06 Jetta PD TDI cam replacement

[71Chevyguy]

No questions really, just posting pics because I know you all love to look at this stuff as much as I do. Cam removal so far and assembly hopefully tomorrow. She was pretty torn up and should be good to go after the new cam is installed. It actually ran great and was driven home over 100 miles after I bought it cheap. Glad I decided to take it apart right away though, the hole in one lifter isn’t something that should have gone further. All lifters seem to be very worn and dished.

 

[71Chevyguy]

Rest of the pics… so far

 

[atikovi]

A bigger turbo and mild tune will really wake that engine up after you're done doing that.

 

[Wrenchturner44]

@71, how many miles on that engine? The journals look good.

 

[Nick1994]

How many miles? My '04 had a fairly worn cam at 175k.

 

[71Chevyguy]

It is at 237k, last timing belt was done at 120k so I made sure that it didn't get restarted after it pulled into the driveway. I believe it has an 80k interval.It did run fine aside from an EGR code and MAF code. It smoked like a freight train when I test drove it at the dealer. After buying it, I unplugged the MAF and it ran perfectly with no smoke, drove it home 100 miles getting 43MPG on that trip. So it must not be running too bad. Not going to replace the EGR or MAF till I get it running with the new cam because I have read that the cam issue can create those codes.

 

[andreigbs]

Nice find and excellent work so far. The new parts should keep it going at least another 250k miles if properly maintained.

I think the timing belt replacement interval was still 100k miles on those, at least it was on my '04 TDI (MK4 body).

Is it 6-spd manual or DSG? I'd plan on a clutch if the former or a DSG flush if the latter.

 

[dumkid]

the dsg flywheels can wear out and chatter in park, dsgs have a dual mass flywheel like a manual, but the flywheel splines straight to the transmission instead of there being a clutch. the clutches are inside the transmission and can wear out but usually last longer than the rest of the car. if you find a loud chatter in park that goes away in gear then your flywheels getting old. you should consider changing your transmission fluid someday even if it's a manual transmission.

 

[QuadDriver]

well, the PD2 was a special beast that required a very specific oil grade and service...they LITERALLY played the 'death card' if you used another oil - as in severe injury or death can result...... something about an injector leaving the scene with force. (I personally think you have greater chance of the dual mass flywheel sawing your foot in half - that I HAVE heard of)

But the pics you post are indicative of the wrong oil grade, or waiting too long for changed. I hung 175k on my Pd2 when I traded it in for one of the 'clean diesels' so I had the required maint done, did the timing, did the glow plugs..typical VW fleas.

ps: last summer I posted similar pics online of a 3.0 mitsu v6 in a j body 'vert (92) I was putting on the road with a rebuild...the inside looked like it had only gone thru new vehicle break in. can someone explain to me how a 150K motor that was not treated right can wear better than all the 'junk' they are putting out now, in the future? smh.

 

[QuadDriver]

the dsg flywheels can wear out and chatter in park, dsgs have a dual mass flywheel like a manual, but the flywheel splines straight to the transmission instead of there being a clutch. the clutches are inside the transmission and can wear out but usually last longer than the rest of the car. if you find a loud chatter in park that goes away in gear then your flywheels getting old. you should consider changing your transmission fluid someday even if it's a manual transmission.

ha! that chatter is on the manuals too. My '10 clean Tdi 6M lost the dual mass flywheel at 150K, the imbalance took out the main shaft bearings which have to be replaced via complete tear down, so I replaced with a low mile co-part. (still was a $4K bill at the dealership including the south bend stage 1 flywheel and clutch) I put over another 100K on it and the chattering started fairly soon - turns out thrust bearings in the trans ALSO wear out and the chattering is the no load chugging of the shafts back and forth. FORTUNATELY for me, some lady totalled it for me just over a quarter mil and I used the large check to find a low mile '10 AGAIN which I drove for about 100K chatter free, flywheel ok until VW paid me a crap ton of money for it in the buy back. sidebar of a negative nature: I hung over half a mil on 3 vw TDIs in 10 years, all TDI, 5 or 6M. All were not ready for primetime junk in the end. never a VAG product again - I swear. I had far less problems with the '90 J2 digifant 5spd...and it was like caveman crude.

 

[Nick1994]

the dsg flywheels can wear out and chatter in park, dsgs have a dual mass flywheel like a manual, but the flywheel splines straight to the transmission instead of there being a clutch. the clutches are inside the transmission and can wear out but usually last longer than the rest of the car. if you find a loud chatter in park that goes away in gear then your flywheels getting old. you should consider changing your transmission fluid someday even if it's a manual transmission.

Yup, I had a bad dual mass flywheel too on my '04 DSG, it chattered like crazy. I had the dealer replace it and it went silent for about a month, then started chattering again. The dealer replaced it under warranty, said it had a broken spring. Still chattered.

 

[two-up]

Each of the three VW TDI's I had was flawless and returned easily 57 mpg-62 was quite doable-manual transmissions.

Something else that was really quite surprising was that the quality of the Mexican Jetta sedans was AT LEAST as good as the German made wagon that I got in fact I would give the nod to the assembly of the sedans from Mexico, the engine/transmission I understood were shipped assembled to Mexico and as such the 'quality' differences would be limited to body fit and finish.

 

[Tim_S]

Good work, but on an unfortunately flawed engine. I had an 06 PD Jetta. Great car that returned really good fuel economy, in the 50 mpg range on the highway. The clutch on mine started getting grabby at about 10K miles. I researched, and found that the dual mass flywheel was under a world wide recall everywhere EXCEPT North America! Great job VW!. US dealers were refusing to honor the recall even when presented with a copy of the recall notice. Also found that the conventional clutch/flywheel from a VW VR6 would fit the diesel perfectly. I performed that change and found that the DM flywheel was beginning to separate. After the job, the clutch action was perfect. Only down side, and it is a small one, was there was a slight rattle from the transmission at idle.

The PD diesel unfortunately suffers from inadequate upper end lubrication. The cam shaft has lobes that actuate both the valves, and the injection pump plungers built into the cylinder head. The genius VW engineers did not provide for adequate lube for the upper end causing premature valve bucket and fuel pump plunger wear, and cam lobe wear REGARDLESS of whether the proper VW spec oil was used or not. At 40K miles or so, I pulled the valve cover and saw the increased wear on those items. Not terrible at that point, but easily noticeable. I had been religiously using the proper VW specification oil.

At that point, I traded the vehicle for a Subaru and didn't look back, having had enough of VW.

 

[two-up]

The last Subaru the Mrs. had was a '10 the engine grenaded at 94k-3500 mile full synthetic oil changes and all scheduled dealer maint-she had at least 6 of those over rated pieces of junk and only two showed no glycol in oil samples-the year that had the solid lifters and the XT an '06 I believe which I really wanted her to keep.

Never ever buy a Subaru only lease one if you must have it, that way it will only torment you for a few years-of course quality might have changed for the better and I hope so for all the people who buy these things.