Knackered Turbo

[NobleGuy]

Heard from Turbo Technics today who said that the turbo has quite a bit of carbon depositing inside the bearing housing which has caused the wear, which is a bit wierd because I do usually let the car cool a bit on a slow run round the block and let it tick over for a minute or two after stopping.

Anyhow, the chap on the phone mentioned checking the engine breathing systems - what kind of things was he referring to?

[ThatPhilBrettGuy]

Catch tank is probably the best thing to reduce this. That's most likely what he means.

[tonyvan]

WAS IT THE FRONT TURBO??????? very good possibility it was.
you need to get rid of the steel catch tank/oil seperator,and replace it with an alloy one.you will be surprised how much loose bits of rusty metal are just waiting to get sucked up into the front turbo..........
contact forge motorsport.

[daddysumo]

tonyvan said:

WAS IT THE FRONT TURBO??????? very good possibility it was.
you need to get rid of the steel catch tank/oil seperator,and replace it with an alloy one.you will be surprised how much loose bits of rusty metal are just waiting to get sucked up into the front turbo..........
contact forge motorsport.

I agree with Tony. On my last track day at Donny one air filter was dripping with oil, and the oil had also run down into the turbo which can't be good. Ive got a Forge one ready to go on when I eventually get my car back which eliminates the breather return to the inlet so stopping all the nasty hot oily rusty stuff being ingested by the turbo !

[gaz 7404]

Or going straight out the bottom of the nasty mild steel catch tank and into the sump! Nice! all these mods people are doing (which is fine by the way) this is overlooked by a lot of people but its a fatal part for the engine imo,its one of the first things I made.

[Adrian W]

daddysumo said:

tonyvan said:

WAS IT THE FRONT TURBO??????? very good possibility it was.
you need to get rid of the steel catch tank/oil seperator,and replace it with an alloy one.you will be surprised how much loose bits of rusty metal are just waiting to get sucked up into the front turbo..........
contact forge motorsport.

I agree with Tony. On my last track day at Donny one air filter was dripping with oil, and the oil had also run down into the turbo which can't be good. Ive got a Forge one ready to go on when I eventually get my car back which eliminates the breather return to the inlet so stopping all the nasty hot oily rusty stuff being ingested by the turbo !

Bit worrying if that much oil is getting in the inlet, would suggest you have either overfilled it or you have a ring problem ()

To the op looking above, your engine breather vents back into the inlet to the front turbo, the catch tank mentioned above would collect it instead, if it's a lot of oil you have a worn engine.

Pro-Alloy do an oil breather/swirl pot especially developed for the Noble, it is alloy and works well enough that you dont need a catch tank.

Edited by Adrian W on Friday 17th October 08:27

[Noblescort]

daddysumo said:

On my last track day at Donny one air filter was dripping with oil, and the oil had also run down into the turbo which can't be good.

This happened to me yesterday at Castle Combe on the front turbo air filter (just before the wheel stud broke and put an end to the Noble for the day).

Mine has the original steel Noble oil seperator/catch tank. I was just wondering how changing from the steel Noble one to an ally one stops this oil-in(out of)-the-air filter issue?

[RobP]

Adrian W said:

Pro-Alloy do an oil breather/swirl pot especially developed for the Noble, it is alloy and works well enough that you dont need a catch tank.

Edited by Adrian W on Friday 17th October 08:27

+1. Not a drop of oil at the bottom of the i/cooler since changing over (with muchos track time)

[NobleGuy]

OK. I'm a technical numpty remember? What does the catch tank/breather look like? Is it the cylindrical black bottle-type thing situated near the intercooler?

P.S. Yes, front turbo. Checked the hoses around rear turbo and they're completely dry.

[Adrian W]

NobleGuy said:

OK. I'm a technical numpty remember? What does the catch tank/breather look like? Is it the cylindrical black bottle-type thing situated near the intercooler?

P.S. Yes, front turbo. Checked the hoses around rear turbo and they're completely dry.

yes, the Pro-Alloy one fixes directly in it's place,

[Noblescort]

Turbo'd cars are a new thing to me and I'm still not sure I understand how oil comes OUT of the air filter. If the engine breather vents to the induction pipe between the air filter and the turbo, why isn't the oil just sucked into the engine rather than flow out of the air filter? Is it something to do with wastegates?

[ACROWE]

The one from NobleMods works well too, and is easy to fit.

