combo 1.7cdti blowby

[torchwooduk]

Thank for your help, probbaly going to be easier for me to take the head off rather than make tools or put another engine in, don't want to go to loads of effort and expense to then have blowby and find out the piston rings are knackered.

[stevieturbo]

torchwooduk said:

Thank for your help, probbaly going to be easier for me to take the head off rather than make tools or put another engine in, don't want to go to loads of effort and expense to then have blowby and find out the piston rings are knackered.

There should be no reason whatsoever for there to be anything wrong with the piston rings, either before or after this.

But yes, removal of the broken part will be much easier with the head off....aside from the fact you have to take the head off lol.

Head Gasket and bolts werent overly expensive anyway ( ebay seller, genuine Reinz parts ), although a top end set was I think around £40-50 too ( elring..again either ebay or Amazon ) which covered the rest of the gaskets.
It is a bit of a pig of a job, everything is squeezed in there tight. But not totally horrific. Obviously make sure all lifters etc go back where they came from

But with the head off you'll be able to tap out the broken part quite easily, and give it a little clean up before pressing in the new sleeve ( think I paid around £35-50 from Vauxhall )
The o-rings can add up, but will need replaced. 2 per sleeve and 1 per injector. These are far more expensive than they need to be from the dealer although the original rings did seem nicer quality than some generic o-rings I bought as spares with the same dimensions.

Before refitting the injectors/copper washers, you'll need to clean up the injector seat. There are cutting tools for this.

[Huntsman]

stevieturbo said:

Or look at the ecu and see if it is overboosting or holding back fueling.

Thanks - I have a cheap code reader bought for a job on my wife's CR-V, it also works on my dad's SAAB 95. But when I tired it in the Combo, expecting a list of codes, there's nothing.

Do you think the ELM327 thing you referred to earlier (see, at least one person is reading what you say) would show me more detail?

I'd never heard of an ELM327 until you mentioned it, not had chance to read up about it yet.

[stevieturbo]

Huntsman said:

Thanks - I have a cheap code reader bought for a job on my wife's CR-V, it also works on my dad's SAAB 95. But when I tired it in the Combo, expecting a list of codes, there's nothing.

Do you think the ELM327 thing you referred to earlier (see, at least one person is reading what you say) would show me more detail?

I'd never heard of an ELM327 until you mentioned it, not had chance to read up about it yet.

Cheap generic OBD stuff is limited in what it offers. It's still handy to have though ( using with a suitable phone app of course )

There are other options that might help more..and more expensive. Or there are dodgy clones/hacked versions of proper gear, usually on egay etc.

[torchwooduk]

If i'm going to remove the head I think i'd want to change the o rings and or sleeves on the other 3 too, can the whole sleeve be knocked out from the other side? not a nice job I agree, everything is jammed in their. Would a haynes manual explain the head removal better than the workshop-manuals site?

Edited by torchwooduk on Thursday 19th July 22:26

[stevieturbo]

torchwooduk said:

If i'm going to remove the head I think i'd want to change the o rings and or sleeves on the other 3 too, can the whole sleeve be knocked out from the other side? not a nice job I agree, everything is jammed in their. Would a haynes manual explain the head removal better than the workshop-manuals site?

Edited by torchwooduk on Thursday 19th July 22:26

No idea on Haynes manual.....old books years ago used to be pretty good.

Unless you have a reason to remove the sleeves, I would be leaving them alone. See what the damaged one looks like when you take it out though
The ones on that Corsa forum looked heavily corroded which seemed very strange. The one I removed from a 130k engine was just dirty, but otherwise like new.
If yours looks good...then dont touch the others. If it was corroded then maybe the others would need replaced too.

Head removal isnt overly difficult. That said for access reasons when doing stuff like that I just remove the entire front of the car. 20 mins removes the bumper, another few mins the front crash bar and slam panel which leaves the rad etc sort of floating. But it does free up access to the engine bay so much easier for only 30mins or so work.

Removal of the inlet manifold can be a bit awkward, but is doable with a good 1/4 drive set. Stat housing bolts can be a little difficult to get to but if you know where the bolts are it helps.

Timing belt side of things is easy

With the front removed you can undo the a/c unit and brackets ( leaving pipework intact hopefully although as I was swapping engines at the time had to remove pipes entirely ) and also undo manifold so it can be prised away from the engine to allow head removal.
Bracket at base of turbo/downpipe flange will need undone and be careful with oil feed to turbo, it might need undone too to allow movement.

[torchwooduk]

I'm just a little worried because until I read not to I was trying to turn the injectors and lift which will have been turning the sleeves, just wondering if I may of damaged the rings although the other 3 seem solid.

