My mechanic says that this engine is used in Corsas and Astras as well and has a history of early failures. He'd usually expect them to go for 250k miles without a problem. The car is back on the road but I don't know the full details of what was damaged yet.
Hi.
Glad it's up and running again. I was reading one of the motor trade mags my mate gives me to read and the MJ was mentioned regarding chain failures and Fiat blamed the oil, allegedly some mods have also been done during the engines life. It's not just Fiat and the supply of engines to GM in Europe, the MG3 & others have chain issues. If you look at a modern chain its about half the width of chains of days gone by. The old chains were duplex and of a decent size of pitch but not so now. I think that they should either revert to a belt, fit stronger chains or make the chain part of normal service replacement.