uh-oh - turbo drainback issues/guidelines

[Eric Deslauriers]

This morning I got to the exhaust shop and noticed the turbo is leaking oil at a very unreasonable rate out the exhaust and at the intake/exhaust housing joint.

After calling Turbonetics and not getting a lot of help (You need new seals), I called Turbo Tech in Tacoma, WA and told the fellow the same story. He immediately asked me where my turbo oil drain was pointing.

It's not quite 6 (this I can fix), but it's also not a straight shot to the drain. I only have about 2-3" vertically and about 10-12" horizontally to the drain. I can gain maybe 1" by cutting down the return pipe on the block.

I ended up having to loop the hose under the frame. I see now that this was an error. <wry grin>

Anyone have any real objections to cutting a (round!) hole in the frame?

Any minimum guidelines or success stories ya'll can share since "near vertical" is out of my reach?

Even if I have to build a new manifold, this is still one of the funnest projects I've done recently. smile.gif

OTOH, my wife has her heart set on going on a 700 mile trip this weekend (starting Fri), so I'm all for "engineering" this for the moment (though not at the cost of an engine due to pouring all my oil on the roadway).

TIA!

[ 08-21-2003, 11:34 AM: Message edited by: Eric Deslauriers ]

[britannic]

Did you install the drain so it uses the gallery behind the mechanical fuel pump?

[Eric Deslauriers]

Oops, yes I did.

But my turbo had to be installed lower to clear the floor on my MH.

[britannic]

There must be a restriction in the drain, since oil is entering under pressure from the feedline and even with a lower turbo, or loop in the drain, it should be able to overcome gravity without forcing out of the turbine/compressor seals.

I had a restriction in the adaptor plate drain when I first installed my turbo, which forced oil into the intake and drained the oil pan in about 8 minutes!

[Eric Deslauriers]

So I just spent the last few hours redoing my drain = no joy. I don't have much of an angle, but there's a definite angle to it. And if I fill the return hose w/ oil, it drains right down.

I've come to the conclusion the seals are shot in this turbo. :(

Hopefully I can find a set tomorrow (Portland -Tacoma is a 300 mile round trip), get it rebuilt, and it won't leak. And I won't need a cartridge.

Consarnit! I knew I should have gotten it gone through.

[britannic]

Which turbo do you have? I have a low mileage Bank's Garrett T04B in excellent condition for sale, if that's of any use to you.

[Eric Deslauriers]

Will it fit the Rayjay flange? Mine's a 3a**ee7081

If the Banks mount is the same size as the GM, I'll have to redo my mounting flange. After the last 40 hours worth of work on this, I'm not real keen on that at the moment. smile.gif

e-mail me details & pics plz - eric at LVMT dot net

I'd also need the/a downpipe since the Rayjay is 2.5"

[britannic]

The turbo has a 3" outlet, I do have a downpipe flange stub for a 3" exhaust. Let me know if it's still viable for and I'll take some pictures.

[Eric Deslauriers]

I think I may have fixed the problem. The guys who ran the intake (an exhaust shop) kinked the suction-side hose for the CDR where it came into the tube they fabbed for me.

I found it this morning while I was going back over everything.

Unkinked it and within 5 minutes driving down the road, no more smoke.

I just got back from about 45 miles and except for blowing out the intake manifold to air-cleaner replacement "seal" (vacuum hose cut in half until I can find a suitable replacement) twice, no problemas!

Let me see what the weekend looks like!

Thanks for everything!!!

I'll be posting a complete writeup soon for all you class-A owners. ;)

[britannic]

Excellent news! I'm interested to hear how that turbo works out with the 2.5" outlet, let us know the EGTs/boost for a given gear and speed.

[Eric Deslauriers]

Yeah, as soon as I get a working EGT gauge. Anyone have one they want to part with cheap?

Get this, the MH came with a VDO and probe. No worky.

The turbo came with a Spearco & probe. No worky.

After 45+ hours last week alone on this project, plus 55 at work (Yes, there was at least one night I hit the sack at 5:30AM and got up at 8 ready to go to work!), I misplaced the Spearco probe. Spearco gauge was supposed to work, so bought what I'm told is the correct probe from big instrument shop here in town. No worky.

Take gauge to the shop - tests good.

Screw it, I'll install the gauge anyways. No worky. I'm hoping the Spearco probe will work - if I can find the durn thing! Sigh.

