V70 tdi. Complete*. Smug smog.

[scdan4]

Top hose sprung a leak! 

An advantage of having dismantled another one is I had a spare top hose. So I fitted it. ? 

 

[scdan4]

It keeps working, so I bought it a present. 

That's 2 stickers now, more than enough. 

 

[scdan4]

Yesterday, after a far too long hiatus caused mainly by the wife spending the hoarded project money on fipperies like rent and food but also by the rona shutting everything I finally went to this purveyor of exactitude. Deus ex machina ciren style me luvver. 

It looks inauspicious, but contains closely packed engineering machinary as far as the eye can see and more importantly The Boys You Want To Use who run it. After some chinwag they gave me this lovely, shiny, faced and pressure tested head. 

Some of you may remember that I'm attempting to build an engine with a bit more go for it, mainly to see if I can. That little side quest has now resumed. ?.

This head will go on the old bottom end which survived the head explosion last year and is now on a stand in the garage and get built up into something with bigger turbo and injectors, which then will be a 5 Minute Job (TM) to swap with the one in the car thus ensuring that the car doesn't get stranded broken and abandoned in the way (all this is happening in works unit, so it really can't get broken and stranded as it very much will be in the way) . ?. 

I'm a little loathe to do this as the one in the car currently is fit, strong and already has a good few go faster goodies and pulls like a train. But I'll get over that. ? 

I dug the box out of storage and gave myself a little pat on the back. Look what earlier me did! Everything bagged tidily and marked and I left myself a map. 

Dug through the shelves thinking "I'm sure I saw some of that when we moved" , and hey presto 

Carborundum bought last millennium, I can only remember using it once before on a z250 kawasaki. Borrowed the sucky sticks from Supertom and got to it. 

One done 

Ten done. Boring. At least it's only a 2 valver. 

Take the sucky sticks back and swap for a manly valve spring compressor 

Clamp half the head off the bench and start building it up. ? 

Done. Yum. 

Retrieve the buckets which weren't stored so carefully

Cleaned them and fired them in (dry and empty of oil for now) along with the cam caps 

One head built enough for now, and a very pleasant afternoon. ? 

[scdan4]

A productive day has happened. First, I found the engine under its blanket and under a reasonable level of detritus and reacquainted myself with the holset flange of doom. 

The flange that bolts here is a complete arsehole. Despite clearly being a 5 bolt flange, it is not a "holset 5 bolt flange". Hours have been spent and tempers have been lost trying to find something to fit here. There is a possible option that I could order, but it's from America, and over £100 delivered. And might not fit. I suspect that this is the reason that the turbo was cheap and available in the first place. Ho Hum. 

After some sulking I remembered that I'm a resourceful young* man. I'll make a flange. 

Start with some 4mm plate and mark out (using spray paint, yeehaw) and roughly shape 

Spray paint through the holes to show bolt location worked well enough with only a little filing needed, but the spray can couldn't fit in behind 2 of the bolt holes, so switched to some cardboard aided design 

But by the time I'd made the template supertom had gone home, which was disappointing as I was using his pillar drill. Flange making was thus stymied for the day. 

Which was fine. Above the flange of doom is a takeoff for an exhaust gas temperature sensor on the manifold adapter thingy. 

I've tapped a thread into the plate but am unconvinced that it's man enough and the sensors fairly low in the manifold so needs a nut welded on, stronger and higher up. 

I love having a welder ?. 

Then I opened a box of absolute deliciousness 

Brand new and shiny freshly reconditioned injectors. The absolute sex. 

These are too good and too pricey to save for best so fired them straight into the car. They felt nicer on the drive home but I'm now wanting a proper cold morning to see the real state of play ??. It's been fairly missfirey and very claggy on the old ones, I'm hoping for fresh air and flowers now ??

[scdan4]

More flange action occurred today 

Welding could be prettier... I'm still learning that too 

But beginning to get there, think it's going to work. 

Next it needs some counter sunk little fixings for the two holes under the v band, but it looks as if there is room. Just. 

Pleased with the progress as I'm a metalwork novice and I've not had to scrap it and start over. Yet. 

Very pleased with the reconditioned injectors. Started with minimal smoke and then drove off immediately and didn't misfire or smoke screen at all. ?. 

 

[big_al_granvia]

some quality engineering going on there

[scdan4]

More doings. ? 

First I quickly welded up the start of a downpipe support bracket (still not bored of my new welder and having the ability to stick metal together) and then started to strip down the engine to swap the dummy head for the new one. This focused attention onto the oil coolant heat exchanger, and it was decided that it really would be better without the oil /coolant heat exchanger as it's a shit oil cooler, but mainly because of the oem installed pipe routing. 

 

Grim, poor effort sven. But happily it's removable. 

Undo the nut underneath the oil filter and the ally square assembly slides right off 

All* you need to do now is shorten /cut the centre pipe down and bypass the hoses so that the water jacket feeds the rail directly. 

Of course, despite getting it cut off on a lathe the threads caught and pulled a coil out of the filter head. Caused quite a bit of quiet panic for a while but I managed to fiddle it right in the end. 

