So after shattering a conrod on my standard 1.6cvh bottom end, ive gone and bought a 1900cc tall block... Only to fit it and find its breathing abit heavy, 200-300ml of oil collected in the catch tank after 150miles?!
Anyway ignoring that and moving on, i took the car on a 200mile road trip yesterday to the beach. It drove nicely, had some good tear ups on the way a brand new focus st staying with me till well off the clock (are they really that quick?)
Still once arriving at the beach destination after 100miles the car is smoking slighty on idle, blue oily smoke from the exhaust... Im thinking this is suspect! Half way home and its smoking on over-run and on idle. By the time im home it wont boost or even start to spool up and there is plumes of smoke behind me! Brilliant, fucked turbo!
I was disheartened by the rod breaking and the coolant issues before that... Maybe nows the time to get rid?!

 

Could it be the rings?

 

This is why i rebuild any engine i get now - no matter who its come from or what the history is. But yer i'd say its most likely rings/bore wear unless your turbo got damaged in the last meltdown??

As you've saved me so much hassle over the years, you are more than welcome to help yourself to one of my spare blocks. Iirc, i've got an unused since it was freshly honed, +1mm bare block (1600 N/A but obv not difficult to mod for turbo) that i had done a few years back before i ended up going ZVH if this helps out at all?
Would have been my next engine build but tbh I'll probably go full zetec next time.

 

Tbh the 1900cc drives so differently to the 1600cc, it needs to be richer at cruise to avoid lean missing, but it boosts so much sooner, 500rpm sooner...
Trouble is its breathing heavy! I dont know what to do next!?

 

Compression test is your cheapest way to the route. With it breathing as you say the rings and bore were my first thought. Simple and cheap check then it's strip down time after

 

Compression test tells you feck all about the oil ring

 

Leak down would be the way to go. But face it, its a CVH, it'll be bore wear

 

More concerned about the blown turbo tbh...

 

bloody hell Roger, I thought I had bad luck with mine, having said that I had 3cvh's in a year lol

 

get wilky to have a look at the turbo

 

I stand by what I said a few weeks ago dude.... full zetec turbo, wins every time

I would certainly aim to rebuild any thing that you install next time round though. I've seen genuine 40,000 mile CVH lumps that were fucked, my engine was a genuine 60,000 mile unit when I put rods etc in and the crank needed polishing, bearings were tattered etcetc. A good clean rebuild is worth the time for peace of mind if nothing else.

Rob,

 

Time to go zetec... Sorry...
You've had that many issues it's the only way...

 

Not interested in Zetec's...
If im doing this, i'll put a turbo on it, get a gearbox rebuilt as thats getting noisy too and then at some point pop the engine out and get a basic rebuild done on it!

 

keep the tall block rog nice engines best thing i did to my car was the 1900