I just put 900 miles on it over the weekend and am pretty pleased with the performance increase. Especially since timing is still a SWAG. ;)

I'm glad I sorted out the crankcase sucker-outer (what the heck is that called again? CDR?)

Overall, it is one of the coolest projects I've done in a long time.

I just got back from my trip, which included WA-97 to and from Chelan, WA. Lots of hills. I can now go up hills 2x+ faster than I used to be able to. Fuel mpg didn't increase much, but I was running 10-15psi boost most of the way, so I was happy it didn't *decrease*! All that right-footed abuse and I pulled ~11mpg. When I can get by at 55 and 5-7psi, my mpg jumps way up.

Not bad considering:
a) It's an '83 and prolly weighs more than any newer one its size
b) AC was on the whole time
c) TH400 doesn't have a lockup torque convertor
d) running 4.56s in the rear pumpkin (good thing a 4L80E is going in next!)
e) there's a lot of durn hills!!

Exhaust Masters in Beaverton did the exhaust work. The exhaust turned out very nice, but here are some non-positive issues I had
a) used a torch way more often than necessary - melted some of the wire loom in 4-5 places, didn't replace
b) while doing intake tube, melted a hole in a vacuum canister - too much torch again.
c) All three passenger side exhaust manifold to exhaust pipe studs (were new) fell out 150 miles from Wenatchee at about 10:00 at night.
On Sat, it took Midas 4 hours to get the right studs and get them in. OTOH, they "only" charged me $60 to put them in
Midas took my CB antennas off not to break them on the ceiling of their shop. And forgot to put them back on. One was still on the roof, along with a Crescent wrench from their shop. GRRRR. I'd rather have the antenna.
d) All three driver's side studs were finger tight, so Midas tightened them for me.

The pipe work was pretty good at Exhaust Masters. The only complaint on the pipe was one intake mod and I'm going to ask them to fix it tomorrow. And eat the $60. Not sure they can solve my downtime when I should have been at the amusement park (http://www.slidewaters.com/).

Not that Midas impressed me. It was a 10 minute job if they had had the freakin' studs. OK, 1:10 since I had an hour wait as a walkin.

[britannic]

With 15psi of boost, 2.5" turbo outlet, hills and weight you really need that EGT gauge pronto; it's very easy to take the EGT over 1050F and into the danger zone.

[Eric Deslauriers]

Yeah, don't I know it. :rolleyes:

I was wetting myself at first, but I didn't see any red parts (would lift the engine cover at night at speed), so I'm not too concerned at the moment. I also left the front of the wheelwell out to help provide a large flow of air over the turbo & manifold, so it has a lot more cooling than a pickup would. The turbo is located a fair distance behind the airbox, which is now a ram-air system.

I used the airbox out of a 96 1/2T 'Burb and spun it 90 degrees. I may have a wet filter problem in the rain, but only time & testing will tell if it's significant.

I'll canvass eBay and see if I can find one. We're not going anywhere soon, so it's not a hot (ha!) issue at the moment.

[britannic]

You're very unlikely to see any red hot iron (more common in a gasoline turbo engine than our diesels), but the aluminum piston crowns fail first, especially #7 and #8 in the rear of the engine as the EGT's climb past 1100F.

[whatnot]

If you have a lot of space, it might be worth getting an innercooler. The bigger ones sell for almost nothing on ebay.

[Eric Deslauriers]

Intercooler... Hmm. smile.gif

I picked up a new VDO EGT kit (complete) for 106 shipped on eBay. Should have it in a week.

Thanks all!

[Eric Deslauriers]

Finally got the EGT gauge installed and played with the MH a bit. It's something I WANT to drive now, rather than feel I must. Varoom, baby!

I managed to get the temps up to 650 running up my hill (foot on the floor, 2nd/3rd). W/ the turbo it's only about a minute now (vs 2-3 before). It's sooo much better. Wow.

I'll post more details as I get them. It'll be a couple of weeks at least as I'm busy parting out a K5 and then need to pick up my new to me Cherokee. That's one baaad boy.

Poor guy from Banks called me to see if I had made up my mind about their turbo. He was surprised/impressed when I told him I had fabbed my own since they didn't have one and asked their standard questions I'm sure.

I still think the Banks is actually very good bang for the $$. If I would have gotten a reasonable (vs screaming) deal on my turbo, I would have had about 2/3-3/4 of the $$ in it as the cost of a Banks and a lot less headaches and worries.

This was still cooler than heck!!! Thanks everyone!!!!!!!!!!