Coop booked in for mot and cambelt Tuesday next week. So today last few jobs, change wipers, get washers working, change bulbs, change injector.

The end of six months of weekends overhauling her, last job was injector.

Changed it as per GrahamL's how to, started the car, ran fine for a second or so then stumbled, a couple of metallic rattles and stalled.

Started again metallic rattle.

Runs really rough now with a metallic rat a tat.

I had noticed while changing the 4th injector to the right that the injector clip on the first (drivers side) injector was broken, only half a clip attached so I fitted another.

I think the other half of that clip went in the engine

How long since it was last started? If its several months, the hydraulic tappets will have emptied and it will rattle like a bag of spanners for minute or two

PS - I can't see how half an injector clip could get into the engine - the clip section will have fallen away before you removed the injector

To get half a clip in an injector hole whilst replacing one would be lottery winning odds. Hopefully it's as Nigel says and it's empty followers.

engine was running fine less than four hours before when I moved the car into my workshop.

Have run the engine long enough for everything to settle the rat a tat started out intermittently like something being knocked around inside the engine and has settled into a consistent rattle ?

Muzzie/Nigel - I know what you mean about the odds of half a clip getting in the engine. Will look again today, swap around the injectors and see what happens I guess.

She lives...

Muzzie/Nigel- you guys were right I guess, after removing cam cover to see if any metal in the oil up there, turning over engine to see everything working we put her back together.

Started ruff as hell rat a tat tat then after a short time smoothed out ran up to temp, revved freely and sounds as good as ever...

I am amazed that something can sound so bad and not have something major wrong.

I am a happy man

Happy outcome=forum power

Good stuff! Never doubt the power of coupe paranoia or the power of positive forum wishes!!

Glad its sorted. And for future reference I'd remove the whole fuel rail with injectors still fitted in one go from the intake manifold, then remove the clips/injectors.

Thanks for the words of wisdom and positivity guys, appreciate it

It does happen, a few years back I was changing injectors and out of the corner of my eye I thought I saw something disappear down #5! Can't remember what it was now, but out with the borescope and yes there it was sitting on the back of the valve. The borescope has a magnet attachment so was easy to retrieve. Eye of the needle stuff...

Yes, it does happen - last time it happened to me, we were about to start my son's Mk1 Golf after a couple of years standing - we decided it would be a good idea to drop a little oil down the bores and turn it over before trying to start it

Annoyingly, the plastic end of the syringe dropped into one of the cylinders....

We tried retrieving it with an attachment on a bore-scope. We considered taking the head off. We consulted Paul at Motormech - he said just start it up - we did and a couple of seconds later, some melted plastic shot out of the tailpipe.

Easy on a two-valve head with no turbo in the way - probably wouldn't have tried it on a 20VT....

Is it worth ditching the oil and filter then if it's possible something has gone through ?

No, because it will only have gone into the cylinder, then out of the exhaust - no contamination of the oil

And hopefully it will not hit a blade in the turbo