My Octavia (1.8 20v petrol) broke down on Friday night. Ran for 5 miles, parked up, got back in 10 mins later, and there was a diesel type rattling for 5 seconds, then the engine died. Tried to start again, but it just turned over fast, as if there was no compression, or the cambelt had gone.
I presumed it must be the cambelt, but on inspection this morning, the cambelt is intact and turned fine. There is the opposite end cam chain on these engines, which may have failed, though unlikely. (the cambelt runs only the exhaust cam, then there is a chain at the far end to run the inlet off the exhaust cam).
What are the likely faults? Some I can think of are cambelt skipped a tooth or 5, and valves now bent, so no compression. A holed piston, though as there seems to be little compression, it is unlikley to be this unless all cylinders are holed. Head gasket split badly, though that seems unlikely to cause such a big failure, with no clues to its demise beforehand.
I cannot see any way of finding out the fault without taking the head off (apart from a compression test, which will not tell a great deal I think). Are there any other tests I can do before stripping it down?
Thanks Alan.