Success. Much better. ? 

[scdan4]

I've had a great afternoon shade tree mechanicing. Proper hot, so a measured and steady pace was the order of the day. 

New head on, proper reinz headgasket

Held down by these bad boys, heavy duty, shortened vag pd150 head bolts. 

These are apparently needed as the standard head bolts aren't strong enough to hold the head fully on in a full boost fuel situation. ?. Bolts give up and the head lifts up off the block and bleurgh.

Inside of the vacuum pump had a quick clean 

Then fitted water pump and cambelt. So much access, so easy. I love engines on engine stands. 

Carried on until I lost the will due to heat which left it looking acceptably more enginey. 

 

[paulplom]

It's a massive lump that. It must have took some impressive engineering to get it side ways under the bonnet.

Very impressed by your mechanical skilz.

[scdan4]

On 8/1/2020 at 6:34 AM, paulplom said:

It's a massive lump that.

You are not wrong. 

But it's out after a mere 8 or so hours prodding with a selection of spanners 

In fact not only is it out but the gearbox is off and its on supertoms number 2 engine stand. 

 

Work area cleaned and tidy. This is mega important as you may have noticed that I've managed to squeeze this at the end of the works unit. Normally an outdoor events trailer lives here but covid has cancelled every single one of its bookings this year. It'd normally be doing 3 a weekend about now. Whilst this is definitely a bad thing, it does mean that I've been able to put the trailer in my back garden and yoink the space. Make hay and all that. 

Lovely to be inside with a thumping sound system, flat dry floor and my tools close to hand. The ability to wander off without having to close and lock everything up is just amazing. I've never had a garage, but this rocks. 

Considering that it's only been in a year, it's goppingly filthy! 

 

 

[scdan4]

For fucks sake. I forgot to refit the fuel lines. Loads has to come off to get them on as  they are hard lines that route round the block underneath all the other crap. They should have been fitted before the head. Arse biscuits. 

I did manage to get them on though. And build it back up and a bit more, so that's a win. 

Enjoying the aesthetic 

Loving my air ratchet. Makes a lot of things a lot easier. Wasn't expensive either. 

 

Because I'm back in the zone of timing up these engines, and everything was visible, cleanish and on the engine stands I'm going to do a tutorial on how to do it. Mainly for me, later, when I've forgotten it again. ? 

[scdan4]

D5252t engine timing method. 

Tldr: 0.55mm at tdc. Do cam up last. 

1. Engine needs to be top dead centre on number one (closest to timing gear). Locate indicator peg on flywheel through the window in the base of the crankcase /gearbox join. 

Peg and cutout just visible above. Normally involves both being under the car looking AND being by the rhf wheel inching over the engine on the crank bolt (27mm not deep socket required) 

You need the engine on the 1tdc with the cam looking like this with the lobes for cylinder one (on left in photo) pointing out of the head. This only happens once per 2 crank revolutions, pop off the rocker cover and get it right. If you are building from first principles there’s a slot in the ip end of the camshaft that goes parallel above.

Once you have got the engine at the correct tdc, you'll need vag special tool 3313 (ebay £15ish)and a dial gauge, preferably a mini one. It's very cramped in the engine bay. 

Remove the centre plug from the back of the injection pump and screw tool in with dial gauge. 

If you have fully lost timing the injection pump timing marks are there, but only useful to find number one out of the pump. Using the pump marks only you will probably have a non running car. This seems to have annoyed a few people over the years, myself included. 

To make life much much easier fire a couple of bolts into the injection pump pulley. Clamp a molegrip on and you have a handle to turn the pump with. I have a luxury taper that allows easy, steady adjustment. 

It's well worth knowing that you can also clamp the pump at this point by unslotting this spacer and tightening the bolt that was holding it on the side of the pump. Do that and it defo locks the pump, but I have no idea if it is official method, so use mechanical sympathy. 

Lastly, (and one of the more counterintuitive bits)... 

Our aim is to get 0.55mm of lift in the injection pump at TDC, so we need to be able to adjust them independently of each other. So undo the cam either or both ends. As long as the lobes are on the correct phase then it's good. 

Turn injection pump backwards (away, top towards windscreen if in car) slowly, a bit and zero the dial gauge at the lowest level (no more than an inch of pulley rotation). 

Ensure that the bottom end is at tdc 

Turn pump towards you until you have 0.55 mm of lift. Hold it there by whatever method. 

Check tdc. Check lift. Check belt tensions as next we do it all up. Pump end pulleys are adjustable and can be used to adjust the pump timing, but that's a different way involving a computer and old proprietary software... That's exactly what this avoids so just set them where you want to get the belt tension right. 

If you are sure it's good tighten up the cam (bolts work against each other so keep it at tdc.) 

Bada bing Bada boom. 

And that's it. 

Look how far away the pump marks are 

Have fun. ? 

 

 

[Tamworthbay]

Yup that is exactly what that spacer is for. It’s coming on!

