Dead engine

.My '96 300tdi has just died. As I pulled away from a set of lights, there was a slight lurch as the engine died ( it felt as if it had dropped out of gear) so I coasted it to the side of the road. It turns on the starter but makes no attempt to fire.
Fortunately, I was only 100 yards from home and, even more fortunately, the mechanic at the lock up service shop next door to me was late getting away so we managed to tow it onto my drive.
I fitted a new timing belt a couple of weeks ago and my initial suspicion was that the new belt had failed but the mechanic tried it on the starter and seemed to think that the engine was turning over with too much compression for the belt to have snapped ( I had the belt snap on a petrol megane and there was next to no compression when the engine was turned) but Im not sure whether this theory holds true with the 300tdi.
We did have a look in the oil filler cap to see whether or not there were any rockers visibly moving as the engine was turned. We couldnt detect any movement but I'm not convinced we could see the rockers through the oil filler cap anyway.
Its now on my drive and I have arranged to get it collected to a local garage in the next few days on the assumption that the belt has snapped and there will be some major piston and valve damage. Or is the 300tdi a 'safe' engine in the event of belt failure?
However, if anyone has any suggestions as to what else it could be I can investigate further and possible tackle it myself.
Any advice would be great,
Thanks

You will see the rockers moving throughout the oil cap.

It's a safe engine so it's probably bent a few pushrods and worse case broken some of the valve gear.

Brian S said:

You will see the rockers moving throughout the oil cap.

It's a safe engine so it's probably bent a few pushrods and worse case broken some of the valve gear.

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+1 At the very least I would take the rocker cover off and turn by hand to check if everything seems ok only a five minute job

Brian S said:

You will see the rockers moving throughout the oil cap.

It's a safe engine so it's probably bent a few pushrods and worse case broken some of the valve gear.

Click to expand...

in that case, the rockers definitely weren't moving so it seems that the belt has broken. I cant get it in my garage, and a repair like that is too much to tackle outside in this weather so I'll let the arrangement stand with the collection to a local repairer.
'broken some of the valve gear' sounds like it should be prefixed with a dozen pound signs, and I'm guessing that it a major strip down job. Any guesses at how big a bill I should expect?

Valve gear is easy to pick up if any of the rockers are broken, but as yours was at low revs maybe you have got away with some bent pushrods which are cheap enough.

I broke some followers as I was going 70 when my belt went last year, but I picked up a rocker set for £25.

I even kept a spare set off me breaker if you need one.

Brian S said:

Valve gear is easy to pick up if any of the rockers are broken, but as yours was at low revs maybe you have got away with some bent pushrods which are cheap enough.

I broke some followers as I was going 70 when my belt went last year, but I picked up a rocker set for £25.

I even kept a spare set off me breaker if you need one.

Click to expand...

Cheers for that, I'll bear that in mind when I get the estimate.

Apart from that it should be a belt change and a little bit if labour to change this and reset the tappets.