Ooops! That's not going to be cheap.
 

I've been on hiatus for a bit coming to grips with this, and the emotional roller coaster between my Birds finally putting a stake in Bellicheat's heart, and the reality of driving rental cars for the next couple months. I hate rental cars.

Was purring along doing 40, headed up to get a pan to warm the wings for the SB party, coming into town and I started to hear a little chirping, turned down the radio, it's light chirping alright. Pull off into a parking lot and it stalled. Refired it, opened the hood, and it sounded like the belt was dragging on an idler pulley or the AC compressor was melting down, and of course my first panic reaction was "I can't leave this car HERE!", and second, "I need a car for the party!"

Enterprise 1/2 mile down the road so in a split second of stupidity I took off, 1/2 way there it hits me it's Sunday and they're CLOSED, and it's starting to sound worse, but that stupidity put me on a path where there was no place to leave the car except in a field on somebodies front yard. It made it another 1/2 mile to a restaurant where it died a death that gives me nightmares.

Needless to say, I've watched every game completely sober, but to get my mind off the car I watched the Bowl slightly comatose. There were plenty of tears shed by the elders there, mine might have flowed a little harder.

First, nobody has seen this failure before, or knows exactly what happened, but the variable valve lift end and the part of the head it's in sheared off, at the same time you'll notice the 2 shattered cam caps. Dissection isn't complete, he's scoped the plug holes and finds no piston damage but there are metal shavings in the oil as you would expect. Waiting for the final assessment to decide the path, but, I miss my car!! :cry:

http://www.ibanezrules.com/images/va...208_141830.jpg
http://www.ibanezrules.com/images/va...209_142945.jpg
http://www.ibanezrules.com/images/vantage/4406.jpeg
http://www.ibanezrules.com/images/vantage/4405.jpeg

Sorry to see such damage.
How many miles you have on the car?
The camshaft is sheared off - it indicates something with lubrication gone totally wrong.
Please keep us updated with the diagnosis.

A shade over 17,500.


My initial speculation is, maybe, the head cracked which took the end of the cam [the VVEL] out of alignment and that was the chirping I was hearing with a little chatter. And as it kept shearing away it put extra stress on the rear caps and they shattered. Of course I have zero idea if that's even close but it makes physical sense. The only consolation is from the time it started chirping it was probably already circulating shavings which no matter what happened to the head is not exactly compatible with the rest of the engine.

Wow that's some serious ooops.
Sorry to see that.
Are you still under warranty?
Hope there is a good explanation for the cause and a good ending to this mess.
Thank you for sharing.

I have always self insured everything that made sense, except where mandated, auto, health [not mandated but could easily bankrupt], homeowners, it's cheap! They sell warranties because they make money on them, so I've always chosen to pay the consequences instead of paying the insurance. Sometimes the consequences bite a bit deeper into the posterior than the rest, and this will be one of those cases. It would have been $7500 for the 2 year, and I'd be about 17 months into it, so it would have been the better choice in this case. I asked if I could buy it and pre-date it a month ;)

This is why I'm not likely to ever own an Aston without extending the warranty. Most never use it, and of the 5 Vantages I've had the first two were upside down (repairs vs. warranty cost), my 2015 GT had about $20K in warranty work, my last 2015 V12S - the new owner who has two years warranty left - the engine just blew last week (Aston's providing a new engine under warranty)... so you never know. I have 1 1/2 year left before I extend on my current V12S, which I'll extend every two years until I sell the car.

Sorta like Obamacare? Sorry to see that kinda damage. .

Oh man that sucks big time. My gut is wrenching for you. Hopefully thy can put some sort of goodwill claim in given the age and mileage.

Stories like this make me extra paranoid since I do not have extended warranty as well

My heart weeps for you :(

Wholly crap that's awful. Good luck with the repair.

Did you email Aston Martin corporate on this?

good god man that makes me feel sick looking at those photos

I feel for ya :(

Sorry about no warranty, I don't do that either... only time i've ever bought one was for my Cayenne and boy am I glad I did...

Bloody hell, I know it's something that can be fixed. I'm sure since AM is involved in the stalling they should help with repairs of a low mileage fault. Appears the stalling was a precursor to this? At least it's in capable hands with factory involvement.

Oh no. I know you and I have had discussions on this several times and of course the smatter man won this round! But what happened to the V12?? I've stayed out of touch for the last couple weeks so if you wrote it up somewhere just direct me there. It's really kinda funny the "corporate" car was bound to fail, but it's replacement did fail!
They have been informed because it throws a monkey wrench in the stalling [and now bogging] issue, I would not relate one to the other though, I just don't see a correlation. I wish I did but I don't.


To everybody else I appreciate your condolences!