b6t at 16 psi!

[mikemounlio]

The guy i bought the car from said it was rebuilt but i cant see that being the cases. A rebuilt turbo would not have had oil lines that were that old. I think the turbo was just bad to start with. Then lack of oil and the couple times of over boost trying to dial the numbers in just fried it. I will replace it and hope that does the trick for me. If not ill have to dig into the motor to find the issue. I have lots of shaft play in the inlet of the turbo. It didnt turn very smoothly. It didnt feel like it was grinding but it did take slight effort to spin by hand.

[Advancedynamix]

Plain bearing turbos are supposed to have some radial play as long as the wheels don't rub the housings. It's the axail play that is bad. Turbos don't typically make a grinding sound when they are bad, some times they will make a high pitched squeal or shreak. Usually they just spool louder and louder. On a tight B6t with factory air box you can barely hear the turbo, but when they start to get sloppy the turbo makes a louder and louder whoosh until the whoosh goes away completely. Lol. Your grinding sound may be something else. Sometimes the alternator will start to make a sort of high rpm growl that can be heard inside the car. Also, timing belt tensioners can make that sound too.

[mikemounlio]

Hmm great points. So given my situation what should i look at?

when at idle it is now smoking. More gas more smoke. boost is not building. When actually driving and heavy on the gas it kinda sounds like lifters tapping or maybe like a fan hitting a shroud or something (didnt really try to make the sound happen as i just limped it home and shut it down asap). The return line from the turbo blew out. It was old and soft as can be (finger went right threw it). I never did see a low oil light or check engine light. I changed the blown out line with a section of pre bent heater hose. Changed the oil and filter. Still getting lots of smoke, high rpm noise (the same noise when moving but heavy on the pedal). Seems like as soon as it wants to build boost it just makes a noise instead.

What should i check and or do?

[mikemounlio]

I never did see any oil stains in the driveway. I drove maybe 1-2 (more like .5-1) miles after the turbo started to make noise and no boost. Car started to make smoke when i stopped about 2 blocks away from the house. I checked it out saw the leak went straight home. Still no oil stain on the driveway. Plenty of oil came out when i did the change as well.

[Advancedynamix]

I have personally run a vj14 at 15-16psi for over 40k miles of abuse without any issues at all. Tweak started out with the 160kmile turbo that was on my donor car (which had a destroyed engine from neglect) and that turbo lasted for over 20k miles at 15+ psi until I switched out the stock ECM for one tuned by G force (also leaner tune according to my wideband). That tune allowed 7800rpm, and the high rpm wasted that poor turbo within 3 sessions at Firebird. I swapped that turbo for a tight vj14/11 hybrid and wasted the hybrid in 2 sessions along with melting 2 of my pistons. That's when I went back to a stock tune and a beautiful vj14 that AZGTX sold me. That 14 is still on the car after 5 thousand trouble free track miles, 25k daily driven miles, 10k cross country miles and 2 years of use at 15-16 psi with a stock tune and water methanol. I briefly ran my EL prototypes tuned ECM on Tweak on the street to compare air fuel ratios. The EL ECM was consistently leaner on boost than the factory tune and had a 7500rpm redline. The car was noticably faster, but I didn't dyno the car to verify hp gains. My guess was around 190-200 ft.lbs of tq. Fuel mileage also improved with the EL ecm. I swapped back to the factory tune because I know it will keep the engine together through hell and back, and with the way I drive that's more important than the extra power.

[Advancedynamix]

I never did see any oil stains in the driveway. I drove maybe 1-2 (more like .5-1) miles after the turbo started to make noise and no boost. Car started to make smoke when i stopped about 2 blocks away from the house. I checked it out saw the leak went straight home. Still no oil stain on the driveway. Plenty of oil came out when i did the change as well.

Check for a broken exhaust manifold, or blown out O2 sensor or loose turbo on the manifold. The turbo may be bad, and passing oil, but I've seen way too many poeple instantly blame the turbo for everything.

[mikemounlio]

What do you think my issue could be? The turbo on mine has play but not in and out. I couldnt pull or push the blades (in and out of the turbo. I could lift them a bit tho.

[mikemounlio]

Could the bad 02 or mani make it burn oil? Ill grab a video of it tonight!

[mikemounlio]

I do have the center crack in the manifold. It didn't look bad enough to worry about tho.

[Advancedynamix]

Also, if the lifters started ticking you probably lost oil pressure. The rod bearings don't like that at all. You may want to check those before you do more damage. Leaning hard on an engine with damaged rod bearings usually leads to a lot if other damaged pieces of metal being spewed out the hole that forms in the back of the block after a rod let's go.

[mikemounlio]

With the smoke plus no boost that makes me think tubro let go. tonight i will start it back up and see if i cant get the noise chased down without doing damage. Will try to get a video as well. I hope as is well with the motor

[mikemounlio]

If the turbo is actually good what would be the next thing to look into (motor wise)?

[ryanprins13]

b6t at 16 psi!

Your oil pressure light doesnt come on until 2 or 3 psi and thats too late to save your engine if your not idling. Cut your old oil filter apart with tin snips. Metal in it means you damaged the motor for sure, no metal doesnt mean much, but i would check that first. Did you check the dipstick before draining the oil or measure how much came out?


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[ryanprins13]

Do you have the old oil still? Run a magnet through it and see what you pick up.
Oil filter is better because if you can tell what type of metal it is that will help you determine what part of the engine it came from


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[mikemounlio]

I do have the oil and filter still. will look in it tonight.