Date: Fri, 27 Jan 2006 12:56:06 -0600
Reply-To: Larry Chase <roadguy@ROADHAUS.COM>
Sender: Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From: Larry Chase <roadguy@ROADHAUS.COM>
Subject: Re: Head Retorquing On New Engine
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Blake,
I'll be damn.
That is almost exactly what happened to me.
At around 12,000 miles my AVP Rebuilt began showing the same sytoms as yours.
Took two VW shops to figure out what the problem was ... but not after I replaced
every major componet in the collant system including radiator.
Problem ... combustion gasses in the collant.
Found that I had 9 loose engine bolts ... but unfortuntley by the time we properly diagnosed the
cause one of heads was slightly warped and I needed new head gaskets.
BTW ... AVP was terrible to deal with. Even though the engine was still under warranty they
claimed no responsibility and were totally rude. Aftwer much back and forth and intervention by
Ron Salomn of Bus Depot (were I bougth the engine) they agree to provide a set of head gaskets
and a "reworked set of VW heads". I took th eparts but decided to purchase a set of new AMC heads
and have them installed instead. That was maybe 5-7,000 miles ago and all seems fine so far.
With your AVP engine I'm now aware of 4 other AVP engines that had the same problem at
10,000 - 25,000 miles.
good road,
good adventure,
good life
larry chase
roadhaus.com
On Fri Jan 27 9:01 , Blake Heinlein sent:
>Zoltran & Larry,
>
>My engine was rebuilt by AVP. I went at least 25,000 miles on poorly tightened heads. I had a compression test done under warranty
to see if there was any problem. The compression came out good on each cylinder so they didn't think there was any problem.
>
>
>I continued having cooling problems. Right after I installed the rebuilt engine the radiator failed, then a heater core hose burst,
and the front and back heater cores began to leak. The main symptom was after driving non-stop on the freeway for a couple of hours,
I would coast to a stop on an off-ramp and the van would start to overheat and and coolant would spill out of the reserve tank onto
the ground. I assume that coolant was leaking out the back while I was driving on the freeway, I was just unable to see it at that
speed.
>
>
>I had a second "german auto mechanic" look at the problem and they couldn't duplicate the problem in their shop. They replaced
various parts at their whim and then charged me $350 and said they said it was working. I continued to have problems. So I really
though I was going crazy. I replaced every part of the cooling system (
>e.g hoses, heat exchangers, clamps, caps, tanks, plastic fittings). Eventually I discovered there was gas/air getting into the
coolant system at the rate you would find leaving a bicycle intertube with a pinhole in it. This little tiny leak over two hours was
enough to fill the cooling system with some air and block the correct flow of water to the radiator under idle speed. Things seemed
to be working fine at higher engine speeds on the freeway.
>
>
>Finally I found the solution and it was very simple. All I did was correctly torque the head bolts and the problem went away. It
has been gone for about 3 years (30,000 miles) now and never resurfaced. It was like turning off the light switch to my coolant
problems. To bad it took me about 3 years to find.
>
>
>Here is more of my information http://www.home.surewest.net/heinlein/engine.htm
>
>--
>Blake Heinlein
>1984 Westfalia
>Sacramento, CA
>
>blakeheinlein@gmail.com
>http://www.home.surewest.net
>
>On 1/26/06,
>Zoltan <zolo@foxinternet.net> wrote:
>You mean, you went for 25 000 miles with the heads badly torqued? What were
>the symptoms you noticed?
>Zoltan
>
>
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