Some slight progress here...
Car is going over to my mates unit at the weekend, he's gonna chuck a cambelt on and time it up, try and turn it over by hand and see what the crack is.
In the meantime I priced up some parts.
8 new valves - 125 pounds. Not too bad I suppose.
Now this is where it gets worse. The guy doing it (a very highly spoken of VW specialist) seems pretty much convinced the pistons will be damaged, personally, I'm not convinced. Obviously if they are chipped then they will need replacing, can't argue that, but he says if they are scratched on the top they'll need replacing? Now oily bits are not my forte, especially the insides of an engine, I'm very tempted to get a second opinion if this is the case. Would it be worth getting pics of any so-called damage for the second opinion of people on here? I'm just doing all I can to not get ripped off
I priced up 4 pistons, which comes to 400 quid (well 96 each). I just think it's pointless getting stock pistons though, I might as well step up to forged internals if I'm changing them, obviously with a view to more power in the future.
Can anyone offer any opinions/advice upon the situation?
I'm finding it very hard to justify another 1k+ in repairs on this car. I've had the car since July 2008 and it's ran for 4-6 weeks in total.