Club 80-90 Forums

vw t25 1.9 dg petrol automatic hightop - Can anyone comment - driving along - heard a pop sound (thought i had gone over a hole in road) when 5 miles later steam started coming from engine - had notice temp gauge higher than normal - stopped the van "steam everywhere in engine bay" - called AA and guy topped up the pressured tank to the left hand side as u look at it - water started to pour out of bottom right hand side under engine via what can be described as a bung hole - ive look in the haynes and cannot find it - its a machined part of the engine and looks like a screw hole but cannot feel any thread - any ideas what i need to replace it with and could it have damaged the engine - regards in hope - john

is it above one of the four silver tubes? i think the second one in? was it freezeing the night before it went?

if so it sounds like its your core plug. you might not have had any antifreeze in the van and when the water has frozen it had popped the plug out. this is what a core plug is designed to do it stops the expanding water cracking your engine.

a core plug is about 60p from gsf and a bit of gasket seal. bit like putting a top on a smartie tube. if you cant get it in you may have to take the rocker cover off and the whole mechanism comes off with 3 nuts. pull the pushrod out and yank the pushrod tube off. put the core plug in the whole then tap it home with a socket bit and hammer then put an adjustable push rod tube in so you dont have to take the head off. screw everything back together, fill the water system back up with antifreeze and bleed it. start the van up, it will run like crap for 2 minutes then it will be fine.

i replaced mine last year

jed

if you can't fit it in but can run the engine to warm.. put the core plug in the freezer over night, then run the engine to warm and try the core plug swap "double time". it might just give you the 0.5 mm clearance you need.

could also be the coolent drain plug if the hole is only small, maybe the thred has been stripped in the past?
helicoil and new bolt should sort that out.