04 Aveo Hatchback getting new engine!

[gone-Jonphilip]

hello everyone. I just joined this forum today and decided to document my engine replacement. I recently traded an 04 Aveo for a minivan. The Aveo had a broken timing belt and I was told the engine needs replaced. The car is in pretty nice shape, other than the engine. It has 91k miles and no rust so I think it will be worth fixing. I want to document as I progress through this project much like this post: http://www.aveoforum.com/forum/f103/...epaired-10191/

I would love to shake this guy's hand because this post convinced me to attempt this project. I really appreciated all of the information he provided. I am NOT a mechanic so this is going to be a bit of a challenge for me. I am a computer programmer/systems analyst by day, and a "fix whatever the kids broke" dad by night. So please be kind with your comments as my lack of professional mechanical ability will be obvious. But my skills as a computer programmer usually allow me to figure just about anything out.

So here are a few pics of the car... I will post more as I progress and I look forward to getting to know some of you guys on here and hopefully will get some helpful tips. Thanks!! JP

[thehunterooo]

Welcome, body looks excellent,do you know the extent of the damage? (how much did you "pay" for it if you do not mind?). A new engine would be the best route, but if everything looks good on the lower end, you may just need to buy a head off eBay. The timing on the car is tricky, you will need to be very careful so you do not lose the new engine

You will find a lot of useful information here though, just not from me

[gone-Jonphilip]

hi thehunterooo. I traded even up for a minivan that I was trying to sell for 2k, so I figure I have 2k in it so far. I'm not sure if that was too much to pay for a non-running car or not? I guess it will depend on whether I am able to get it running or not!

The body is in excellent shape. It appears to have been undercoated which is why there is no rust. The couple I traded it for had it worked on at CarGuard and they already replaced the timing belt. But it didn't run good after that, so they think the pistons are damaged. My 1st task is going to be to get the head off just to see what all is damaged, but I suspect it will be getting a salvage engine. JP

[thehunterooo]

Not a bad price at all, you should be good to go, I am sure you will have no troubles with the repairs.

[gone-Jonphilip]

OK, so I started disassembling some of the engine components. The 1st thing I did was remove the battery. I also removed the battery tray to give me more room to work. There are 4 bolts that hold the battery tray in and they were pretty easy to get out. The nice thing about this car is that it is only 7 yrs. old so the bolts seem to be coming out pretty easily. What I hate most about working on cars is rusted bolts!

Next, I removed the airbox and hose from the throttle body. The hose has a tear in it so I'll have to replace that. I removed the valve cover unplugged all of the spark plug wires. I took some pics of the plug wires to make sure I hook them back up correctly. I started disconnecting the wiring harness. I have learned to go slow and be patient when disconnecting wire plugs because they all seem to have different type connectors and they break easily. So far so good, none of them broke. I also labeled them with some masking tape to make it easier to hook them back up. Most of the connectors only fit in 1 place, but it can still be confusing when you have 15 disconnected wire plugs so marking them will just help it go a little smoother for me. I have only ever pulled 1 other engine and that was from an 87 Ford Tarurus 4 cylinder about 18 yrs. ago. I'm just going to take my time and try to make this go as smooth as possible.

I also drained and removed the radiator. The drain is on the bottom left. TIP: I figured out that if you just slightly open the radiator cap it will drain out slowly and not make a mess! I found couldn't get the radiator out, so after about 10 minutes of fiddling I removed the left fan shroud. After doing that, I was able to wiggle it out. I'm going to attach some of the pics I took for my reference so maybe they will be helpful to someone else as well. JP

[gone-Jonphilip]

My 1st dilema I need to figure out.... Do I call someone to come out and vacuum out the AC coolant or do I leave everything connected and just unbolt the condensor and push it out of the way? Can anyone offer any suggestions on this? If I leave everything connected, will I have enough room to get the engine out or do I need to disconnect the lines?

Also, it looks like there is an AC line that is connected to the power steering pump. I'm not sure why?? I'm going to have to do some reading to figure out what to do next.

I have found that there are no paper service manuals available for this car except for the factory GM manuals which are $150 bucks, which for me is a rip-off. I ordered a GM service manual on Ebay for $15 that you install on the computer. It has some good information, but I would prefer a manual in a book form (I already spend 9 hrs. a day on the computer!) If anyone know of 1 for less than $30 please let me know. JP

[ontarian_frog]

You will need to get the AC evacuated(It's illegal to evacuate it into the atmosphere). I suspect you will have a hell of a time removing the engine with the AC compressor in the way. It might be doable though, I'm not sure.

[thehunterooo]

My 1st dilema I need to figure out.... Do I call someone to come out and vacuum out the AC coolant or do I leave everything connected and just unbolt the condensor and push it out of the way? Can anyone offer any suggestions on this? If I leave everything connected, will I have enough room to get the engine out or do I need to disconnect the lines?

Also, it looks like there is an AC line that is connected to the power steering pump. I'm not sure why?? I'm going to have to do some reading to figure out what to do next.

I have found that there are no paper service manuals available for this car except for the factory GM manuals which are $150 bucks, which for me is a rip-off. I ordered a GM service manual on Ebay for $15 that you install on the computer. It has some good information, but I would prefer a manual in a book form (I already spend 9 hrs. a day on the computer!) If anyone know of 1 for less than $30 please let me know. JP

rabbit has some things you can download and print out

[petrified.rabbit]

its more than 1000 page iirc, so printing it isnt really ink friendly, plus i think it is the $15 ebay manual, just free.

No one will come to you for ac, i can not tell you to let it into the atmosphere, but if you are really really careful, you can tie it up to the rad support.

Are you doing the whole engine or just putting a head on? i would probably start with pulling the head and seeing if its rebuildable. less money, less work, in a sense.

[thehunterooo]

good lord that is a lot of pages, never knew it was so big :/