You can do a bbk for much cheaper than you can. Buy one, personally a bbk is a waste. YOu can do the rebuild just do it slowly check everything twice And if something goes wrong stoP and ask for help

 

if you gotta ask that question, no, it is not smart for you to rebuild an engine. there is a vast amount of knowledge involved, and a vast amount of tools needed to complete the job correctly. and a lot of money. rebuilding a motor is not a simple process. i understand people need to learn, but if you had the tools to do it by yourself, im guessing youd be able to do it yourself. sorry, but it really doesnt sound like your going to accomplish your goals here.

 

Agree with redline - when in doubt... Leave it to the pros. Atleast have them assemble the block and head you should be able to manage the rest.

The process Engine building isn't really difficult. It's getting it right that's difficult. You do need a lot of special tools to do it and you can't just overlook somethins you have to make sure everything is perfect so when you put it al in and turn the key you didn't waste all that time building a bomb.

 

I thought you could use the brakes from like an A8 and put them on the A4s. When I was talking to one of the local tuning shops here in Vegas the guy was telling me it would be a wise choice to upgrade the brakes just because the power increase the car is going to have and he also said the brakes for the 1.8 quattros were weak to begin with. I know they have to make their sell, but I don't know if its true but yeah.

I think I'm just going to risk doing most if it myself what I can anyway. The turbo programming I'm going to leave to the shop. but as far as everything else I think I'm going to tackle the job. I'm not one person to over look things when rebuilding something. I'll go and ask for help if needed as well but I want to rebuild the engine because even if I do get a used one which the lowest I've found so far was 800 bucks with shipping but I have to call and find out the miles on the engine. I'm thinking it would be wise to get an engine rebuilt putting these type of upgrades on it wouldn't it?

 

you can do the porsche boxer caliper on the a4 they can be had for 400. plus hardware and everything you way under 1000 which still isn't the thrice of a brembo kit. I swapped my spindles to s4 spindles and am running s4 brakes. This summer I'm strapping on a set of porsche cayenne calipers.

If you get any engine used its always a good idea to break it down and at least check it. With time and patience you can rebuild the 1.8t.

 

Surprised this hasn't been brought up yet, but I saw you mentioned that this car was your daily driver. What are your plans for getting around while you're working on it? If you don't have other means of transport yet, I would put that on the list. The work you're talking about doing yourself can be very time consuming, especially if it's your first time.

If you're curious about rebuilding a 1.8T, check out this video:


It's part one of a 5 part series on rebuilding a VAG 1.8T. The other videos are linked via the first one.

 

love that video series!

IF this is DD and your not planning on running high boost, bt, anything like that theres not really a purpose for a rebuild. Yea you'll have a 0 mile engine but a used one at 80k, will still run if you the care of it.

 

Yeah I've watched it a bunch of times and it still seems like I pick up something else I missed each time.

That's kinda what I was getting at. Unless you're correcting problems with oil pressure, low compression, or some kind of catastrophic mechanical failure, a full rebuild for a daily driver is overkill. You can run a GT series eliminator at conservative boost levels on stock internals all day long. If it were me (which soon it will be ), I would break that list into smaller chunks. Start with the maintenance stuff like oil leaks, timing belt, motor mounts, etc. Then do the turbo. An elim turbo will bolt up to the stock manifold if you don't have cash for a HF mani. When the clutch starts to go, replace that. When you're ready for more power, upgrade to a front mount intercooler. The beauty of elim turbo kits is that you can do it in pieces. If you tried to do that with a big *** full frame turbo, you'd snap a rod of float a valve almost immediately without upgrading everything at the same time. By breaking things into small projects that can be done in a weekend, you can save yourself the time and hassle of having a ton of down time.

The only thing with that approach is, you HAVE to be meticulous about laying out a plan. If you're wrenching on your daily driver on weekends and you forget so much as a crush washer or some manifold bolts, you're gonna hate your life. Get on Audizine and read all of the build threads in the B5 tech forum. Then read them again.

 

CHris, id love to give you a hand on this big turbo job. Big turbos are always fun.

Adding to what chris said, when you to do much at once you get overwhelmed as well and feel like it can't be done and then you get lazy and **** **** up. Break it down into small projects.

Have you run a compression and leak down on your motor?

 

Max, how about you and Chris come up here and we'll all break out the beer, I mean wrenches, on the turbo build