityaudi - the water pump hasn't been done yet. I only did the thermostat & housing, it was after this and a drive when it overheated that it failed to start.

Mad Cow - When I turn the ignition, the engine sounds completely normal. It sounds like the car is simply out of gas. Also, the mechanic who did the thermostat IS an idiot, at least as far as european cars go - the shop said they don't do audis, but they (and I) figured since the thermostat was such a simple piece, there wouldn't be a problem.
It should be noted, however, that before I dropped the car off, the engine started easily and there was never white smoke from the exhaust - when came to pick up the vehicle and started it, there was smoke and a rough start. I don't know what they could have possibly done in the course of replacing a thermostat that would cause this.

Anyway, the mechanic who did the compression test, etc., is well respected. He even hosts a weekly local radio show where people call in with questions about their automotive problems. I don't know that the compression test registered exactly 0psi, but apparently it was low enough for him to write "unable to gain compression, suspect internal engine failure, recommend engine replacement" on the receipt.

In terms of OBD codes, a scan revealed only the following: P0012 - Intake Camshaft - advance setpoint not reached. It's my understanding this means I need to replace the cam chain tensioner, but that wouldn't cause this kind of problem.

I suspected a blown head gasket myself until the skilled mechanic recommended replacing the engine, now I just don't know what to think. I imagine that he'd be able to tell whether I just needed a head gasket. It does seem unlikely that the head cracked in all combustion chambers during the 2 mile trip from the garage to my house. I'll do the leakdown test like mad cow suggested, hopefully that will tell me one way or another. Thanks for the input.

 

I think you need not to much worried about the situation. These kind of things happens some time. You just need to follow the advice of above members.