Thanks for clarifying, I've never taken one completely apart. I just knew mine was dumping oil in the the exhaust.

 

I had the valve cover that had been take apart and the baffles were not sealed. It pump out a quart after a few laps.

 

I was stupid and tightened the NPT drain fitting so it was flush against the oil pickup and wouldn't let enough oil through. It smoked like crazy on startup and oil was coming out of every orifice in the intake piping. I put a restrictor in the oil inlet and that reduced the problem, but it came back a few weeks later. Finally, I checked the drain line + fitting and realized my mistake. Backing out the fitting a few turns solved the problem.

 

FWIW........my car smoked like hell for a while! everybody was telling me that it was either my piston rings, or the valve seals.........i didnt believe what i was being told because my car never had those problems pre boost, and all that **** started the moment i turned my car on after i installed the turbo kit.

i was running a 2854 hybrid chinacharger that BEGi offers (i bought it used) i replaced the turbo with a Garrett GT2560r and what do ya know, no more smoke. it solved all my problems. boost was a lot better too, a hell of alot smother as well.

im not saying what worked for me will work for you, but if you can get your hands on another turbo, bolt it up, turn the car on and if it doesnt smoke than thats what your problem is. that is what i did because i can do that myself and it is a lil easier IMO than pulling the motor to have the rings and seals replaced!

 

I would definitely advise eliminating the turbo as a possibility for the oil consumption before I replaced the engine. Either by isolating the oil supply/drain like I did, or removing the turbo/manifold and reattaching the exhaust to see if the smoke remains.

In my case, I believe the oil control rings were damaged when the car was overheated by the previous owner or the fact that he had 8 quarts of oil in it when I got it. I bought it with plans of replacing the engine thinking the overheating had blown the engine (it did smoke), but then thought I got lucky when I discovered 8 quarts of oil were in it. After I drained the oil the smoke went away. I figured I would go ahead and install the turbo kit while I still had a second car. After installing the kit the smoke returned. I'm guessing the rings were damaged and the turbo put them over the edge or they were trashed all along and I just thought I had fixed it. Either way, the engine replacement fixed it.

 

Thanks for all your suggestions, I'm seriously leaning toward it being the turbo as no smoke coming up if spark plug is removed...

Idea of drain fitment being in too tight is an interesting one to be investigated.

Has anyone else had problems with the chinacharger?

 

Missing turbo oil supply line restrictor? BEGi has been known to ship incomplete/improperly built kits.

 

you shouldnt need a restrictor, others have the same turbo without one. they are only needed if the issue really is too much oil pressure.

 

We don't use oil line restrictors unless there is a need, and special ordered. In this case, one was not ordered, nor should it be needed. It has absolutely nothing to do with an incomplete or improperly built kit. If the excessive oil is from the turbo and not the engine, this would be the first China Charger to bite the dust. But that has not been confirmed yet either.
Stephanie

 

I should say that Steph and I have been in contact over this via email and hopefully a conclusion will be reached soon as my garage gets a chance to investigate further!

As with any mysterious problem it is always best to get a range of opinions, hence my post on here. There is a far greater range of turbo'd MX-5's (miata's if you must ) in the states than in the UK so chances are someone may have experienced something similar.

I will keep you all posted...

 

No worries! It was a great idea.
Stephanie

 

If this is truly the first shanghai turbo to fail, can you give us the total number of china chargers you've sold so we can get a statistical data point for failure rate?