Gurds, so sorry to hear about your engine man To think that i actually had been thinking about your engine following Nige-s failure as i knew you both had same rods and wondering if you had same bolts! Hope you get it sorted soon bud
Final warning to Chris Eyre and his trolling of this thread. Right... As I am the person actually ultimately responsible for the smooth running of this forum, Your contribution to this thread over the last few days, has been nothing but negative towards Nige and his misfortune, negativity to which I take a dim view. I also took a dim view when you attacked Rob T in this thread. My dim view has been evoked, in a similar manner to when gsi_tuning suggested Nige was incompetent. Whilst I was tad nervous with the title of the thread from the onset, the comment from gsi_tuning made me rethink whether I would request the OP to have title to be edited. I also have no apologies for sharing the some of the Chinese suppliers of rods, which can be found by simple google search. Anyone can do the same for turbos, manifolds, diagnostic equipment and a host of other generic items. We now have a second engine failure with the same components fitted, which occurred when Gurds was travelling to support a "large footfall event" as you like to call them. This event was the WestsideVW show, where the organisers did they best to accommodate Club GTI. You sympathised with Gurds, to win him over and attempted to then twist your argument to have a go at Nige. You are also looking for sympathy by 'thanking' those, who really do not approve of your 'endorsement'. Ultimately both guys have the same base engine ( being to some extent based on my own 16vT philosophy) and both gents are more than competent to build a 16v engine for themselves. Bleating on about watches and other objects you use to justify feasibility, does not change what has happened here where two engines have blown up and the fact, we as a forum and car club are more united now to ensure, expertise, further testing of root causes and parts are available between us, to get both engines ready for the up coming trackdays we plan to attend to close the year off. Your *****ing will never change or split a new Club GTI united One more trolling post from you in this thread, long reply or disrespect for myself, members or fellow staff on this post it gets locked and your post will get deleted. No excuses. Keep it on topic or show willingness to move forward like the Nige and the rest of us, else I am afraid I will act in the interest of the rest who come here for the love of things VW related. That is my final warning to you Mr Eyre. This is a car forum. Play nicely. Cheers.
Your perception and conspiracy is not mine, and I fundamentally disagree with what you have just written as you abuse this platform to turn members against me - Prior to today I, like others, clearly voiced their discomfort over the naming and shame. That was it. The request remained ignored, leaving the thread as a bone of contention. - Contrary to your assumption, I remain entirely sympathetic to Gurd's engine situ. With work pending on the engine but not fitted, that is a very harsh situ to face. - However, on both this channel and another, difficult messages have been given out over the concept of buying cheap parts. I won't be singled out for that when quite clearly I am not alone in that
Just to add my tuppence (bourne out of experience given my engineering profession). The top bolt shows fairly consistent evidence of having failed due to overloading. To the uninitiated; that is an overloading axial load in operation, not over-torquing when fastened. The axial (centrifugal) forces acting on a bottom end bolt are pretty significant. Imagine the bolted lower half of the conrod/bearing assembly is constantly "pulling" away from the main section with greater force than it's relatively low weight would suggest. This sustained high load on the fasteners is why high tensile strength bolts are used. If bolts of insufficient tensile strength are used then they will break under high loads in the way shown. A sheared bolt (due to shear loads applied due to insufficient clamping force or too much torque being applied (you know, like that stubborn exhaust stud that just won't come out...) will show a "clean" break. I know this bolt has been pretty dinged up in the aftermath, but it's pretty obvious that it doesn't have a "clean" break. Instead it is more irregular (sharp, even, pre-tumble in the remains). This is a classic sign of overloading. Therefore it would appear bolts of insufficient tensile strength (or "grade") were supplied. Pretty common in the "Chinese" market. High grade fasteners are expensive for a reason. Now, to me, the rods have actually stood up pretty well to flailing around in the crankcase. I know that's hard to believe given the state of them now, but I've seen some poorly manufactured stuff shatter in similar circumstances. So the assertion that the rods being "Chinese" in origin automatically meaning they are of poor quality is not necessarily fair. Indeed, Nige's tolerance measuring bears out that they are actually well manufactured, and the material would appear to be of decent quality. Given all that, I'd put the blame squarely on incorrect grade fasteners. I don't think it's necessarily fair to call them "fake ARPs", because as far as I can see they weren't billed as being ARP, but they are definitely of inferior quality. If Gurds is able to find a similarly failed bolt in his findings, then it'd be pretty compelling.
