The next weekend we perform an autopsy on the engine and remove the cylinder head. Sitting in the #1 cylinder we find one of the valves!
This is what we saw when we took off the cylinder head. Notice the valve in cylinder 1!
Another shot with the valve sitting on the block.
This is a shot of the cylinder head. Notice the damaged valve guide.
Here is a blurry shot of the culprit lifter. You can see the jagged edge.
As for the mysterious cylinder head... If you know anything about VW's, particularly the A1's, you probably allready know that what we had was a '83-'84 Rabbit GTI head, also found in '83-'84 Jetta GLIs, 83-87 Sciroccos, and 1983-87 Cabrios. We should have found this page before we blew our engine! We decided to stick with the same engine type so perhaps someday we can still use our "lumpy" cam.
We located a low mileage engine for $300 including shipping from Nebraska. The plan was to perform the engine swap the weekend of April 15th, 2000. And we did! Here are the details.