[scdan4]

 

It's in, but it's fucken tight. Need to move brake lines and do something magical with exhaust scallops. 

But both are achievable. 

I'm slightly over the moon it fits and it's in. Winching these in and out is no fun really, hopefully that will be it for a while. ? 

[scdan4]

I decided that it was too tight. Fixings on the turbo output were hidden, exhaust too close to the servo, lines having to be moved. I'm doing this as a hobby, there's no rush or reason not to do it right. And it would annoy me every time I looked at it. 

Off with the manifold and slice down /shorten the link pipe 

This is done on the angle as it will fit /look better

Excess pipe cut off the flange 

Which was then flapped clean 

And tacked on 

A fillet was made to fill my hole and the flange was welded fully onto the pipe

And then welds were slowly filed away from where the fixings go. If I'd known it was going to be that slow I'd have taken more care in the first place. Only thing I had that reached was a hand file. 

Chopped off the heads of some bolts to convert the turbo fixings to studs 

And it all came together nicely as my time ran out. 

And hopefully we'll have gained a smidge over an inch, which should make quite a difference in comfort indeed. ?

 

[stuboy]

good work

[sutty2006]

Getting there slowly matey. I wouldn’t even dream of stripping one of these engines so fair play to you! 

[Tepper]

Nice work, not too far to go now! I saw this video the other day, is this the same/similar engine?

 

[scdan4]

Better. 

Much better 

 

[scdan4]

Teppers, that's the type found in the 740's, this is a different one, turned up in the 850s. 740 type allegedly won't give more than 200 bhp, I'm aiming at 250ish, maybe 280 if I'm lucky. ? 

[scdan4]

3 hours ago, sutty2006 said:

Getting there slowly matey. I wouldn’t even dream of stripping one of these engines so fair play to you! 

I've been in here long enough that this is a "normal engine" for me now. Going to be very confused when I return to motorbike fettling! 

[scdan4]

Of course, having moved the turbo many other, previously nicely lined up bits also now needed adjusting. 

Altered the exhaust to suit, my welding is improving. 

Then assembled all the other bits of engine, filled with fluids. Looks the part 

Does it work? After helping the diesel bleeding process with a pela pulling from the filter to the pump, I'm rather pleased to say it does. ?. 

 

 

[scdan4]

Also I made art out of some left over bits. ?.? A bit of welding art therapy. 

[Lacquer Peel]

Excellent work, and I love the exterior colour of your V70. 

I would like to make my similarly powered S70 a bit quicker and it'll probably get a tuning box at some point. 

[scdan4]

On 8/28/2020 at 6:17 PM, Lacquer Peel said:

and I love the exterior colour of your V70. 

 

I love it. 

Gave it a celebratory wash and polish. 

 

[paulplom]

Is it for sale yet?

[meshking]

16 hours ago, scdan4 said:

I love it. 

Gave it a celebratory wash and polish. 

 

I love that colour too - my first v70 (the miserable 2.0 10v spec) was the same colour. It's pretty rare I think? Anyway, enjoying the progress and updates

[sutty2006]

The purple throbber ?

[scdan4]

It's in good company today... 

Insurance proving slightly problematical, (still) waiting for a phone call that says I'm safe to drive it..... 

Another learning point there.... No point rushing to get it finished at 5 on Friday on a bank holiday! 

[scdan4]

On 8/31/2020 at 7:10 AM, paulplom said:

Is it for sale yet?

Not. On. Your. Nelly.

Its insured, finally. What a ball ache. Obviously it’s modified, so needs a modified scheme. The current insurers said “No problem but our modified scheme doesn’t cover diesel automatics, here’s your refund minus admin see ya” which was a bit of a disappointment but the broker said no problem... oh business use as well? That is a problem.

So it is insured, but on limited miles (5k) and SDP only, can’t use it for work. Hey ho.

And I’ve been out for a tentative drive and it’s just brilliant. A bit shakey and hunting at idle (which will be the massive injectors) but lovely once on the move. Put the foot down and it flies. Put the foot down harder and its going harder still. It didn’t explode once either. Brum brum.

I’m really pleased with myself. The whole car rebuild has been a personal learning journey as I’ve recovered personally from my own problems and head failure. I set out to have a go and see how far I could get if I just allowed myself to have a go. And I fixed it, twice, and then I tuned it, successfully and now I’ve gone as far as I reasonably can tuning the nuts off it. On an uncommon, reputationally difficult engine.  At the beginning I was too scared to do a cambelt change and a mere 2 years later I’ve fabbed a custom manifold and cambelts are a piece of piss. Tom has been invaluable as a source of experienced eyes and tools, we only moved next to him 3 years ago so he’s not known me at all long but he lends me the snap on torque wrench’s and impact drivers happily. A very nice man indeed.

I hate to say it’s finished, but until it breaks, I’ll be happy just driving it and not waving spanners at it for a while. (And I’m old enough to know that writing that’s probably cursed it!) I’ve always wanted a sleeper, if I let this get dirty then I think I’ve got one. <coming soon to a traffic light GP near you....>