I'm probably 80% of the way to having the head off, couldn't locate the bolt to remove the intake/egr. Came off easier on my 2005 combo, sure it was only 3 bolts.

[torchwooduk]

Update: Got the head off, just looking at the pistons and cyclinders and while i'm no expert they look ok to me, nice and smooth inside cylinders.

[torchwooduk]

This is the sleeve, going to guess others will look same, did make a mistake and went to knock the wrong one out, scraped the bottom of it, will this be ok? posted a pic of it.

Do you think that the injectors leaking was the cause of my blowby resulting in oil being blown into the intake? don't know wheather I spend a few hundread now fixing the injector issue or put another engine in it. Sleeve(s), gaskets, o rings will add up to that I think.

Edited by torchwooduk on Friday 20th July 20:11

Edited by torchwooduk on Friday 20th July 20:12

[stevieturbo]

torchwooduk said:

I'm just a little worried because until I read not to I was trying to turn the injectors and lift which will have been turning the sleeves, just wondering if I may of damaged the rings although the other 3 seem solid.

I'm probably 80% of the way to having the head off, couldn't locate the bolt to remove the intake/egr. Came off easier on my 2005 combo, sure it was only 3 bolts.

If the sleeve has rotated, then the concern will be sleeve damage at the chamber end. This is purely an interference fit and because the sleeve is thin why it can break easily.
The o-ringed part wouldnt pose me any concerns

The intake and EGR are separate items, linked by that large metal tube.

One bolt down through the top, I think one front/side going upwards just beside the radiator hose/temp sensor and then another going upwards through the stat housing. This bolt will be shielded by a metal bracket holding some wiring so may not be obvious to see.

https://workshop-manuals.com/vauxhall/corsa-c/j__e...

egr bolts you cannot see. One from above is easy....also note there's a small o-ring seal beside the top bolt when you remove the cooler.



Injector sleeve and o-ring for the sleeve, 2 o-rings per sleeve



injector beside the sleeve



injector in the sleeve



injector o-ring ( as measured and size I bought spares of. Dealer part did feel like better quality though, but pretty sure same dimensions ). Dont have that part number to hand though, nor for copper washers although I'd have it on receipts.



part numbers for a top end set ( Elring ) and rocker cover gasket ( FAI )



Head gasket and bolts are separate purchase.

Top end set also does not include the seals around the injectors/rocker cover, but just inspect yours and hopefully they'll be ok. If they were leaking badly before it was probably because of the crankcase pressure from the leaking injector seal.
I had mine apart a few times with injector issues, so ended up buying a few rocker cover gaskets as it was a pain in the hole trying to clean sealer off the old ones every time, and for sake of a few quid it was easier to buy new ones than spend an hour or two cleaning the old ones !

[stevieturbo]

Remove the injector pipes and you should be able to get at the inlet manifold bolts ok. A 1/4 drive set is handy for this, most awkward one is the lower one near the EGR stuff as oil cooler thing is in the way. But It can be removed without taking that off.

[stevieturbo]

torchwooduk said:

This is the sleeve, going to guess others will look same, did make a mistake and went to knock the wrong one out, scraped the bottom of it, will this be ok? posted a pic of it.

Do you think that the injectors leaking was the cause of my blowby resulting in oil being blown into the intake? don't know wheather I spend a few hundread now fixing the injector issue or put another engine in it. Sleeve(s), gaskets, o rings will add up to that I think.

That sleeve looks fine ( broken, but fine )

The end piece is stuck in the cylinder head, just use a small socket and tap it back up out of the head from the chamber side.

I never seen any info about using any sort of sealer etc when pressing the new one in, but I did use some loctite flange sealant....some orange stuff. Think it was either 510 or 574. Honestly no idea if it was needed or not though.

As long as the sleeve is fully seated, not damaged and the injector tip fits through nicely then it should be fine. The workshop manual does seem to indicate sleeves may pull out when removing injectors and it just says to drift them back into place if they do move a little. So it must be a fairly common thing.

There's no doubt injector seals leaking would be causing lots of crankcase pressure..blowby as such. You could hear it clearly, that was the ticking that sounded like an exhaust leak....because it was sort of, except into the rocker cover.

As for buying another engine ? Really....swapping engines is another huge stload of work, and you could easily buy an engine with similar problems.

When my 660k engine failed, I'd already bought a Meriva for spares and used the engine from it. But even with it only having 130k, it clearly had not been looked after and it too needed injector seals and is where I went through all of what you're going through now. But I got the whole driving car for £400 so was an ideal spares package for me as I knew mine would die eventually.

