[hermanpj]

well... i hate to admit it but what the dealer is saying sounds plausible:

the car was rolled, during which time the engine mounts were subjected to stresses they are not designed to tolerate without damage. in fact in many cars (not sure on VW)they are designed to shear in a crash, so that the engine and transmission submarine under the passenger compartment as part of the overall structural plan for how the car will perform in the crash and in conjunciton with crumple zones, etc....

so although body panels were lightly damaged, the force of the rollover multiplied by the weight of the engine, focused on motor mounts (which are bolts connecting the engine to tabs of metal welded to the sub-frame) could very well break mounts. As to why 3 checkouts didnt detect, can't say. Engine mounts are routinely checked in a rollover collision. They need to check not only for clearly broken mounts, but for metal fatigue. Sounds like the dealer was not one of the places that checked it out.

So anyway, a mount finally give way under load of shifting into gear, and this rotates the engine enough to cause a problem with the transmisison. Where is the block cracked? at the motor mount location on the block? or where the engine bolts to the transmission? similarly is the transmission case cracked where it meets the engine? or is it cracked where the transmission mounts to a frame cross-member?

Not saying that is exactly what happened, but it sounds more possible than 'the torque of the engine shredding the trasmission and the resulting engine-transmission lockup cracking the engine block, and breaking motor mounts.