I recently bought a '88 GTI 16V with a blown head gasket. I replaced the
gasket in my garage with a lot of help from people like Dennis G. (I didn't
know about the list then) I was almost as happy as when my first son was
born when it started up and didn't seem to leak ! It hadn't leaked at all
except for around the oil cooler. I had just changed the oil when I noticed
the leak. I didn't think it was a big deal and figured on fixing it at the
next oil change. About his time I swapped out the instrument cluster and
didn't notice that one tiny but very important light didn't work on the new
cluster.....
A few days later I was on the freeway at night and the valves started
rapping pretty loud, my first thought was that I didn't get the timing belt
tightened right and it had jumped a notch. I got off the freeway and took a
look, I noticed the oil leak was worse. I checked the oil level and it was
fine. I drove very carefully the 10 minutes by street I had to get home, the
oil temp never went over 205, the coolant was about 2/3 (it was about 40 deg
outside). The oil pressure light NEVER came on. The next day I saw there was
a lot of oil all over the engine and hood, I checked the oil level and it
was DRY. I later found the thick O ring between the oil cooler and block was
split. After replacing it. I ran new oil with the old filter for about 15
min and drained it, it looked like nail polish with the shiny stuff in it. A
mechanic friend says minimum I aged the engine about 75,000 miles in those
10 min.
I now have 20/50 in it and it runs great, a lot of weird noise from under
the hood @ 3500+ RPM but I really don't know if that's not normal.
Recently the replaced oil light comes on @ around 2200 RPM, not lower oil
temp 210 deg. Any thoughts?
Questions: What is normal oil temp on a summer day? Does anyone have
suggestions as where and how to install a gauge? What's the little buzzer
behind the speedo for? How does the oil pressure light work? It has a sensor
for .3 and 1.8 (bar, kg/cm2 ?)
I'll leave the rest for later.
