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Stuck Cylinder Head

Transit Mk3, 4 & 5(smiley front) Forum. All Transits 1986 - 2000

Stuck Cylinder Head

Postby Wotisname » Sun Sep 12, 2021 11:16 pm

Can anyone suggest a way of removing a stuck cylinder head from a 2.5tdi engine. I have tried talking to it nicely. I have even tried lifting up the front of the head with an engine lift until it ran out of grunt as the front wheels started to come off the ground. Still while attached to the lift I then tried knocking upward with a block of wood and a persuader and then knocking down with the same lump of wood on a part of the engine that is not part of the head. I even tried using a 4' crow bar while it was suspended on the engine lift and bent the end of the bar, as it slipped out it then removed a piece of the aluminium back plate to the belt cover.

I have definately removed all the bolts unless you know of one cunningly hidden.

I will be getting the head surface ground but I can't afford damage to the block.

In all my years of doing heads I have never seen one stuck so well and have never seen one with the inlets so coked up. When the engine was fitted I didn't like the look of the coking in the inlet tube and had the turbo rebuilt properly. On a test drive the exhaust was very smokey and there was no power. In fact it was worse than the 2.5di engine it replaced. This is a replacement engine for my Mk4 Ambulance Camper without an ECU so I have needed to blank the vacuum pipes that come off the turbo and the EGR valve. I have not touched the vacuum pipe that operates the waste gate though.
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Re: Stuck Cylinder Head

Postby 00353theking » Sun Sep 12, 2021 11:18 pm

How many bolts have you taken off it ?

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Re: Stuck Cylinder Head

Postby dumper » Mon Sep 13, 2021 6:11 am

When you remove the rocker shaft I think if I remember correctly that under the oil is the centre row of bolts you have definitely left some in somewhere have a good look.
MK 8 L4 H3 Motorsport campervan
Past camper vans
1974 mk1 v4 with 2.0 pinto fitted
1986 mk3 2.5 di swb
1990 190 lwb 2.5 di
1998 100 lwb 2.5 di
2006 350 jumbo 135 tdci
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Re: Stuck Cylinder Head

Postby MinorMatt » Mon Sep 13, 2021 9:29 am

I've only taken one off, but it wasn't a problem...

Leave injectors in and everything hooked up, undo all the head bolts (put 2 back loosely, i.e. about 2mm before they bottom), then put the rockers back and crank it over. Compression should lift it - especially if it starts.
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Re: Stuck Cylinder Head

Postby Wotisname » Mon Sep 13, 2021 9:28 pm

Thank you for the replies, the head is off. I went in this morning and put it all back together and ran the engine until it was just too hot to touch. I then removed it all again and then connected the engine lift to the front of the head and low and behold the head popped off.

All of the inlet from the turbo to the valves is covered in a dried oil coke about 4mm thick. I have fitted a rebuilt turbo.

So the result was there is a lot of coke on all pistons and no.2 piston has a self tapping screw embedded in the piston crown which is touching on the inlet valve, hence the tapping noise I could hear. Doing a vacuum test on the valves found No.1 inlet and exhaust showed 750 on the gauge. No.2 exhaust only showed 400 while no's 3 and 4 cylinders exhaust and inlet showed nothing. The conclusion of the pro engine builder doing the test; he was surprised the engine even started never mind ran well enough for me to drive around the block.

The moral of this story is be careful when buying an engine, ask why it was removed from a vehicle in the first place and spend the £50 for a gasket set and take the head off or at least do a compression test before parting with your money. Changing the engine on my camper from non-turbo to turbo will have cost me nearly £1000, and most of the summer when I could have been out and about in it. But then I should get years out of it now and I can still do a trip to Cornwall this year.
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