[Adrian W]

Noblescort said:

Turbo'd cars are a new thing to me and I'm still not sure I understand how oil comes OUT of the air filter. If the engine breather vents to the induction pipe between the air filter and the turbo, why isn't the oil just sucked into the engine rather than flow out of the air filter? Is it something to do with wastegates?

hmmmm depends on how worn the rings are, but blow by( especially under boost) will pressurise the sump and push oil vapour out of the breather, if the rings are worn you will also get oil sucked up on overrun and blown out of the exhaust. I think when you shut the throttle on cars with front mounted air filters, the filter would be the next (nearest) place for the oil to go, it could also be because the pipe on cars with front mount filters is a lot shorter than rear mount.

[mgbond]

The forge one for £138 doesn't vent back into the air intake it comes with a plug to block the hole and you vent the pipe down to the road.

Thats my understanding, haven't got round to buying one. Now Oz is off for another year I will be ordering one soon along with a few other bits

Bondy

[NobleGuy]

I cleaned my air filters while waiting for the turbo to be fixed and noticed the one connected to the front turbo was more dirty, although if my seals were as trashed as Turbo Technics say then I guess that's no surprise.

Presumably oil can be forced out of the engine as a matter of course whether the unit is perfectly healthy or not?

As for the rust in the catch tank, is it just a case of removing it and taking a peek?

P.S. Does the oil filter not remove these rust particles?

Edited by NobleGuy on Friday 17th October 10:02

[Adrian W]

NobleGuy said:

I cleaned my air filters while waiting for the turbo to be fixed and noticed the one connected to the front turbo was more dirty, although if my seals were as trashed as Turbo Technics say then I guess that's no surprise.

Presumably oil can be forced out of the engine as a matter of course whether the unit is perfectly healthy or not?

As for the rust in the catch tank, is it just a case of removing it and taking a peek?

P.S. Does the oil filter not remove these rust particles?

Edited by NobleGuy on Friday 17th October 10:02

I don’t know about the rusty tank thing, but I think that how hard an engine breaths is a good indication of how worn it is. Mine revs to 8000 and is running 1.8 bar of boost and does not breath, just in case of a catastrophic failure I have a catch tank after the breather and it's always empty.

[RobP]

The first 'fix' on an OEM set-up is to fit a restrictor (essentially with a smaller diameter aperture!) to the pipe leading from the sump to the Noble seperator/catch tank. This just costs a few pence and is pretty effective for normal road driving. For any track work you will need a Pro-Alloy (or similar)set-up to eliminate the problem.

[NobleGuy]

Adrian W said:

NobleGuy said:

I cleaned my air filters while waiting for the turbo to be fixed and noticed the one connected to the front turbo was more dirty, although if my seals were as trashed as Turbo Technics say then I guess that's no surprise.

Presumably oil can be forced out of the engine as a matter of course whether the unit is perfectly healthy or not?

As for the rust in the catch tank, is it just a case of removing it and taking a peek?

P.S. Does the oil filter not remove these rust particles?

Edited by NobleGuy on Friday 17th October 10:02

I don’t know about the rusty tank thing, but I think that how hard an engine breaths is a good indication of how worn it is. Mine revs to 8000 and is running 1.8 bar of boost and does not breath, just in case of a catastrophic failure I have a catch tank after the breather and it's always empty.

Is this what JNM would have been looking at with their leakdown test?

[Adrian W]

NobleGuy said:

Adrian W said:

NobleGuy said:

I cleaned my air filters while waiting for the turbo to be fixed and noticed the one connected to the front turbo was more dirty, although if my seals were as trashed as Turbo Technics say then I guess that's no surprise.

Presumably oil can be forced out of the engine as a matter of course whether the unit is perfectly healthy or not?

As for the rust in the catch tank, is it just a case of removing it and taking a peek?

P.S. Does the oil filter not remove these rust particles?

Edited by NobleGuy on Friday 17th October 10:02

I don’t know about the rusty tank thing, but I think that how hard an engine breaths is a good indication of how worn it is. Mine revs to 8000 and is running 1.8 bar of boost and does not breath, just in case of a catastrophic failure I have a catch tank after the breather and it's always empty.

Is this what JNM would have been looking at with their leakdown test?

Yes, there will be an acceptable level of leakdown (I dont know what it is on a car engine but on my racebikes it was 2%) assuming the head gaskets are ok It will eather leak from the top (valves) or the bottom (rings)they should be able to give you the results.

[NobleGuy]

I remember them saying 4 of the 6 test came back very well, and two of them were found to be at (from what I remember) 10-20%, although he did mention he did the test a bit later than he wanted to in terms of allowing the engine to cool down. He seemed happy enough.

Presumably that implies they leak more the cooler it is?