Broken glowplug...in the cylinder

[golftdiaz]

Somehow in my attempt to replace my glowplugs (the other 3 went fine) I think I broke one...but it's still in there. Basically, the nut turns and turns but it doesn't seem to be coming out. When I look at the other old glowplugs it seems highly unlikely that a clean break occurred right under the nut, where the socket connects, however I can't think of any other explanation. I know that the threads are off-track because the tool I turn the nut with goes in a little circle at the top--in other words, it's broken and in there crooked. Help!!!!!

 

[ninedee_golf_tdi]

You have two options: 1. leave the broken one in there and hope it doesnt leak compression and that the engine is strong enough to start on three glowplugs, and 2. pull the head and take it to a machine shop and hope they can get it out without boogering up the head too badly.

edited 8 years later to those still reading this: I now have the appropriate tooling to remove broken, spinning or stuck glow plugs while the 1z, ahu, or alh head is still on the engine. Email me for details.

 

[Drivbiwire]

Tap a Torx socket into the hole, this will grab the plug and help you extract it.

More than likely what happened is you cranked on it and applied a side load shearing the plug.

Seems to be common for people to do this if they are not careful.

By the way, it's only 15ft-lbs to tighten it down...DO NOT overtighten these!

Also use some anti-seize when installing the new plug to help it come out next time.

DB

 

[golftdiaz]

What does a torx socket do that the other socket won't?

 

[Wingnut]

You can look here for details of the last one I did:

http://forums.tdiclub.com/showthread.php?t=153383

 

[mjwilson]

Here's my story about a glow plug that blew to bits and ended up replacing the cylinder head (thank goodness for warranty!)

http://forums.tdiclub.com/showthread.php?t=155382

Hope the Torx thing works...good luck!

 

[Drivbiwire]

My sister just did this to her car... (I am so embarrased)

Waiting to hear back if she was able to extract the plug...

DB

 

[hdeptech]

if the pug is spinning and lose but not pulling up. the end of the plug is ballooned up at the tip. try this
grab the plug with vice grips.
spray small amount of brake cleaner around the hole and work the plug up and down round and round. the break clean losens any soot build up.
ok now spray wd40 repeat.
once the plug is loser spray more brake clean in the hole. Watch to see if the fluid bubbles.(leaking into cylinder) this is good.
now do this a bunch. pull up on the plug and crank the engine.
you may have to do this a bunch depending on how stuck the plug is.
I have never had a plug not come out unless the engine was started on eather....
good luck

 

[ninedee_golf_tdi]

Time for me to go break a glow plug in half and try that trick. Isnt there an electrode and ceramic inside the threaded area ?

 

[PDJetta]

Here's my story about a glow plug that blew to bits and ended up replacing the cylinder head (thank goodness for warranty!)

http://forums.tdiclub.com/showthread.php?t=155382

Hope the Torx thing works...good luck!

"A few days ago, an MIL light came on and I had it checked out by the dealer. Code comes back as a failed glow plug and all the glow plugs seemed to have erratic readings. They recommended replacing all four and I agreed (all under warranty) however they didn't have any in stock so I'd have to wait a couple days. They gave me my car back and proceeded on home. About a half-mile from the dealership a loud "shotgun" sound went off and the engine started to badly stumble. I shut it down immediately, openned the hood but couldn't see anything obvious. Only after removing the engine cover did I discover that the #2 glow plug was completely missing and some remnants of it were scattered about the engine bay.

Needless to say, I wasn't going home anytime soon! I called the dealership and they dispatched a mechanic immediately. Unfortunately, the threaded portion of the glow plug was still in the block so he couldn't install a new one.

The car was towed back to the dealership where it has been the last few days. I called Fri. and the service advisor said they were pulling the cylinder head to make sure none of the glow plug shrapnel ended up in the compression chamber. Seems reasonable to me but I'm not thrilled to have a relatively low-milage (~30,750 mi) engine go through such radical maintenance. They anticipate my car will be done Tue. or Wed.. Anything I should keep an eye on after I get it back? Has this ever happened to anyone else?"


