There were low compression 1.8 engines made though (RF, RP and AAM = 9:1 compression ratio). Different pistons is what made the difference. It is the crank and pistons that change to make it a 1595cc or 1781cc engine. The conrods are the same 144mm long in both. The bottom line is the engine could be a number of options. Making assumptions on power and torque outputs are not going to be that useful if the engine has a different specification from what those assumptions are being made on.
Cam timing??? I think we have established that my cam timing is probably a tooth out, or the mark on the edge of the vernier is in the wrong place?? As it has been suggested that I should refit the original VW pulley to be sure the cam timing is set up spot on. I think I will do this but will book my car back into A B Garage and ask them to do it. I am getting rid of the custom stainless exhaust and getting a supersprint 2" 2 box system which will be mated to a VW front silencer. I will get A B Garage to do this as well. Hopefully then they can set up the car on the rollers and get a nicely running torquey 8 valve with about 130BHP. I have a couple of spare gti cams and a spare pulley. I fitted the pulley onto one of the spare cams and held it above the rocker with the timing dot roughly in the position in line with the O.T mark. What surprised me was position of the cam lobes?? They are pretty different to the Kent GS2H ??Is this correct? I also decided tonight to check that when the flywheel on my girlfriends totally standard gti 8 valve was set at the TDC dot, that the small dot on the VW pulley edge lined up with the O.T.mark. This is what I found:- Flywheel TDC dot lined up with bellhousing pointer Position of pulley marker dot in relation to O.T. mark Now I'm totally confused?? Her car seems to run pretty well but according to my calculations her cam timing is six teeth out. CAN ANYONE PLEASE EXPLAIN??? From my understanding, when the flywheel is set at the TDC mark (small dimple, not diamond), then the mark (small dot) on the cam pulley edge should align with the O.T. mark EXACTLY? Is this right? Cheers Paul p.s this thread is a bit like that tennis match at Wimbledon that lasted over 11 hours..i.e it went on forever!!
The car wouldn't run if it was 6 teeth out, so not sure what is happening there...hmm. Il have to have a think. Did you put the pulley on your spare cam the right way round? Both inner and outer faces have marks, but at different points roughly 90 degs apart If you do return to this A B Garage place with a stock cam pulley, please ensure you point out the 2 timing marks on the outside AND inside of the pulley and how they should be set. With flywheel set to TDC Outside mark lines up with O.T Inside mark sits level with the top front edge of the cylinder head. Might be worth asking them what on earth is going on with their dyno too? The torque figure you were given last time was nonsense. Should be 110-115lbs/ft peak, not over 200
just to add is it right the dot should be on the inside and the line on the outside? just thats the only way mine fits i think
yea, the dot was on the inside on my other engine, everything origanal aswell, is there a line on the inside of the pully?? the inside of mine has a deeper dish
on your gf car it'll be 1 of 2 things: 1. it has an early cam sprocket without an OT mark 2. the cam sprocket is on backwards All sprockets have an inner mark as 8vdub says, regardless of age. so check the inside face of the sprocket the punch mark lines up with the front of the head surface at TDC, i.e. with the rocker cover and seal removed
Hey Rubjonny How can you tell if the sprocket is back to front? On my car the cam spocket that came off has a VW part number, a triangular mark and a dot on the edge on one side and just a dot on the other side. Think my girlfriends car must have the sprocket on backwards? An update on my car! Supersprint two box system and VW front silencer being fitted next week and the cack custom system being flogged on ebay....hopefully...no way I will get my 300 back..but life is full of lessons to be learn't! My car was back at the garage that did the rebuild today...the reason? Well both of the outer C V boots they fitted during the rebuild had shed their contents all over the suspension and inside of my BBS. They rightly didn't charge me to replace the C V boots and clean everything up. They reckon there was a hole in both..hmmmm??? When I took the car in they asked about my rolling road session. I told them I was dissapointed with the power and also that the cam vernier was probably so retarded (6 degrees) because the cam timing was a tooth out. I told them I would like their opinion on this, but not to adjust anything! Spoke to the boss and he said he reckoned the timing was half a tooth out so couldn't be adjusted. He said it wouldn't make much difference From comments on here I still think it is a whole tooth out, so the next step is to get the exhaust fitted and go back to the Rolling road at A B Garage and get them to set up either the vernier or put the VW pulley back on and set the cam up to run on standard marks. Another option is to go to Stealth..what do people think??? I sick of messing about now and just want it to be right! Cheers Paul
you seem to keep leapfrogging between these two garages, neither of which you seem happy with so i would just take it to stealth, ok its a long way but you are much more likely to be happy with it afterwards. They transformed i.a.n.b's car.
