Soooo. I threw a rod on the way to work...

Just what I needed on a day with a 9am meeting. Driving in rush-hour traffic. At like, 6:30. Highway speed in the bumper-to-bumper funfest that is rush hour...

At about 60mph I'm cruising in 5th or 6th (can't remember), and all of a sudden I get a thump, like the ebrake is on. I press the clutch in and regain whatever residual speed I've got. CELs are all on, plume of white smoke behind me, and I pull off to the side of the road.

No WOT, no boost to speak of, just cruising along.

So, I get to the side of the road and inspect what I can.

Oil puddle under the passenger side of the engine compartment. Little to no smoke.

I call triple A and get towed home.

Grab the tiguan and head to work... fuming

So when I get home from work, I jack up the car and remove the bottom engine cover.

I see a hole in the front of the block, behind the AC compressor, and a hole in the back. There's a little cluster of steel crap at the bottom of my oil pan where a crack has emerged.

Apparently I threw a rod. No boost to speak of, no WOT, nothing.

FML.

Pics to be added soon. Gotta work again tomorrow AM, and figure how I'm getting the car back in my garage. It's in the driveway now, facing the wrong way.

My main concern now is whether or not the piston (#1), which appears to be all the way up, contacted the valves when it broke free of the rod.

I was able to spend like 15 mins, at work, trying to see how common this is. Apparently not that common. I read one thread of a similar issue. And I'm not really all that confident my root-cause is the same.

So, yeah. FML. What a great Friday.

AAAAAAnd.... on the way home some lady in a jeep rear-ended my wife's tiggy (borrowed it after I got towed home). So, I'm 0 for 2 today. Just needed to vent. Damage was minimal, but it's going to need a trip to the body shop for a new bumper, and maybe crash foam.

I'll drop some pics here, when I can get a camera under there. Big ass hole though, front and rear of the block. I know you sadistic bastids want to see my pain in high res.

I'm thinking best case: new block, pistons, rods... And assload of my time.

Worst case, block, pistons, rods, head... A larger assload of my time.

Specs in my sig. Nothing too crazy. Was running like a champ before this BS.

Carnage:





You can see the ground behind the engine in this one: Hole in the front, oil pan, and back of the block.

How many miles? I've only seen that on tsi engines...

about 80k, just a tad under

APR k04 tune, running 93 oct with meth

Checking into IE rods now. And looking for a block and a head (hope not)

Did you upgrade rods with the K04 install?

Wow, that is uncommon and very unfortunate! Best of luck with the rebuild and I hope the costs are too high.

Did you do any logging before all of this to make sure you weren't getting any knock? Even low knock can do damage if it is sustained - the sustained knock can cause fatigue on parts and eventually break.

Not sure if you have inspected it recently or not, but I would take a look your intake valves as they could be the culprit. Carbon build up can cause improper seating, which can lead to hotspots in the cylinder.

Sounds like a tuning issue if it wasn't at WOT. I'm sorry to hear this man. Keep us updating

vwcorg said:

Wow, that is uncommon and very unfortunate! Best of luck with the rebuild and I hope the costs are too high.

Did you do any logging before all of this to make sure you weren't getting any knock? Even low knock can do damage if it is sustained - the sustained knock can cause fatigue on parts and eventually break.

Not sure if you have inspected it recently or not, but I would take a look your intake valves as they could be the culprit. Carbon build up can cause improper seating, which can lead to hotspots in the cylinder.

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This is hands down the most informative first post I've ever seen! Welcome to the forums man!

@nkresho- I'm really sorry to hear this man, not one but two FML moments! Hope the Tiggy is ok. Really hope the GTI isn'tnearly as bad as Iit could be. A built block isn't the worst thing you could do with a K04, you can have a little more fun then and up your tune! BPY blocks can be had for reasonably cheap, drop in rods and OEM pistons are a good way to go when doing the bottom end, I'm sure your crank and associated parts are fine, new bearings and a few other things and you should be set.