Your story is identical to mine, except for the plug breaking off in the cylinder head. At 9000 miles I had a GP fail and the dealer replaced all four, and it took them three tries over 45 days. I was rather anoyed with the experience, but after reading your story, I think I had a pretty good outcome. I even removed one of the plugs and put it back in after I got the car back. I would have never had all four replaced by the dealer if I knew they were ceramic and fragile.

Glad you got your car back and fixed.

--Nate

 

[Wingnut]

if the pug is spinning and lose but not pulling up. the end of the plug is ballooned up at the tip. try this
grab the plug with vice grips.
spray small amount of brake cleaner around the hole and work the plug up and down round and round. the break clean losens any soot build up.
ok now spray wd40 repeat.
once the plug is loser spray more brake clean in the hole. Watch to see if the fluid bubbles.(leaking into cylinder) this is good.
now do this a bunch. pull up on the plug and crank the engine.
you may have to do this a bunch depending on how stuck the plug is.
I have never had a plug not come out unless the engine was started on eather....
good luck

The reason the plug seems to be spinning is because the hex head has sheared off from the base. But the core is still intact. You can see in this picture:

What you need to do is get a pair of vice grips & grap the tip of the plug. then just twist it. Its like breaking the stem of the top of an apple. The core will snap off, leaving the base still in the head:

At this point, you can hammer in a torx bit like I did, or get a good extractor set (recommended) and tap it in the hole. It should grab the plug and you should be able to spin the base out. There are lots of options for extractor sets. There are the ones with splines, similar to a torx bit. There are reversed thread ones that screw in backwards and once tight, will grip the plug & extract it.

 

[Wingnut]

A quick google search for "screw extractor sets" turned up these:

http://www.nextag.com/screw-extractor-set/search-html

If you want my opinion, get the splined kind or the square ones. I have not had good results with the reverse thread extractors in the past.

Here is my favorite:

They go straight in, so give the best grip & wont expand the hole, causing the threads to expand & wedge tighter against the threads.

Details here:

http://www.lislecorp.com/tool_detail.cfm?detail=1098

Oh, and one moe thing. It might be easier to extract it with a hot engine. Drive the car around for 10 - 15 minutes to get it hot. It should be easier to extract that way.

 

[chrisjs]

I did the same thing on my car, no amount of "ez outing" it was able to remove the plug. Jason (TDIJetta99) pulled the head off my engine last night and is taking it to a machine shop. Hopefully they will be able to repair it without much trouble. Chances are they'll need to put a Helicoil in there, I'd prefer a solid insert but if installed right the helicoil should work. I'll know tonight or tomorrow what they determine.

 

[golftdiaz]

Ok guys, a little update. I took it to Tony, a well-known mechanic in town who knows nothing about TDI's but everything about jerry-rigging, fiddling, and fixing things without going "by the book"; in other words, a good and honest mechanic but in no way a specialist. He broke the top off, and sure enough there was a clean break under the nut just like wingnut's picture. Unfortunately, the inner part (not the sheath) took about 45 min to remove; I don't know if they usually break lower down or are easy to pull out, but he couldn't pull it and ended up drilling it with a needle-sized bit and using a magnet to pick up the pieces. Then he went at it with a very short EZ out, spraying "PB" lubricant the whole time, but that sucker is STUCK! It absolutely won't come out, which leads us to believe it is cross-threaded, which leads us to believe maybe it wasn't wholly my fault but it was installed wrong prior to my purchase of the vehicle 6 months ago. Now the plug is ripped up to the point he probably can't try that same EZ out (he had a great grip the whole time, but still no go) more than one more time. So the current plan is I'm driving it as much as I can to work in the PB and Monday he's going to try a slightly longer extractor; if that doesn't work they're pulling the head. Question 1: how much time should it take them to pull the head, so I don't get ripped off? I trust them but i've had bad experiences and want to be sure. After they pull the head they're going to try to get it out, but now the fear is that the threads on the head itself are trashed. Question 2: How trashed is too trashed for those threads? Any advice would be appreciated.

