VY Wagon for $1000 (bargain?)

[Brett_jjj]

We spent a few more hours on it again today. The engine is now out of the car. I pulled both heads and found the piston on the drivers side front cylinder still ok, so I dont know why its spark plug was flattened, but the passenger side front cylinder was a different story. The conrod and piston pin are sitting on the bottom of the sump somewhere, I might find them tomorrow when I remove the sump for a better look. The cylinder wall in that front cylinder unbelieveably was left unmarked, no scoring at all, which I couldnt believe. Usually it makes a huge mess of the bore/block when something like this happens. Also the head didnt cop much of a beating either, the valve(s) have obviously hit the broken piston, the valves would have to be slightly bent, but you could never tell just from looking at it by eye alone-see pic. I will now get the other engine back together and get it re installed over the next few days, I can only hope everything goes just as well as it has so far. The third pic is pretty much excactly how I found the piston sitting in the cylinder when I lifted off the head.
Some of the pics are a bit dodgy, took these lot with a phone camera.

 

[Dr HaxZaw]

how is that cylinder not screwed by that piston lol gotta be some sort of miracle

 

[Atreidae]

Holy crap... Wonder what caused the issue in the first place.

 

[Brett_jjj]

Diesel oil, im pretty sure thats whats caused it, Ive seen similar damage done to other engines when diesel oil was used instead of the proper oil. And taking into account that one of the the flattened sparkplugs came from a good cylinder, I wouldnt be at all suprised if the wrong oil was put in there on purpose.

 

[Clutchy]

Ya might find ya good cylinder that the other plug came out of has done a bearing as well or maybe somebody had a look at it wile it was knocking pulled the plug out and knew what thay had done so just changed it to a good plug and sent her on her way.

 

[Brett_jjj]

Yeah, the plug definitely hasnt hit the other front piston that was still ok. Theres no marks on the piston crown at all to show it hit the plug anywhere, and when I turned the engine over after the heads were off, the piston was still going up and down smoothly, so I just dont get it, unless, as you said, someone swapped the plugs over trying to fix it. Its the only explaination that would make sense. I cant believe it was still starting and running, albeit with lots of very loud rattles and clouds of smoke.Ill get some more pics of the crankshaft when I remove the sump. The crankshaft journal looks a mess though from what I could see of it.

 

[Atreidae]

So. Rebuild project then?

 

[Brett_jjj]

No, not at this time mate. I will be doing a full rebuild on another ecotec later on for my VS. When I do get around to doing this, I will post up pics of the engine assembly etc for anyone thats interested in that sort of thing.

 

[Brett_jjj]

I did a bit more to it today. The engine is in and all bolted back up to the trans. I had to replace both the engine mounts as they were both broken, so theyre both new. Ive refitted the starter motor, the A/C compressor and the power steering pump. I just have to refit the inlet manifold and exhaust manifolds and EGR setup, and reconnect the wiring etc and she should be up and running in a day or so, if it all goes well..
I found the A/C compressor mountings are different from VS ecotec to VY ecotec, so I had to remove 2 studs from the VY engine block and screw them into the VS block, luckily these stud holdes were already in the VS block, so I just had to screw them in.. I also removed the sump from the old engine to check it out, what a mess!!

 

[Dr HaxZaw]

im still amazed that old engine ran lol