Still can't believe you through a rod like that, something else had to be going on, maybe oiling issue? Hope this all works out. My sadistic ass is waiting patiently for high res pics ;-)

pics added to first post

Wow. Were/Have you run a 100oct tune with 93+meth?

You're gunna wanna get a whole engine...I wouldn't want to use anything off the old one.

vwcorg said:

Wow, that is uncommon and very unfortunate! Best of luck with the rebuild and I hope the costs are too high.

Did you do any logging before all of this to make sure you weren't getting any knock? Even low knock can do damage if it is sustained - the sustained knock can cause fatigue on parts and eventually break.

Not sure if you have inspected it recently or not, but I would take a look your intake valves as they could be the culprit. Carbon build up can cause improper seating, which can lead to hotspots in the cylinder.

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I have logged it with the 100 octane tune, when I was tuning my nozzles, and I wasn't getting any timing retard or knock.

But, I was having some issues with an overactive front sensor at the beginning of the summer. I was spraying my engine bay to clean it and the sensor must have gotten wet, because it actually triggered a CEL for knock while idling in my driveway. After everything dried out, it never came back.

gti2slow said:

Wow. Were/Have you run a 100oct tune with 93+meth?

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I have before, but I was running the 93 tune when it went.

I am thinking this was a long duration thing. I run the hard a few times a week, just when I get on the open road. My boost spikes to 25 or so then settles about 20 to redline.

Also, when I first went k04, I was having pretty bad spikes to 30 on the gauge. I'm sure the stress then contributed.

donjuan1jr said:

You're gunna wanna get a whole engine...I wouldn't want to use anything off the old one.

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Agreed. I think I'm going to find a sub $2k long block on ebay, add some forged drop-in rods and new piston rings, and make sure the cam is a B revision (in case it's an older FSI).

At this point, I could go full-retard and prep for a BT. We'll see how it goes. 500 more for pistons is not that much more considering what this is going to cost me in the end. And I could probably get away with just rods anyway if I'm going for like 400 wheel.

Pm me for any oem pricing and or cts products.

Any disadvantages to buying a higher mile motor versus a lower one? I'm going to be using OEM pistons, with new rings, with drop in rods, unless you guys recommend that I really need pistons. Ebay motors are just under 2k with around 100k on the clock. If I get into the sub 50k mile motors, prices start to approach 3-4k. I was planning on using the pistons the used motor comes with.

I'm only thinking I really need to be worried about the rev B cams in a higher-mile motor. And I think my car's B cams are still in good shape, so I'd reuse them if the replacement motor has rev A cams. Gotta get the head off mine to make sure I didn't snap one when I threw the rod.

For the foreseeable future, I am going to be running k04. Power was fine for me. I really don't plan on upgrading to a different tune (APR k04 now), which is what I'd need to do to go BT.

Why not put a TSI in rather than a new FSI with the same ol' cam follower issues, etc. I know both motors have fail-points, but I think most people would agree that they changed from FSI to TSI for a reason (and still continue to use it). This would be the perfect opportunity to make the switch. I'm sure there are components that you'd need to change to do this that would make for extra expense/hassle. Not sure what all would be involved, but if you could get a complete engine, it should have most of it, I would imagine. I dunno, maybe I'm ignorant on this one.

LilRaverBoi said:

Why not put a TSI in rather than a new FSI with the same ol' cam follower issues, etc. I know both motors have fail-points, but I think most people would agree that they changed from FSI to TSI for a reason (and still continue to use it). This would be the perfect opportunity to make the switch. I'm sure there are components that you'd need to change to do this that would make for extra expense/hassle. Not sure what all would be involved, but if you could get a complete engine, it should have most of it, I would imagine. I dunno, maybe I'm ignorant on this one.

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It would be a pretty huge hassle. New ECM, motor/trans/dogbone mounts, evap system, trans, etc. I honestly much prefer the FSI, I think it's a better motor all around, stronger and less major issues. It's a little more maintanence heavy but tends to be a more reliable motor. Not to mention if your going for big numbers the block is way stronger!