Right been meaning to get this post up here for ages. I bought a Mreg Diesel Fiesta back in December 2004. It was a bit of a shonker and didnt really run right at all, you had to really rush it to get past 40mph
. So a mate of mine all the way up north in Cumbria had a Mondeo TDI engine converted to run in his fiesta by another mate of mine. Anyway he went killed the block (we think) so the conversion was up for sale. To i purchased the conversion along with another TDI block from a local scrappers and built up a new engine and went about fitting the conversion to my shonky Diesel. Anyway now for the pix:
The Dead TDI engine:
The new bottom end being stripped:
The build was rather easy concidering it was the first Diesel engine i have ever re-built/referbished.
So with that all done i took out the old Diesel engine from my Fiesta which didnt go over 40 mph on a good day
and replaced it with the TDI engine.
Modification did have to be done to the front valance and bumper for the IC to fit, but with one of my mates badgering me to slice off the lower part of the front valance and the bottom of the wings i decided to do it seeing it would give me easy access to the boost pipes and bumper mounts in the future.
It didnt start
So with much head scratching and alot of phone calls later we were told to tow it at 30mph with it engaged in 2nd gear for a few mins as the pump had an air lock inside it. This cleared the air lock and i fired up the glow plugs and it started in a big soot colud of smoke needless to say of the WTF glares i got when that happend down my street,. So then i had a working TDI fiesta that just needed a few tweeks to get it running right.
This is how it stood for a while while i decided what to do next
Well later in to the year on the way home from work at 2 am the temp guage kept rising into the red so pulled over and turned the engine off. Took the expansion cap off and the little bleed screw in the top hose out to let the steem come out, the system had almost boiled its self dry.
Chugged home as it was ony a mile odd away and let it cool down over night, went out to it this afternoon and put it into the garage for a closer inspection, first thought was the thermostat was shot. So took it out and run it up again, same thing it filled the system with steem/air and overheated.
Took the bleed screw out of the top hose while the engine was running, it was chugging out steem at athe same pace as the engine was idling plus it was bubbling up in the hedder tank, thus indicating air is some how getting into the coolent system. So seeing as this was the same problem James had when he sold the engine to me, narrowed down the fact on what it could be.
James (the guy i bought the conversion off) thought it could be a cracked block. So i rebuilt the engine with a new one. So its not that.
Head gasket failing.... Slim chance but the gasket was new only 4 weeks ago.
Cylinder head is cracked on an exhaust outlet to a water way, very likeley!!!!
So i took the head off and got a new head gasket and bolts plus fitting the head off my old N/A diesel engine, i checked microcat and the head numbers are the same for TDI's and N/A, only the pistons vary (same as petrol versions).
It was the head as it was running cooler than id have like it, it just got to the underside of the N of NORM on the temp guage. Prob because i hadn't got a thermostat in it as the other one was sporked.
The head i had on the engine was a N/A Fiesta Diesel head, with a few minor changes nabbed off the turbo head. The engine was running exceptionally well after all that.
Only minor quip i had was the fact it didn't boost to well as the actuator had gone weak, it tended to come on boost and then the actuator wouldl let go and you can hear it leak out of the wastegate. So looked like a new actuator was on the cards once i found out who did em.
Now the engine was finally sorted i could concentrate on the body as it was in a poor state with both doors are dented up and one had been pried open in a break in attempt with its last owner.