It's a lot of work to remove/refit the head...but you're well on your way.

Removal and swapping an engine is a pretty large and awkward task...a huge amount more work than where you are currently. So I'd struggle to recommend it at present. I removed the entire front end to allow engine/box to come out front, but it's still pretty awkward.

[stevieturbo]

Approx prices, I shopped around ebay/amazon really and some were quite reasonable. Some were dealer parts.

Victor Reinz ebay HG and bolts £46

Injector sleeve was around £40 I think ( I bought 2, one from dealer and one from ebay...dealer was cheaper ffs ).
Sleeve o-rings, not sure but I've a full set of them here so they mustn't have been too expensive. Maybe £2-3 each ?

FEBI rocker cover gasket 28631 gasket around £8ea, ebay

Injector o-ring seal 97252584 around £4-5ea from dealer, or much cheaper if you buy generic o-rings. But the dealer ones I got just felt better.

Copper washer for injector seal can easily get 4x online for £10 or so, Some less, some more. Dealer price was oddly expensive but I ended up with a few from various sources.

The new sleeve will be fine, but old sleeves may need the injector seat cleaned up before fitting injector and new copper washer...ie with this sort of tool. It just cuts/cleans the mating surface a little.

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/BERGEN-10pc-DIESEL-INJE...

Elring 486.090 top end set ( includes rocker cover gasket ) I paid £60 off Amazon last November
Prices for this will vary...I did buy another locally via trade for around £45...but I see them retail online for £80-100 too.

Realistically what do you need from it ? Really only a rocker cover gasket and the cam carrier gasket. These can be bought separately ok. Elring, Reinz etc will all list them
More than likely you could re-use your intake gasket and exhaust gaskets but these are also in the top end set.

[torchwooduk]

Think I will just proceed and fix it since I have come this far, just looking at that elring top gasket set on ecp and see it comes with the injector seals and o rings, around £5 each from my local vaux dealer for those. Only problem I have now is 2 of the copper seals are stuck in the sleeve, trying to fish them out with some copper wire but their is no lip to hook onto.

[stevieturbo]

torchwooduk said:

Think I will just proceed and fix it since I have come this far, just looking at that elring top gasket set on ecp and see it comes with the injector seals and o rings, around £5 each from my local vaux dealer for those. Only problem I have now is 2 of the copper seals are stuck in the sleeve, trying to fish them out with some copper wire but their is no lip to hook onto.

From memory....yea I think that top end set did have injector seals and o-rings.

You can get a slide hammer type tool with what is essentially a large easy out to pull the old copper washers out.

Or....just a suitable easyout. Just go gently with it, you only want to screw it into the copper enough that you can pull it out, not so much it might damage the sleeve itself.

Or google injector seal removal tool for various options.

But an easyout or similar threaded thingy that might grab the copper washer as you screw it into it will work.

head gasket thickness is denoted by the number of holes, so ensure you get the same.

Mine was 2 holes...some online resources including that workshop manual had wrong thickness statements per hole...so just go by the holes, not any thickness claims



Mine was 61-53245-10 from diycarserviceparts on ebay, best price, fast postage and proper Reinz parts
Bolts were 14-32160-01 from same place.

[torchwooduk]

Is it just one o ring per injector? ones that came out had 2, they were all brittle and fell apart. Just waiting on parts now, some to pickup tomorrow and Tuesday then I can make a start on putting everything back togeather.

[stevieturbo]

There is only 1 o-ring per injector, there is only 1 groove for the o-ring.

The other lower recess is simply the step between the nozzle section and injector body

If you've found the remains of 2, then some muppet has been in there before and likely also the cause of some of the problems

2 o-rings per sleeve

[torchwooduk]

Put the head on last night, forgot to clean the head bolt holes, paranoid now. What's best, to remove one by one clean and bolt back or remove all and start the sequence again? since they havnt been heat cycled I presume I can use these bolts again?

[stevieturbo]

Just the bolt holes ? Did they not torque up correctly or something ?

No doubt they are probably fine to re-use.....but it is simply the stretch/torque that renders them supposed to be changed, not the running of the engine.

I'd be more paranoid about re-using them though given they're cheap to replace. But they're not really an engine prone to head gaskets so there maybe isnt any huge concerns either way

[torchwooduk]

Screwed them in hand tight then went around and torqed to 40nm, checked again and each bolt turned a bit more a few times, did stage 2 and 3.

Checked this morning and they were still torqed to at least 40nm. I removed 1 and the hole was clean, spec of water on bottom of bolt though.

Edited by torchwooduk on Tuesday 24th July 11:38