Time for Turbo Rebuild?
 

Well....car has 1200 miles on it now.

The car has been running great, but today I was fine tuning my 20 psi tune (adding a little timing:)).

After that, I stopped to adjust my two-step. I had the two-step at 4500 making 3psi.....not much. Messed with a few setting and got it up to 10psi.

Immediately after that, the turbo started making noise (not metal on metal, but a very very noticeably "hum"). Stopped and killed then engine, pulled the Air Filter off to check out the shaft and found quite a bit of side to side movement when moving the compressor wheel.

So, I set off to get home. About 2 miles before I got to my house I started to here metal on metal contact, but only about 5 seconds or so when I was almost stopped at a stop light (as the turbo was slowing down). It seemed like it would make more noise with less load. If I gave it a little throttle, it would actually get quieter (as far the new turbo sounds).

I guess if I need to rebuild it, I will order the stuff tomorrow. Fun Fun

wtf Mike?

Not sure exactly what turbo you have right now, my memory isn't that good. gpopshop.com sells rebuild kits for a good price and they supposedly ship fast.

What kind of oil feed system do you have? What size AN feed line and are you running a restrictor, .060 is what's commonly used.

Precision Turbo SC61 T3/T04E

No Restictor. I want to say it is about 3/16" Line.

Tell me about it....I can't get this thing going for any length of time.................................

At least you're in good hands with Chad and company. BTW, loved your video with the C5.

Check braineack's how to for additional info. Knowing you I'm sure you won't need it.

You're not using steel braided a/n line and AN fittings?
I would run a restrictor with that turbo, spend the money on the fitting from ATP turbo. I'll get you a link.
Not sure what oil pressure you're maxing out at with the built motor but stock max oil pressure of 90 psi when cold will blow by the seals on some turbos. That's where the restrictors come into play. .060 for journal bearing .030 for ball bearing.
When i bought my car it had some shitty high temp silicone feed line, it cracked and after repairing it my turbo started smoking. A piece of rtv had somehow gotten in the oil system and bypassed the filter or something. Anyway, the thrust bearing had RTV in it when it was disassembled. It was bypassing oil and shaft play was like woah.

It is Steel Braided Lines and AN Fittings. 3/16" would actually be a -3AN. My oil pressure with Bill's Billet Steel Oil Pump Gears really isn't all that high. With 10W30, Cold OP is from 40-50 all the time, Hot OP is 15 psi at idle and 40 psi max. Might need to go with 10W40 next oil change.

Yeah, that actually sounds pretty low, interesting.
Either way a rebuild is in order. I'm interested to know if you have oil coming out the turbine or the compressor. If not something must have gotten into the oil feed blocking oil flow causing the bearings to wear. Not sure what else would cause premature wear like that.

Backfires in the manifold (from the two-step) do tend to put a lot of energy in front of the Exhaust Turbine. Maybe I screwed something up doing that. Of course, There are a lot of people that use launch control and it doesn't seem like a really common problem.

I am going to order the "High Performance" Rebuild for it tomorrow. Never rebuilt a turbo before, fairly easy?

Yeah, really easy to rebuild them. Look in the archives of this forum on the main page. There is a writeup on a T25 and T3 rebuild, you should be able to figure it out from that.

You might want to get a 360* thrust bearing if you're putting that much force on things. The 270* or whatever that comes standard might not be enough for you anymore.

I'll check it out, how long does it take (so I can allocate time for it, last dumb question...hopefully). I'm going to go with beefiest stuff I can for the rebuild. 1200 miles is unacceptable IMO.

Thanks

That turbo should hold up for thousand upon thousands of miles.
The rebuild won't take you more than 2 hours. That includes cleaning the hell out of everything. Heck you could probably get the turbo off the manifold, rebuild it, and bolt it back on in about 2-2.5 hours. It's easy man.
If gpop wants big money for a 360 thrust look on ebay, they show up for sale on there as well.

Thanks bud, I appreciate the help.

Is your compressor housing held on with brackets and bolts or a big snap ring? Should be bolted with a turbo that large. Just curious because snap rings are a PITA.

http://www.atpturbo.com/Merchant2/me..._Code=ATP-OIL1

Wideopentuning (forum member) might be able to get a discount on it as well.

I'm pretty sure it's bolted, I would have to double check though.

Pulled the turbo out and took it apart (it may never be the same). After inspecting the turbine housing, I noticed that it was covered in carbon except just a part of it was nice clean metal....I assume that the turbine wheel was scraping there. Inspected the turbine wheel and it looks good, so I'm not going to worry about it.

Hopefully I don't run into any problems with the rebuild. I might have already botched it by trying to turn the nut to remove the compressor wheel the wrong direction....status of shaft straightness.... unknown. Still spins freely, but I doubt a minor bend would make it stick. But, on a side note, I know how to take it apart now...so I shouldn't run into the problem again.

Mike, take a pic of the "restriction" on the oil feed line you told me about.

I don't own a digital camera....BUT I will say that the opening is only about 1/8" diameter. Seems pretty small to me.

When I get up there Thursday, we can pull the feed line off the turbo and take a pic (if you want).