Club 80-90 Forums

last year as the exhaust studs refused to come out after heat etc on my 2.1 petrol the next step was to remove the head so the mechanic did so and the liners came out thus binning the engine. is this common on the head removal or can i take steps to avoid it as i have the same problem on another van ?? thanks andy

sometimes yes the sleeve does come out with the head , just hit the sleeve gently with a rubber mallet and they drop out , the pain is getting the pistons back into the sleeve , I cant believe that the mechanic binned your engine for that
you can carefully tap the sleeve as you draw the head off , i've never managed it yet , sometimes its better to pull the sleeves out anyway , so you can replace the rings and give the piston a good looking at ,also makes for easier cleaning up of the lower rubber sleeve grove

I think the liners quite often come out according to the haynes manual you only need to replace the seals, but more commonly people replace the liners, rings and sometimes even pistons at the same time.

my liners came out stuck to the head too, unfortunately!, despite penetrating oil, tapping with a mallet, swearing at it, leaving it for a bit.. the genuine vw manual says the wbx'r heads can be removed with the engine in situ, but after 20 odd years of being in there, it seems sometimes they'll stick , sometimes they won't. even when on the bench, mine were a pig to get apart.