 

[chrisjs]

Oh boy. Looks like you are in the same awful situation that I am in. You're going to need to bring the car to someone experienced with TDIs because removing and replacing the head requires the timing belt to be put back on, which is something you want done by someone who has the tools and has done that already.

Chances are if the glowplug is that well stuck, the threads on the head are shot and will need to be repaired.

Expanding on my previous post in this thread, my car's cylinder head is at a machine shop right now. They were able to remove my stuck glow plug (probably drilled it out, but not sure) and are currently waiting for the right sized helicoil to be delivered so they can repair the threads. The helicoil is an insert that gets put into a slightly larger drilled out hole and will provide the M10x1.00 threads in the inside for the glowplug to go into. Some people claim that helicoils are not strong enough and even blow out on gasser spark plugs, others claim the helicoils are stronger than the original thread and that failures must be due to incorrect installation. Despite the fear, I'm having the shop use the helicoil because they are confident that it will hold. The cheapest I can find a new head is just under $900 shipped, so trying a repair is worth it to me. Personally I'm confident that it will work.

I actually did the same thing your mechanic did in trying to easy out the plug. I also just chewed the crap out of it. The sides of the glow plug are made of a steel, which I would expect to be strong but apparently cower at the first sign of gummed up threads of the aluminum head. You could probably continue to ez out as there is quite a bit of length to go down before you are at risk of cutting through the plug and into the conical mating surface, but in my case trying to ez out by grabbing into the heater core of the plug just chewed it up.

In regards to your particular questions, removing and replacing the head will take 10-11 hours by someone who is experienced with TDIs. (I have no doubt some can do it faster, but 10-11 hours seems the norm.) Reinstalling the head will also require about $100 worth of gaskets, bolts, and turbo oil line.

I don't think anyone can really answer how trashed is too trashed, but even chasing the threads while the head is still on the car risks metal fragments getting into the cylinder itself. The O-rings won't like that.

Good luck.

 

[golftdiaz]

No one in my area is exp'd with TDI's. Right up the street are these geniuses who do official VW warranty repairs; they lubed my timing belt to make it quieter, allowing it to continue rubbing until I fixed it myself, and I refuse to go back. Down in Phoenix, about 2 hrs away, are a few "recommended" (by tdiclub) shops but when I go to their websites it seems like they're more about racing mods than functional repair. Damn it, I hope they can get that thing out. I know if it involves head replacement my guy won't do it, so I'm kind of at a loss.

 

[golftdiaz]

OK wait, I just had a thought. If I can I will drive up to Portland, OR mid-December to visit the fam--could I leave the glow plug stub in there for 6 weeks w/daily use and then do a 1500 mi drive on it? If I can, there's a lot more TDI's up there and probably someone trustworthy and experienced enough to work on it...just a thought...

 

[chrisjs]

Right up the street are these geniuses who do official VW warranty repairs; they lubed my timing belt to make it quieter, allowing it to continue rubbing until I fixed it myself, and I refuse to go back.

Ouch. I tried talking to one of the recommended mechanics in my area (under an hour away) and in the end he wasn't helpful. The guy the car's with right now knows his stuff and is very nice, but he's two hours away. I had my car towed up to him per my AAA Plus. ~90 miles.

 

[Wingnut]

OK. Well first of all. I am sorry to hear it was not an easy fix. But I am glad you took it to a qualified mechanic.

There is an option you should consider before taking the head off. You (or your mechanic) can drill & tap the hole and put a heli coil in it without having to remove the head. Here is the kicker, you need to be able to do this without loosing any part of the plug into the head. If you make sure the piston on that cylinder is at TDC, then that should prevent the plug end from falling into the cylinder if it breaks loose from the body.

