Head Swap

[cdowling_bm]

The falling leaves and dropping temperatures have increased my motivation to get my car back on the road. Cycling to and from work just isn't doing it for me anymore.

Anyway, I've got a replacement engine for the legacy but there are a few challenges still ahead. The engine I got came from low mileage 1999 B4. It's still a twin-turbo engine but there are differences in the wiring, fuel pipes and intake manifold. All these differences mean I need to swap the manifold, wiring and heads from the broken block to the new engine. I'm hoping the new block will accept the older heads. I guess I'll cross that bridge when I come to it.

I've taken all the bits off the old engine except for the heads (intake/exhaust manifolds, timing belt. This sounds like it should be pretty simple but after taking the cam cover off, I got a bit worried. I'll be honest and say this is what I was trying to avoid in the first place because engine rebuilding is not my forte.

So finally the questions. What is involved in removing the heads? I.e. do I have to remove the camshafts and all the other fiddly bits before I can part the head from the block? Is there anything else I need to consider when doing this?

Any advice is welcome.

Charles.

[andrew_lally]

remove the cam covers..and the head bolts will remove the head with the cams intact

im pretty sure of this but im no expert....i know that head bolts need to be heavily torqued....and cam retainers are very lightly torqued

so it would be fair to assume the first comment is true

get the spanners into it mate..........you will know as soon as you lift the cam covers

hope this helps

andy