Hi Paul If I'm correct, the single dot goes to the inside, with the triangular mark on the outside. With one of the outer marks pointing at O.T, the inner dot will be level with the top front edge of the head. I'm sure RJ will verify if this is right. Well done with the supersprint, decent choice With the RR it's a difficult call. At least with Stealth, you can be assured it's a VW specialist who know how to set up a digifant 8v properly and the trip and outlay will be worthwhile. It is perhaps worth considering as you are understandably somewhat fed up, and want a happy conclusion to this!
Why do you want to take the car back to the same monkeys who screwed it up last time? Their rolling road numbers are a joke. On the subject of cam sprockets, I've seen some that had a notch in the back of the pulley, rather than a punch mark, but if you have both, I'd use the punch mark.
Been following this thread for a while; sorry to hear the problems are still dragging on [:^(] Paul, you appear to be a properly picky sod like myself; and if it's any consolation I've found very, very few people I'd trust to work on my car. Over the years I've spent thousands getting work done on various motors, only to be hugely disappointed by the results most of the time. From this I've learned to do the work myself whenever I can, and if I have to farm it out to only humour recommendations from people I trust to be both knowledgeable and as anal as I am. Take the exhaust for example, years ago I had a powerflow system fitted to my old 2.0 Capri. Paid probably 2-300 for it, it sounded sh*t and the backbox knocked the crap out of my rear valance. At the end of the day the bloke in the garage has no idea of the engine characteristics, and won't have the knowledge, tools or botheration to build an efficient system to an entirely subjective definition of "quiet" or whatever. He's just there to weld together a series of boxes that fit, finished off with the tailpipe of choice of the ignorant chavs that probably make up 90% of his clientele. Now I'd only ever buy a complete, full system from a reputable manufacturer, unless I was sure the custom guys had the knowledge and software to design a system properly around proper thermodynamic principals; which would cost big bucks. I currently run a full OEM system; you might have some luck with this sort of stuff on ebay as it tends to go cheap as people "upgrade" to aftermarket performance items. Back to your current problem. For what it's worth (many of the people who have already contributed to this thread have far more knowledge and experience than me on such things), here are my thoughts. Since the origin of the engine is a bit sketchy, I'd be inclined to measure it's stroke (stick something long down the plug hole, turn the engine over by hand, mark the rod or whatever against the top face of the plug hole at the upper and lower extermities of its travel and measure the distance between the marks) This should rule out the 1.6/1.8 argument - I think the 1.6 stroke is something like 77mm, and the 1.8 is something like 86mm.. specs will be easily found on the internet. Secondly, do a compression test to make sure you haven't got a low compression engine. Should be around 12.5 bar for a healthy gti lump. Thirdly, I'd strongly consider binning both garages. The one that fitted the engine can perhaps be forgiven for failing to set a non-standard lump up properly, but given the other cock-ups they've made and half truths they've fed you, they seem like a bunch of amateurs. Can't quite get my head around the bosses "half a tooth out" argument - how the f*ck could that possibly happen? The place where the rolling roading was done seems dodgy too - really don't have any faith in somewhere that lets a customer walk away with a printout that claims their engine produces as much torque as one 2.5 times the capacity. Sounds like they don't know their a*se from their elbow either. I accept that there are a lack of specialists in your area, but tbh you're just throwing good money after bad and muddying the water with misinformation by continuing to use these people. Were it me, I'd be tempted to whip the vernier pulley off, compare it to the original and refit that. Retime the engine properly using the correct camshaft and crankshaft marks, and go from there. If you still have problems it might be worth biting the bullet and taking it to a specialist with a very good rep - obviously there's stealth, I'd also recomment Pitstop in Brize Norton; I was very impressed with them, and I know Dex on here also uses them a lot and thinks highly of them. Of course, you could always sling an ABF in there, but I suspect you'd not appreciate this from an originality perspective Anyway, good luck getting it sorted
easiest way to check if sprocket is the right way round is to spin it close to tdc by checking the cam lobes, then see what marks line up if any. if nothing lines up whip it off and flip round, if that sorts it then jobs a goodun.
My car is now booked into Stealth for Thursday 15th July!!! Rang up and had a chat with Vince...seems like a really nice guy. Getting the VW/Supersprint exhaust system fitted this Friday, so hopefully will have the car totally sorted soon and can just enjoy driving it!! Cheers Paul
Off to Stealth!!! Well I am getting the VW/Supersprint exhaust system fitted to my car on Friday this week then next Thursday I will be heading off to Stealth to get the car set up properly. If I come away with 130 BHP I will be a happy chappy!! Before I take the car to Stealth, should I pop in a new air filter? New plugs were fitted a few weeks ago. Thought about putting a K&N panel filter in (can get one for 29 new). Currently I have a VW paper filter in the original airbox and the plastic trumpet is still in place. I do have an Autocavan air scoop though which directs air from behind the front grille directly into the airbox front panel. Is a K&N panel filter any good or does the oiled gauze cause issues with the AFM?? Cheers Alpenweiss2