Amazing how some people think they are experts in everything with no real knowledge or experiance, the information you read and digest is only as good as the authour, and how do you know if the authour is credible without experiance? Can't remember the exact figures but engine failures caused by incorrect assembly/machining faults account for something like 95% of total engine failures (following rebuilds), but of this 95% of failures they all became evident within a very short period of time, the remaining aprox 5% of failures that were attributed to component failure only became evident after prolonged use. That's the gist of the research that was published in an engine reconditioners industry comic.
Gutted for you both. Looking at the photos of the bolts it seems necking has occurred as a result of the excessive tensile stresses exerted on them. A forensic examination of the bolts would conclude whether they were up to the job. I would say not. Some big egos on here. Really lets what is generally an excellent forum down.
Looking at some of the pics, you can't rule out piston failure either. This would then cause the rod to 'pickup' somewhere leading to the failure you see in the pics. By the way the bolt is contourted it's looks like it's been pulled and bent whilst the rod has been static at some point. But again, thats just a wild guess. Unfortunately, guessing (which we are all doing) doesn't help. Pointing fingers without cold hard facts is all too easy and have previous experience of being in the firing line. It's only after things calm down we find out there maybe others factors that caused the issue, but weren't mentioned initially As for ego's, there's numerous members that have forgotten it's just a car forum.
Just wanted to say, been watching this thread and stayed clear from posting since all this has flared up.. Which is a shame that a paid member should feel this way but people are intitled to their veiws, I for one enjoy this forum to chill out, look at the latest endeavours of my fellow members but I don't come here to have arguments Gurds, I am sorry like others that your engine has failed. Like nige you are pushing the modding further and further and I know that we all enjoy reading about the efforts. when things go wrong I appreciate you sharing the issues and what you think causes the problem as this is why the forum is here, so we can look out for each other. So thank you nige and gurds for sharing the engine failures.... It would have been easier for you both to just to stay quiet, say nothing and just fix the engines.
@Hotgolf, your right, it is just a car forum. Probably the best one out there. Nige and Gurds, such a shame. But please keep doing what you do. Your builds are way over my head, but I love to read about what your doing. Like many of us, I wish you the best of luck in getting your engines built back up. Will be keeping an eye out for any progress you make
It is easier to stay quiet, but then you disengage and this comes into play: Be nothing? What a lame route to follow! I would never encourage that.
Trolling on our forum is not allowed and you have been warned. You can come back after 24 hours. For the record I gave you the time out. Thread is free to breathe and for others to contribute.
Chris, picking a snippet from my post doesn't mean the same.... What I actually said So thank you nige and gurds for sharing the engine failures.... It would have been easier for you both to just to stay quiet, say nothing and just fix the engines.
It's important that we hear the bad as well as the good although the bad always tends to get a bit more air time than the good. A lesson learned by Nige and Gurds and one that we can all learn at least something from. I used Scat H-beam forged rods with ARP bolts bought from a reputable source, which cost roughly 3 times as much. Just saying
If the participants of this thread are happy for me to perform a tidy to remove any trolling remarks, I can do so later. As a result, the genuine feelings for those who suggested, not naming and shaming the reseller of these failed components and generally understanding the root cause of the failure in both cases can be discussed without any other noises. I am very grateful that Nige and then by surprise Gurds, chose to share their mishaps with us, despite the pending loss of personal time due to having to rectify powertrains. So please continue to be kind to them both. While it is rare that these mishaps happen all at twice, I am of the opinion it would be wise, to take the opportunity to capture some data from several components, i.e. std, as fitted and replacements to help us all better understand the root cause of the failure. I too have my opinions which have been expressed to both in person and on other forums but pro assistance would be the way forward to close this off. Please feel free to carry on contributing to this thread.
I would be very interested in the results of tests on those bolts particularly given the general concenus seems to be that they were the cause of the failure and would be happy to make a contribution to a pot to see this done.
We are more than certain, sudden destruction of a working engine, quite sometime after being built, is due to component failure. This is summed up nicely by vrbanana's post last night. There is strong opinion that the supplied bolts are root cause, however we cannot discount the stress risers in the machined areas of end caps, leading to distortion and a degradation of bolt clamping force, general quality control of the component overall and the general quality of the OE components these parts were attached too. We will see soon I suppose.