Here is a crude drawing of the glow plug hole:

Now, if you drill down to the red line, that should remove all the threaded part of the glow plug:

Once you drill out all the threads, there will be nothing holding the plug in there. But don't remove it just yet. Use it as a plug to prevent the shavings from the tap from going into the head.

Once you get enough room in there, you can easily tap new threads for a heli coil. Once the new threads are tapped, clean out the hole with compressed air & then try to remove the rest of the plug. It should come out easily at this point since there are no threads holding it in there. Its basically just sitting on the tappered part of the head.

Remember, it has been in there plugging the hole, so there shouldn't be anything in the cylinder at this point. Just make sure you clean it well. Once the remains of the plug are extracted, simply insert the heli coil in the threads you tapped & you should be able to throw in a new plug. It might not be a bad idea to use thread lock to hold the heli coil. Let it set up before inserting the new plug though. You don't want to thread lock the plug in there.

I think this may work. It will be time consuming & trickey, but a lot less involved than removing the head, which is about an 8-10 hour job. Plus, the parts do do a head removal are expensive as you might as well do a complete timing belt job while you have the front of the engine apart.

If anyone thinks this is a bad idea, please let me know. But IMO, it can't hurt to try. The worst case scenario is that something goes wrong & you have to remove the head anyway, but at least you tried.

 

[chrisjs]

could I leave the glow plug stub in there for 6 weeks w/daily use and then do a 1500 mi drive on it?

It all depends how well it's stuck and if the part in the engine is still ok. If the heater tip down in the engine is ok maybe the worst thing that would happen is the engine would blow the broken plug out. Then you'd be driving on three cylinders and puffing out unburned diesel, probably more blow-by too since there'd be no significant pressure in the cylinder. If somehow something is already broken off into the cylinder very bad stuff would happen.
That being said, there's another forum member who also snapped his glowplug but didn't try to ezout it, just left it alone. He's been driving around for a few months now, so far so good.

I'm in no way a mechanic and I'm learning all this stuff the hard way. Hopefully someone else can chime in with some assistance.

Edit: Yay, wingnut has illustrated what I was trying to say and has given better information.

Just keep in mind with the helicoil you want to make sure it's lined up very well with the original thread angle so the plug is still seated correctly. IIRC, the glowplug seat is conical and not spherical so the angle is important.

 

[golftdiaz]

If somehow something is already broken off into the cylinder very bad stuff would happen.

I think, since the bottom part is still intact, it would be really unlikely, right?

Thanks so much guys, I'll take your ideas with me to the mechanic on Monday...I just hope he doesn't say he can't do it, because I really don't know who else can, and certainly not the timing-belt lubing guys . It's good, when you're in a small town, to have people to discuss this stuff with...

 

[Borborygmi]

I just had a second glow plug failure. First one was not a problem. I am very cautious removing them and use my torque wrench with the replacement. It's sad that they even fail at all, or at least frequently. There was a popular argument that replacing light bulbs is cheaper than the extra energy of long lasting bulbs. In this case, it just seems they are engineered to fail. I have to admit that quality control has been pretty tight on the first two failures.

It sucks when something that ought to be routine turns into a major expensive hassle. I love the dealership timing belt replacement stories where the engine subsequently falls out.

We don't want to pay for space shuttle engineering, in many cases we are talking about the design of parts that cost a few dollars that lead to major expensive complications when they fail. Coolant migration, for example.

 

[chrisjs]

I think, since the bottom part is still intact, it would be really unlikely, right?

I would think so. I don't see how the bottom of the plug would break off but I don't want to tell you to start the engine and then be proven wrong. That wouldn't be good.

