The story of VW T3 failure

I have this story posted in pieces on my polish version of this blog. I wrote every time something new happened. But I think that you don't want to wait a year or so for me to post each of that posts. So I decided I'll put together condensed version of this story. Here it is!

The story begins at the end of may, 2007. I was travelling from Warsaw to Żyrardów. In order to save fuel I drove couple metres behind a large truck, When I turned from one road to another I noticed that the engine's temperature peaked almost instantly and red light started to blink. The engine overheated. It leaked fuel, the fuel burnt on the hot engine surface and smoked a lot.

Tomek took the bus to his place to figure out what was wrong and how to repair it.

At the end of june we decided that instead of repairing the broken engine we'll purchase another T3 (turbocharged, 1.6 litre diesel) and replace the engine. So we went to Germany and brought a red multivan. I mentioned this bus the last time I posted, here.

The engine we bought drove over 360,000 km (224,000 miles). Tomek thought that since he'll have the engine outside of the bus, he'll replace all the worn parts. So he disassemblied the engine and decided which parts to replace.

And this was the moment when all the serious trouble and delays started. Tomek simply couldn't get the parts he needed. When he got something, he had trouble in putting it back (piston rings, for example). He completed the entire part set some two weeks ago or so. He still has to replace oil line from engine to turbocharger, and some other parts. I am wondering, if he will be able to finish this bus by the end of february.

It is also worth mentioning, that the car had his paint done.

From Volkswagen Tr...

This photo was taken on Aug 7th, 2007. It had the old 1.6 naturally aspirated (broken) engine inside. The engine was filled with some "moto-doctor" that was supposed to glue all the holes and protect it from leaking it's fluids.

We wanted to use the bus to go for a holiday. I tried to drive slowly, I checked the oil regularly. I saw that the water boiled in cooling water tank, and the oil level remained unchanged. The engine head gasked was broken and this was the cause that the fumes from the engine appeared as "boiling water". I also found out that the engine was losing a lot of oil (left marks on asphalt), but the level remained unchanged. The water was leaking somewhere, so I thought that the water mixed with the oil, so the oil level was constant. After driving 100 km (60 miles) or so we went back and changed the bus for Daewoo Lanos and a tent.

I hope to post here some good news soon...