[Prickleypear]

Its me and my sister's corsa at it again

30k km back i had to replace the camshaft due to some of the lobe's having worn down to allmost nothing left.

so now with the milage at 223k km it ran a big end bearing, when i opened the engine i noticed that the crank thrust is completely worn down, so much so that the cranck started eating into the block, this probably caused stree on the big ends causing it to fail.

My question, why did the thrust fail, i know my sister's driving style and its not because she rides the clutch.
What i noticed is that there is a spring behind the clutch thrust bearing keeping it permanently in contact with the clutch, i also know the car's history so the must be factory fitted, could this spring cause the damage described above, is that spring necessary to be there or can i remove it??

Any help appreciated.

its a 2006 corsa 1.4 8 valve

 

[Prickleypear]

Nobody have any ideas?

 

[Walksall]

Failure of the crankshaft thrust bearing is almost certainly nothing to do with the way that the car is driven, or even much use of the clutch and certainly nothing to do with the spring.
I would bet diamonds that the failure of the thrust, and for that matter, that of the camshaft lobes, is down to either poor quality oil, or infrequent oil changes.
Do remember that the GRADE of the oil is not an indication of its QUALITY - You will need to look in the manufacturers handbook to see what oil is recommended for your part of the world.
There has been several cases of engine failure with these engines, due to people buying aftermarket oil filter elements, bits have been known to break off and block oil ways.
I would recommend you to use ONLY genuine GM (Vauxhall) filter elements.

Regards

 

[vaux]

Main cause of trust bearing wear is keeping the clutch pedal pressed down when stood in traffic, stood at traffic lights etc.