Originally Posted by rwyatt365

This is a "Good News, Bad News" story. About a week ago I was doing my normal thing; make a run in the morning on the way into work, analyze the data, make changes and then datalog the turn trip home. On the way in, I logged this;



...and I was pleased with the progress! It looked like I was (finally) on a track that would yield a spectacular result and I was stoked. About halfway of the way home that evening, I noticed that I had lost boost. Low power was fine, but there was no longer any boost. In addition there was a small "chirp" that was coming from under the hood. The final depressing thing was that I was starting to see billows of smoke coming out of the exhaust. I knew precisely what was happening - my EBay turbo had bit the dust.

I was too depressed to do much of anything for a few days, but last weekend I decided to tear apart the turbo and see what happened. When I took off the air cleaner, the problem was immediately apparent, the nut on the compressor wheel had literally fallen off! Thankfully it went into the filter, and not into the wheel so the damage was relatively limited, but the damage had been done. There was excessive axial play on the shaft (most likely as a result of the compressor wheel being loose and allowing the shaft to move around) which is allowing oil into the impeller and causing the smoke.

So, where am I? I'm going to get another EBay turbo (I'm REALLY cash-limited, so I can't do what I want - which is to get an EFR...next year, perhaps), get back on the road and save up my pennies for "the real deal".

Originally Posted by rwyatt365

This is a "Good News, Bad News" story. About a week ago I was doing my normal thing; make a run in the morning on the way into work, analyze the data, make changes and then datalog the turn trip home. On the way in, I logged this;



...and I was pleased with the progress! It looked like I was (finally) on a track that would yield a spectacular result and I was stoked. About halfway of the way home that evening, I noticed that I had lost boost. Low power was fine, but there was no longer any boost. In addition there was a small "chirp" that was coming from under the hood. The final depressing thing was that I was starting to see billows of smoke coming out of the exhaust. I knew precisely what was happening - my EBay turbo had bit the dust.

I was too depressed to do much of anything for a few days, but last weekend I decided to tear apart the turbo and see what happened. When I took off the air cleaner, the problem was immediately apparent, the nut on the compressor wheel had literally fallen off! Thankfully it went into the filter, and not into the wheel so the damage was relatively limited, but the damage had been done. There was excessive axial play on the shaft (most likely as a result of the compressor wheel being loose and allowing the shaft to move around) which is allowing oil into the impeller and causing the smoke.

So, where am I? I'm going to get another EBay turbo (I'm REALLY cash-limited, so I can't do what I want - which is to get an EFR...next year, perhaps), get back on the road and save up my pennies for "the real deal".