Tcat55371 Posted January 5, 2006 Share Posted January 5, 2006 Just got off the phone from the place thats rebuilding my stock turbo from the XT and the guy says he doesn't think it's bad. He told me I better look at other things before spending the money on this. So whatelse is there to look at? I changed the pcv valve, plugs have been changed and a were not black. Car runs great. Only smokes at low speed or stopped, does not smoke on the highway, clears right up when it gets out on the highway. Anything else I should be looking at? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
D-Cal Posted January 5, 2006 Share Posted January 5, 2006 Valve guides? Seals? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rallyruss Posted January 5, 2006 Share Posted January 5, 2006 Valve guides? Seals? It would be odd on a subaru but that would be my first guess too. your turbo rebuilder probably is not testing the seals but the bearings. seals may still be bad under actual use. um why bother getting the stock turbo rebuilt? I thought you had bigger and better things in the works? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tcat55371 Posted January 5, 2006 Author Share Posted January 5, 2006 when it gets off low speeds. It smokes out the exhaust so bad that you can't see behind it and it does it when it's at idle or comming off it. When it's on the highway it stops smoking. It's using oil now cause it's blowing it out the exhaust. Cant post any pictures because car is in my garage with the turbo off in the shop. The exhaust wheel on the turbo is NOT oily. If you were to compare it to a spark plug color, it's about the light brown that you want your plugs to look like which by the way mine do. I can't find a reason for this. If I had a broken ring I would think it would keep smoking and not clear up at highway speed. He hasn't pulled apart the turbo yet to see what it looks like on the compressor side but he says it has no play either direction so he doesn't think it's bad. He said to call him in a day and he will take the compressor side apart and look. He also said something about checking the oil drain. I'm guess thats the hose I had a heck of a time getting the clamp off down by the oil pan. I will run a wire down that fitting tonight when I get home. One other thing I have noticed is my oil dip stick rides about ½ inch out of the tube also. The silver alum intake that connects to the rubber hose is not oily either nor is the butterfly when you look down the intake. So how is the oil getting in? Would also think the plugs would not be so nice and light brown or that the smoking would stop at highway speeds if seals were bad because you are building higher oil pressure at higher speeds. I don't know, I'm at a loss. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
idosubaru Posted January 5, 2006 Share Posted January 5, 2006 piston rings or valve seals. i'm not an expert on this but i recall reading somewhere that these will be more obvious sometimes at idle than at speed. moving too fast to see it at speed, it's mixed with more exhaust and dilutes it, the oil burns more (or less) at higher rpm's reducing the amount of smoke you see...or a comination. just throwing that out there. from memory seems i see more cars smoking really bad sitting at redlights than going down the highway, but hard to say i don't see many smoking that bad. a compression test is super easy and might tell you something? a leak down test, while a little trickier and you need a compressor, would be better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tcat55371 Posted January 5, 2006 Author Share Posted January 5, 2006 Yeah I have the TD04 but I'm still looking for other parts. The XT is my daily drive until spring and thats when I was doing the swap. Figured the stock turbo would be a quick fix. Guess I'm wrong Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tcat55371 Posted January 5, 2006 Author Share Posted January 5, 2006 Yeah I guess I will have to start digging deeper. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frank B Posted January 5, 2006 Share Posted January 5, 2006 If your compressor wheel, intake, throttle body, and plugs are not oily or otherwise abnormal looking...I would guess that if the seals on the turbo have failed, that it is the exhaust side. Is it an auto or manual trans? Usually when an engine burns oil at the rate that it BLOWS it out of the exhaust, it's too worn out to run well at all! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tcat55371 Posted January 6, 2006 Author Share Posted January 6, 2006 I did some more snooping into my problem last night. Seems everyone is telling me my motor may be junk. I find that hard to believe. What I'm Guessing right now is the seal on the compressor side is bad in my stock turbo. My car has 132,000 on it now and still runs like a top. Uses about a quart of oil every 3000 miles. I found lots of oil in the intake last night that I didn’t see the other day and the aluminum pipe that connects the turbo to the throttle body has lots of oil. It was laying on it's side on the bench and it all pooled into a corner on it. So here is my guess: When the car decelerates and vacuum kicks in it pulls oil past the seal and dumps it in the intake causing the smoke. When I step on it and the turbo builds pressure, the seal lets the pressure thru and it's going back past my rings some and that’s what is causing my oil dip Stick to always pop about a ½ inch out of the tube. This is all a guess but the car was still running great with no misses so I have a hard time believing the motor is bad. Just have to wait and see what the turbo guy says. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tcat55371 Posted January 6, 2006 Author Share Posted January 6, 2006 Well I got some more info from him but not an answer yet. Found out these IHI turbos are like a diesel turbo and really dont use a seal to say. He says what could be happening in the bearing is wore which leads to more oil getting in the turbo and not draining out fast enough. Also this would explain why it really does it now that it's cold because the oil is thinker and takes longer to drain out and it could push it by. Just have to wait and see. He doesn't think it's a motor issue thou and that makes me a littl happier. On the other side, my TD04 and pipes showed up yesterday and they look really nice and clean. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bulwnkl Posted January 6, 2006 Share Posted January 6, 2006 Just to give you a little context, I have a Mitsubishi turbodiesel pickup. I rebuilt the motor shortly after I got it because it had massive blowby and huge piston-to-cylinder wall gaps. I did nothing with the turbo because the guy I got it from put a kit in it just before I got it ('Put a kit in it' essentially means rebuilt the turbo). The motor was great after that, but it would still burn a quart in about 200 miles if I was working it hard and you could never see a trace of oil smoke. The turbo was shot despite having just been rebuilt. I agree with you that your trouble is likely the turbo. Take care, though, because if the oil leak is a result of wear in the housing, a rebuild does not address that and you'll need a completely new unit. As I posted on XT6.net, I would be a little surprised if these turbos have actual 'seals' in the sense of a crank seal or a cam seal. Turbos 'normally' create their own oil seal through the design of the shaft and housing and the oil flow around them. This is why it is possible to rebuild a turbo (even completely replace the turbine wheel, compressor wheel, and shaft) and still have it leak oil; if the housing is worn. EDIT: I see that you posted back a little before I got this up. Good luck with the TD04! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tcat55371 Posted January 6, 2006 Author Share Posted January 6, 2006 Yeah he kinda said the same thing. The Xt up until this happened was only using a quart of oil every 2500 miles. So I'm still going to be the turbo. Will see what he says and let everyone know. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Meeky Moose Posted January 6, 2006 Share Posted January 6, 2006 just from my experience, valve guides/seals and/or rings will cause smoking and the like at low rpm's / idle.. ever see a dodge caravan smoke when takin off at a light? the valve guides fall down in the heads and cause that.. anyways, turbo's usually don't leak unless they are spooled up.. at idle / low rpm's that turbo isn't doing anything but looking nice under the hood.. i had a turbo last 297k on a turbo wagon.. the turbo is the one on my rx wagon now.. still doesn't leak or have any blowby whatsoever.. these little IHI turbo's are tough.. right now mines runnin 10psi too Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frank B Posted January 7, 2006 Share Posted January 7, 2006 Did you ever replace your PCV valve? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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