UK-POLOS.NET - THE VW Polo Forum

Hey,

I have a 1.2 tsi and thought I'd best share this info

If you have a 1.2 and start to hear any rattle from the engine take it to vw to inspect! Supposedly there is a indicator on the timing chains for stretching. I found this out the hard way

Basically I contacted vw kicked up a small fuss and reduced my bill from 6800 to 602.54 oh and got a free vw umbrella haha!

For those doubters I'll post the paper work which explains about the common fault and the fact it's had a new engine

But yeah don't really want any more fellow polo owners to go through the problems I've had , after checking here and e38 its been mentioned a few times that the engines are a little noisy

Hi Jamie,

I would be intrigued to know what your issue is? I have a 1.2 TSI SEL and there is a thread somewhere in relation to the rattling coming from the engine bay which I believe is due to a lack of support for the fuel lines.

How is this rattle different?

Do you know if the timing chain needs replacing after a certain amount of mileage? Mine's clocked up 68k at the mo!

Regards,

AJ

EDIT: The thread I am referring to is http://www.uk-polos.net/view ... 56&t=62049

Same here, I run a 1.2 Tsi and would be interested in what has happened here. I can't quite follow the post, it initially sounds like there was an issue with the timing chain, but by the end of the post OP is talking about a new engine.

As I understand it timing chains are designed to last the whole working life of the engine (with one or two high performance exceptions) I can only think of two ways that a chain may fail. A catastrophic fail where chain snaps or the chain stretches so much that the chain guide or tensioners cannot effectively take up the slack so the chain jumps a tooth or more, again a catastrophic failure.

I'm old enough to have run older cars with timing chains and while they can become noisy with age and miles I've never actually heard of one failing. Back in my yoof, one performance upgrade many owners did to the original mini's was to replace the simplex chain for a duplex version. I've head a quick Google and can't even find the 1.2 TSi chain listed as a spare.

I have also been keeping an eye on what goes wrong with these engines, next car for wife should have that engine. I've read that the early 1.4 TSI engines suffered badly due to lack of strength of their chains, upgraded chains plus other bits sorted that - or maybe in this cases a new engine sorted it. One thing I don't need if I buy one of these "newer/better" range of VAG engines is wasting time and money getting it sorted early in its life!

RUM4MO wrote: One thing I don't need if I buy one of these "newer/better" range of VAG engines is wasting time and money getting it sorted early in its life!

Totally agree, I don't want to be a test bed for VW's new technology and start picking up what should be their bill when the car is still relatively new. If a modern engine can't do 100k miles without anything more than routine maintenance then it's not really up to the job. The odd "lemon" can and does happen but when you start pushing out engines that use more oil than Iraq and won't hold your hand up you don't deserve a loyal customer base.

I tend to buy my cars new and than keep them for a long time, I ran my previous Polo for 10 years (1.9Tdi Sport) and never had a single issue with it. I suspect these small high efficiency, highly stressed engines, won't come close in terms of reliability. Add to that the steady decline in VW's general quality and penny pinching, they feel like they are in a downward spiral. I've had mine a tad over 3 years and it's been in twice for paint defects (corrosion) and once to have an update to the turbo (basically just a spacer washer fitted)

I've not had time to look into the "Stretched cam chain issues" which appear to be surfacing so I'm not sure whether they are associated with the 1.2, 1.4 or both engines. High oil consumption problems still appear to be unresolved.

Do we have any VW Techs here who may know about these issues???