Oil leaking from timing case

[Greg Roles]

The GTD engine has the fuel filter on the timing cover ( drivers ) end, so a fuel leak in any of the four hoses could leave residue down low, and diesel plus road grime could equal sludge buildup. So too Aydan is onto it, the oil filler through the stock engine cover is prone to dribbling oil down the timing end of the engine. That said my now ex GT TDI always had oil weep from the turbo oil feed line, nothing major, but by 50kms, it would be showing down the back of the engine. It was never enough to bother me personally.

Any decent roadworthy would require oil leaks to be repaired, and having just gone through this myself, you could reasonably put it back onto the seller to get it diagnosed properly and fixed.

As Snail has said the Golf comes with lifetime coolant, and you only top it up when doing water pumps etc.

GTD's have the fabric battery cover as far as I can recall, guess the mechanic has seen the better full plastic boxes on the other VW's and assumed this was missing and only the fabric insulation remained? No big deal.

[The One]

If it has any sort of 'leak' on/inside/near the timing cover, I would not be leaving it @ 50,000kms and waiting until 120,000kms, first of all timing belt on these is 105,000/7 years, next thing is if it is actually leaking oil/diesel into the timing belt, over time (not a long length of time!) the oil will eat away at the timing belt. It should also be noted that leaking of diesel fuel onto or near the drivebelt will deteriorate it very quickly, resulting in it breaking apart and very likely shooting into the timing cover, lodging between the crankshaft and timing belt, causing the timing belt to jump many, many teeth (same deal with the alternator pulley seizing, doing the same thing! so you deffs need a third opinion, from a knowledgeable specialist!

Others have already said what you need to know about the coolant and shocks, so I won't even begin to re-write the bible about these things..

[gfish]

Thanks all. Dealer is fixing everything before we pick up the car and we are then going back to where we got it done so they can re-inspect and make sure dealer's promises were kept. He has been a rather good dealer (even threw in new set of tyres) as wife was told that they were new when she did the first test drive (she was a bit naive and didn't look closely).

Thanks again for all advice, I'll let you all know what happened this coming Friday.

[Ryeman]

Seeing TBH's car has a belt driven cam which is lubricated by the engine oil I'm wondering if belts are oil resistant these days.

[Johnnojack]

Could be mistaking oil leaking from the intercooler pipe as coming from cam cover, or could be turbo oil return pipe leaking. Oil has a habit of moving in strange directions under the influence of air pressure around an engine.