Body seams coming apart in engine bay- How bad and what to do?

[hambler]

I have a 2000 1.8t avant that has been pretty well built up. When pulling the turbo off to replace the studs holding it on and the gasket, I noticed the body seams are coming apart. This is happening on both the drivers and passenger side, although much worse on the passenger side. Has anybody ever seen anything like this, and if so how bad is it? The car is lowered on Stasis coilovers all around, and running a larger sway bar in the back. A couple years back the front sway bar sheared a bolt, and when it was getting drilled and tapped the tap broke off in it, so since I bought the car it hasn't had a front sway bar. Could this be putting extra stress on the front of my chassis since it isn't transferring the load?

Unfortunately since I'm new here, I can't post pictures, so the only way I knew to share them with you was to make a google docs- so please follow this link for pictures of it. The first two pictures are the passenger side, and the third picture is the driver side.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...it?usp=sharing

[bikerbob951]

First of all, welcome. You'll get answers here, especially when you give us details on your issue, as you've done.

I'd say that the issue was caused by the stiffer suspension, up-rated rear swaybar, and missing front sway. Since the rear of the car is resisting *some* twisting force, thanks to the RSB, this leaves the front open for twisting. While the sway bar isn't meant to prevent chassis twisting, it does re-distribute suspension forces from left to right, which does have a direct impact on the chassis.

As far as repairing the separated seams, I really can't say for sure the best method. Maybe some of the guys that have done shaved engine bays and so on can comment here. If I had to guess, I would imagine that drilling holes thru the first layer of steel all along the seam, then plug welding to the lower layer of steel might be a good way to go, but a lot of work. And obviously, either repair/replace the sway bar and/or do the A6 strut bar mod.

Good luck, keep us posted on what you decide to do.

[MetalMan]

I agree with installing a front strut tower brace, like the A6/S4 option. It noticeably stiffened up my car's front end, to the point that I occasionally hear creaking in other parts of the car now! (on uneven surfaces)

[hambler]

My car does have a brace right infront of the battery, which I always assumed to be aftermarket. I am going to try to get the front sway bar back on asap.

I'm currently struggling through researching turbo studs. I could spend $150 for inconel studs from flying miata that should work for my application, or I could consider trying to use like an a286 stainless and making a new gasket and/or spacers that are made out of copper or something that has a higher linear thermal expansion rate than the stainless. I plan to use nordlock washers no matter what, nickel neverseize, and what type of nut I use will depend on the stud material- prolly like a 304 stainless for the inconel, or a bronze nut for the stainless. Any thoughts?

[A1 A2 German]

I just spent 30 minutes writing everything out with links and pics and grabbed the last bit of info and the page refreshed losing everything.

Here's the 30 second explanation:

Seam seperation is generally always the control arms pounding the piss outta the insides of the strut towers driving them towards the hood, which pulls everything apart. They even made a oem "revision control arm" as design flaw thar has mini bump stops on top to help. You'll need to do this:

Look up: Relief cuts and boxed in towers

Also can do these: http://www.audizine.com/forum/showth...t-a-difference!

Which give quite a bit of extra clearance as are 1/3 the size of oem. You need to heat the strut towers ups, pound them down some, cut reliefs and weld in boxes. To check out clearance yourself: Remove sway bar endlink and strut/coilover, you can now jack the suspension up till it hits and you now have a visual reference where to cut.

[hambler]

Damn, I would have loved to have had your 30 minutes of work, because your 30 seconds of work is pretty great. Thanks for your help, I'll have to add this to my list of projects. How big of a deal is the seam separation, and should I be trying to reweld/bond the seam?

[andyrew]

It seems to me like the car was involved in an accident and that is the cause of the separation. The reason I say that is one side is separated a fair amount and shifted while the other side is just slightly separated. This might take getting the car on a chassis bench to get right.

If this isnt the case then welding this back up wont hurt at all. Either strong tacks or full seam welds will work just fine. Drilling and plug welding will look the most OEM and probably help for your resale but you need to work within your skill limits...

[Davdraco1]

Have you ever had alignment issues?

[hambler]

This was a well documented one owner car when I bought it, so I am fairly confident it was never involved in an accident (the prior owner is audisnapr on here, he documented some of his stuff very well). I love this car enough it will never get sold, or if it does both my brothers have been asking to buy it for awhile now- so I'm not worried about resale.

The camber of the car is off, especially in the back- I always assumed this to be a result of how far it is lowered. I've only had it on an alignment rack once, and I haven't run a set of tires through it yet so I am not really sure if I have alignment issues.

What if I fix the sway bar issue, fix potential clearance issues with the suspension, but dont reweld the seam? With a strut bar, is this piece still doing a lot? I'm inclined to say it is, and I def should be fixing it, but I just wanted some more input.

[Lazer Viking]

yea, this is most definitely caused by the stiffer suspension and lack of front sway bar.. iirc he also tracked the car at one point, so that probably didnt help.

mine has been separating for years from the control arms smacking the shit out of the tower, it should probably be fixed.. but mine is worse than that, and i dont believe its at a critical point yet. i would probably add a strut bar and keep an eye on it till you can get around to grinding all the sealer out, and welding it up.

also, sup lancaster :waves:

[ienga4]

Just wanted to throw in some knowledge to the OP here about those turbo studs...the company I work for designs and manufactures studs and bolts for exhaust hotsides for all the OEMs. The design actually has a locking feature built into the studs which totally prevents backout (dunno if I can give away the exact details haha). Most of them are actually made from a286 too. I can see if I can get some part numbers from the OEMs and then pass them on for people to buy from a dealership or something (we don't sell outside of OEMs)