Sunday, July 24, 2016

1999 Vw Passat turbo gasket replacement AEB 1.8t

There's been a exhaust leak on the 'work truck' Passat for a the past few months. So with a moderate break in the schedule I had at it and gave it the old college try of fixin' under the shade tree.  In general I've taken the exhaust off a few months back and replaced it with a 2 1/2 inch stainless turbo back system after the Cat up and went.  I good size of matrix broke out and plugged the muffler blowing out the seams, hence the replaced stainless system.
Also included is a picture for those that may try to do this job on their own, not many tools are needed; jack- stands, philips driver, 10mm wrench, two 13mm wrenches and a 15mm wrench for the turbo nuts. Mind your skills, you be on your own, these pictures are to just show you what I was up against- mind you.
Ok, ripped out the air filter and air box top. pushing it to on top of the engine. I didn't want to pull the wires out of the connector.  The aluminum heat shield on the side of the air box needs to come off; its held on with 4 philips screws.  keep in mind that with the age of a 17 year old car, the screws are pretty worn.
after getting all that off, the one thing from under the car that needs to be done is a support bolt on the down pipe. this needs to be disconnected to let the Cat get pulled back and out of the way. I found that the sprung bolt would not turn so rather than fight it, I pulled the upper support in the rubber mount. It was somewhat difficult to get back together as thhis also has two extra washers on each side of the rubber isolator. Be mindful.

Back to the top side, now the lower airbox unit can be removed. this will give better clerance to the third turbo bolt on the underside of the flange. its tight but not undoable. Again, I removed this a few months back and for the most part used a 3 inch 15mm wrench. you can use the ring end of another wrench as an extension to get the leverage. play around with it, it dose work.

Once the three nuts are off the whole system should slide back and out of the way. Now you can install the new gasket, easy peasy. Do put some copper anti seize onto the studs to help the install.  Below you can see the wasted wastegate. Not having a new turbo on hand, I just levered out the old bit of wastegate. It was going to come out soon anyways, but better now than bouncing around the cat or impellers.


On a side note, while dragging myself out from under the car I grabbed onto the grill section; only to find that somewhere down the road a penny had found its way. curious as to how long its been there? in anycase, all is quiet and the rattle is gone. I'm pretty sure that the power will be down until it gets twisted up to four grand.  Eh, its a work truck...

Thursday, June 16, 2016

Riding a Velo

As a child my mind would always gravitate to this underground storage area. a Mystical place for the mind to wander. What lurks behind the heavy door and massive stone work?

Tuesday, June 14, 2016

1956 Austin Healey 100 four


There are some days that it pays to be in the 'vintage'  motorcycle sceen. Hanging around an old style bike shop allows for the occasional visit of like minded people. Today T dropped in with his 1956 Austin Healey 100 four.  Now for many years I've read a copy of Osprey Colour Classics 'Austin Healey-  100 & 3000' .
by David McLavin & Andrew Tipping during the lunch hour. The copy is becoming a more dogged eared item from wandering the photos- daydreaming of the cars my pops' and his buddies owned back then. So to have T come in with the pure sight and sound;  well lunch break just got better.

The first thing to do was get on the ground and check out the rear suspension.  Evidently, the frame runs underneath the rear drive, hindering ground clearance. Having read this, I had to see for myself. True enough  one can understand the difficulties that could occur when loading up the rear drive. But at this present day that is probably no longer a racing issue, just a trivial bit of knowledge.  Ok, enough of my chatter, enjoy the photos!












Thursday, June 9, 2016

1963 Matchless G12 running again after 37 years


With a lull in shop jobs and a break in the weather, today was a good time to give  focus to the 63' matchless. I've been wanting to fire it up for the past few months but held off so as to have it outside while fluids were introduced.  One of the biggest chores was pre-filling the oil system. It seemed to be a wise idea to add oil into  the filter chamber and  both oil lines as well.  I had rebuilt one of the petcocks  but question the newer brass type to its fuel holding ability.   It took many kicks to get fired off. Later it was noted that the choke was being used backwards making starting somewhat difficult. However the engine settled down and a few rides around the parking lot were had.  









Wednesday, June 8, 2016

2016 MASSBIA Spring Show

Here are a few pictures from the May 29th British Iron Association Mass Chapter Spring Show. A great day was had by all! Hope to see you at Singletary R&G next year! More info at MASSBIA.