 

[jayp111]

Personally drilling partway to insert an extractor and leaving the integrity of the GP intact is reasonable but I would be VERY careful to shove a vacuum hose into the GP socket/base before loosening with extractor to be sure to get ALL fragments/bits out of there to prevent anything from falling in once the GP breaks loose of its threads.

Then again if you have any problems or the GP further fragments on the way out using the extractor I would pull the head and be sure any and all bits are removed.

 

[greenskeeper]

I see you live in AZ. How cold does it get there?

If it was my car, as long as the broken GP didn't leak compression and the car is able to start on 3 GPs, I would leave it alone.

BTW I have 110k on my original GP and the car starts fine down to -20F. I am not even going to think about touching them until it becomes really difficult to start in extreme cold.

 

[chrisjs]

I started fiddling with mine because it was throwing a code. If I felt like scanning it regularly I could have ignored the MIL light. But without doing that, ignoring the light would effectively make me unaware if a different code was thrown for something that I shouldn't ignore.
That being said, I'm in NJ so I do use my glowplugs for a few months of the year. I doubt they are needed in AZ.

 

[golftdiaz]

Actually, I live at 5500 ft, and mornings are in the low thirties, so it's not super cold but cold enough for the GPs to kick in. Update on the mechanic: I have been working like crazy lately and so I had to drop it with the key yesterday before they opened. I left a note: don't pull the head without calling me. They called this morning. Apparantly they have been quite creative; he welded something to the GP after the EZ out had it too badly ripped, and tried to pull that, but it broke. Do you guys think that's sketchy? Tomorrow I have a few business hours off so I'm going in with Nigel's drawing and idea, though I can't let them try it right away because I NEED the car Thursday and if shavings get in the head and they need to pull it, I doubt they'll have time. At least I can see if they think its worth trying at this point, or if they're willing to. This guy is reputed as being super patient, so I'm hoping he'll be willing to get more creative before he pulls the head. I really don't have the money for that right now, and if it comes down to it I might just pretend it's the gas light, not the check engine light, at least for awhile.

 

[Wingnut]

As long as its holding compression, there is no worries about driving it with the broken piece in there. The CEL is just an annoyance, but it won't hurt anything. If you can get it up to Oregon on your road trip, there are plenty of guru's up there that can help you out I'm sure.

I wish you good luck

 

[Wingnut]

One more thing. I beleive the thread for the glow plug is an M10 x 1.25. I will double check that when I get home though. (((EDIT: I was wrong about the size. It is M10 x 1.0, NOT M10 x 1.25. Links below have been edited too.)))If so, you might want to get a head of the game & pick up a kit like this one if the mechanic doesn't already have one:

http://cgi.ebay.com/NEW-Permacoil-10MM-X-1-00-Spark-Plug-Rethreading-Kit_W0QQitemZ290048628474QQihZ019QQcategoryZ303QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

You will need these inserts:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Coil-Type-10mm-Spark-Plug-Permacoil-Helicoil-Inserts_W0QQitemZ290048628268QQihZ019QQcategoryZ303QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

Or, you can get it all in one kit here:

http://www.amazon.com/Metric-Fine-Thread-Repair-Kit/dp/B000EF9YPI/sr=1-3/qid=1163570737/ref=sr_1_3/103-6726289-1786264?ie=UTF8&s=automotive

Or a nicer one here:

http://www.amazon.com/M10-Spark-Plug-Hole-Repair/dp/B000J4K00M/sr=1-10/qid=1163570890/ref=sr_1_10/103-6726289-1786264?ie=UTF8&s=automotive

Here it is on E-bay:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Helicoil-Kit-5523-10-Spark-Plug-Thread-Repair-Kit_W0QQitemZ190051854705QQihZ009QQcategoryZ42905QQssPageNameZWDVWQQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem

You can easily sell the rest after your done with it to the next person who this happens to. Heck, I would even buy it from you.

 

[ELLY]

I have a bad plug but after reading all this I dont want to break it on extraction so is there something I can spray on and let sit to make it come out easier?