Looks like I'll be building a motor sooner than I thought...

On the way home from work tonight the motor all of the sudden lost power and the oil pressure went to zero. I pushed in the clutch and shut off the motor and coasted to a stop. Got out check for a puddle of oil, nothing.

Nothing seemed out of the ordanary except the motor is siezed!

(Insert explative here!!!)

Jerome

Damn.....that sucks!

The oil delivery system is pretty simple......oil goes into the pump, gets pressurized and gets squirted out. Lifters are mechanical, so loss of power sounds like either a cam failure (since the oil pump drives directly off the cam gear) or oil starvation (none left in the sump to splash the pistons or oil the bearings or not getting up the sump pickup to the pump).

Should be interesting to hear what you see when it's opened up......

Gordon

I'm sorry to here about your loss. I have been there, and right after a rebuild, which made it even worse.

That's a bitch Jerome; I empathize with you but look at the bright side. Now you'll be able to put together the motor of your dreams and do it right.

&*%#/>'& !
Sucks rocks to have it let go right in the beginning of the summer months....As Gordon mentioned, it will be interesting to see what you find when you open the case.

Let's pause for a moment of silence......

I've seized many a motor car, bike both air and water cooled. If I remember right
all of my seizures were precluded by a strange noise which would then get louder
then BANG.
My guess (for what its worth)---cheap cam gear. Try rotating the engine back in the
other direction. No noise, no oil, no hole in the block. Very strange, good luck.

Man! That stinks! Especially since you just had the motor out a while back. Wonder if the cam seperated from the gear?
Whaddya going to put in if she's spent?
BD

The wierd thing is there was no bang or funny noise. Just a loss of power. At first I thought I just got a bad shot of gas. Then when I saw no oil pressure I knew something was wrong.

The motor will not rotate forward or back. It is stuck.


What I put in depends on what is broke in this one. I'm leaning toward a 1915cc so I can reuse (assuming they are still good) my crank, rods, cam, carbs, exhaust and heads. I think if I go to a 2110cc I'll have to get at least a bigger exhaust and a bigger bank account.

Now where did I leave that bag of cash?

First thing I'm gonna do is call the guy who built it for me and see how he stands behind his work. It's only got 2200 mi on it!

Jerome

I just talked to my engine builder. He thinks it sounds like the #3 main bearing. He said that best case we can disassemble the motor and if the crank is not damaged it can be cleaned up and reused. He also would like to check the case for warpage. I think I'm going to pull the motor out disassemble it down to a "long block" then take a day off of work to be with him when he tears it the rest of the way down.

While we have it apart I'm going to full-flow the case.

I'll keep you posted.

Gordon can I borrow that motorcycle lift? Just throw it in Pearl and come on over. I'll feed you and put you up for the night.

Jerome

Sounds similar to my motor seizure. Mine only had 300 miles of a rebuild/upgrade from a 1776 to a 2110. Luckily, the motor seized while my builder was test driving it. Motor was running great. 6000 rpm shift out of first and that was all she wrote. No warning, no noise....the motor just stopped. I'm glad it didn't happen while I was driving on the freeway, which I had been the day before. We tore down the motor together (I wanted to be there to see why it seized, as the builder was trying to find an excuse to blame me for the engine faiure). Turns out the rear main bearings were set too tight. The builder did the right thing and fixed the motor (no cost to me).

I don't know if making you waste all that time watching him, while he tore it down was really doing the right thing. He should have said, I'll take care of it, no streetable engine should give it up that quickly.

I give up. Good Bye.

Wow Jerome...didn't know it was that new......there has to be something wrong with a part or the way it was put together. Visit Gene Berg's website to get a lot of technical info., products and labor for your rebuild. While there, get the breather box, sump and full flow system from them. They also offer great machining services such as hemi-cutting and porting & polishing the heads to lower compression ratio for longer engine life and to enable you to use regular octane gasoline. Also check out their balancing services. With all that info. and products you'll be able to build a more powerful and long living engine.

"no streetable engine should give it up that quickly"

That's a bold quick to judge statement without knowing all of the facts, but also realize that you have also been there. Rather than pounce on the engine builder, there are a number of variables that can and do contribute to an engine failure. Before anyone just drops a load on said builder, best to know the "why" of it dying. Amazing how fast we are to condem.

I had a motor let loose recently with under 60 miles on it, I also was quick on the draw to for the first few hours, blamed the builder when actually when I took the time to investigate the events that lead to it's dropping a cylinder, what happend was entirely my fault, lucky for me, it was an easy fix with said builder knowing that it was not something that he had done, he still stepped up to the plate to help in anyway he could and did so without hesitation.

Jerome hang in there buddy, I know it isn't fun as I have been there more times than it's worth mentioning, but you'll actually come out of this with the engine you really wanted .

I originally bought my 2,110 as a long block from a reputable SoCal builder. It arrived, then sat for a long time (years) before I built it up.

Finally, I get to the point of starting it up. Starts and runs ok, although nothing was tuned right. Did all the right stuff during the 20 minute initial break-in and then shut it down. Half an hour later I wanted to start it and run it into the garage (it had been outside during the intial run-in). Fire it up, rev it to 2500 rpm and......it just plain stops. No preceeding noise, no bang, no clunk, just plain stop. I was in shock...wanted to blame the builder for everything, even though he offered to take it back (I would pay the shipping) and fix it, no charge. I decided to tear it down and fix it myself, as THEN I would know what was done to it.

Turned out that #4 main bearing (the one nearest to the flywheel) had been slightly cocked when installed, which caught the centering pin ever-so-slightly, causing the bearing to crush too much so when it heated up during operation it was just enough to expand and stop everything.

In the end, the old bearing came off with very little heat (a Burnz-O-Matic torch, gently massaging the bearing) and the crankshaft guy I took it to just had to polish the journal with 800 emory cloth and, Bingo-Bongo! Time for Re-assembly! (and then I broke the case a little bit, but that's another whole story.....My Life is like a Soap Opera....)

But look on the bright side - Look how much you're gonna learn this Summer!!!

gn

"Life is like a box of chocolates........."

I actually didn't mind helping my builder take the motor apart. I would have liked to help him put the motor back together again, but our schedules didn't match. I've never built up a VW motor from scratch, so it would have been a learning experience for me.