A long time coming, Rob's 4motion turbo build!

[WhO]

Oh dont worry, i shall be! I just need more exhaust flow!

[WhO]

Bad News... Turbo is making a rumbling sound on shutdown and the bearings feel rough when spinning the shaft Not sure what the cause of this is yet, i'm thinking either my oil drain isn't sufficient thus oil is backing up into the turbo, although this is unlikely as it should've been blowing smoke, or more likely the oil feed has become blocked and thus the turbo maybe starved of oil.

I'm going to take the feed line off the turbo after work tonight and i'll start the car to see if i get flow out of it, if not the answer is clear, if i do then more digging to the cause will be needed. Either way looks likely i'm going to need to pull the turbo off already and get it looked at...

More money... sigh.

[pansy]

Oh that sucks serious balls man. Hope its nothing too serious.

[WhO]

Pulled the oil feed line off the turbo and there was no oil in it. Upon pulling all the lines and fittings off i found that a small male to male adapter off of the t piece hadn't been machined properly and wasn't drilled all the way through. Thus the turbo's been running for a week with no oil. Not sure exactly how much damage has been done but turbo doesnt sound great, but does sound better now it's got oil.

So essentially a close to 2k turbo has been lunched by a fitting worth less than $5. It's still boosting fine but im sure the life of the turbo has been significantly reduced. I'm just going to keep driving it for the time being, but if it sounds any worse i'll get a mate who works at a turbo re-seller to get it rebuilt.

Damnn

[Dyldo]

So essentially a close to 2k turbo has been lunched by a fitting worth less than $5.

Mate with the money, work, tears and swear-words you've dumped into her so far, its way better than having something go pop deep in her bowels, lets be honest. Unless you can get a dude that has iived turbos for 4 decades to have a look at your snail, then maybe just keep running it till it fails?

How much is a turbo rebuild? And does a rebuilt turbo run the same as the original?

I think you should be still well stoked with your results. As most have said so far, you've come an incredible way in a short period of time and the workmanship looks awesome.

Look forward to seeing her back on the tarmac soon and definitely looking forward to an in-cockpit video

nom nom nom

[Mr. JLT]

Pulled the oil feed line off the turbo and there was no oil in it. Upon pulling all the lines and fittings off i found that a small male to male adapter off of the t piece hadn't been machined properly and wasn't drilled all the way through. Thus the turbo's been running for a week with no oil. Not sure exactly how much damage has been done but turbo doesnt sound great, but does sound better now it's got oil.

So essentially a close to 2k turbo has been lunched by a fitting worth less than $5. It's still boosting fine but im sure the life of the turbo has been significantly reduced. I'm just going to keep driving it for the time being, but if it sounds any worse i'll get a mate who works at a turbo re-seller to get it rebuilt.

Damnn

If it was a daul BB it may be ok,any shaft play, or was it hard to spin? Did you have water lines plumbed into it also. If it needs a rebuild go for a Hybrid GT35=)

[WhO]

Mate with the money, work, tears and swear-words you've dumped into her so far, its way better than having something go pop deep in her bowels, lets be honest. Unless you can get a dude that has iived turbos for 4 decades to have a look at your snail, then maybe just keep running it till it fails?

Well i've decided to do just that, it *seems* to be alright albeit a bit noiser but otherwise the turbo still spools ok and doesnt have a ridicuous amount of shaft play, the wheels cant hit the housings so i guess it might be ok for now. I'm sure it would've significantly shortened the life of the turbo but c'est la vie! Today i drove 150km on the car out on the open road and it seemed to go ok so untill it either dies from shaft play or blows a seal i'll just geep on trucking. Hopefully it'll hold up to higher boost next week once i get the new exhaust made up

Thanks to you and everyone else for all the encouragement! It's been one hell of a ride! In cabin video's will follow once more boost is fed in

[Dyldo]

Pleasure man - you did what I (and many other 4mower owners) have wanted to do.

[WhO]

If it was a daul BB it may be ok,any shaft play, or was it hard to spin? Did you have water lines plumbed into it also. If it needs a rebuild go for a Hybrid GT35=)

It is a dual ball bearing turbo and shaft play although more than it had is not so bad as to have a wheel hit a housing and in out shaft play is *probably* ok. It still spins freely but i can hear the upset bearings in that they are gritty sounding and have a slight tinking sound on spool down just before the wheel stops. Water lines were plumbed in and i dont doubt this hugely helped preventing further damage. I now realise why the turbo used to boil the coolant in it when shutting down, something it doesnt do now that it has oil flow.

When i rebuild i'll definitely get it hi-flowed as although i have plenty of top end now, its never enough!

Doing some freeway runs in a tall gear i've found that boost starts coming on around 1500rpm with current full boost of 11psi reached at 2850 rpm. Definitely responsive! When i run 20psi i wouldn't be surprised if it is on full song by 3500rpm. Ahh how i love boost.

[WhO]

Pleasure man - you did what I (and many other 4mower owners) have wanted to do.

Hopefully i can return the encouragement & help where i can when when you get to the point where you can boost your 4motion. I do hope that it comes together as it'd be great to see some more boosted 4motions out there

[WhO]

Put 450-500km on the car of freeway driving over the last couple days. From this i discovered

- I've got a bad oil leak from the timing chain cover
- One of my coolant hoses rubs on the throttle body and decided to dump most of my coolant into the engine bay and onto the ground
- Turbo is one sick puppy

The first two are easy(ish) fixes the last one unfortunately is a bigger job. The turbo still spins freely but now if you spin the turbine it has a noticable notchy sound when slowing down. Looks like the bearings are toast so to save the risk of it going boom and taking my engine with it, i'm taking it out and getting it looked at / likely rebuilt.

It's been good to have a bit of shakedown time with the car as its pointed to a few other things i need to address and having to pull the turbo out will give me the time to do them all at once.

Now to clean all the bugs off the front of the car!

[Coralon]

The gremlins could have been much worse but sounds like you have it under control. Hopefully the rebuild doesnt cost to much.

[KKK VR6]

just read through from where i last checked and damn even ive got a smile on my face congrats on it running smooth
but yeh the little problems suck balls !!
good choice taking the turbo off, you wouldn't wanna stuff it now
looking forward to some good news

kay

[Water Boy]

Dang you produced some good numbers. Its a real shame about the turbo though...

[Pergs]

Massive well done thus far Rob!

Sounds amazing mate!

Disappointed to hear about the turbo but should be back in fine fighting form soon

Give us a hoi when you get it back!