Is my turbo oil drain line causing oil to leak out of turbo?

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Is my turbo oil drain line causing oil to leak out of turbo?

By teal_dx
- Mon Jul 20, 2009 4:17 am #131604 First, I started my car for the first time this year :woot:
No CEL's and good idle! I let it idle for a few minutes and noticed a small drip where the drain line meets the oil pan. Turns out I had only hand tightened that -AN fitting and forgot about it.
I jacked up the car, tightened it up, and put it down for another idle test. This time it idles for a good 5-10 minutes and I saw more oil coming from the turbo. I thought I must have only hand tightened the top of the drain line too, but it was dry and tight. The oil was dripping out of the turbo's 5 bolt housing, the 2 bottom bolts that hold it on and the arm for the wastegate actuator. :(

My first thought was shit this was a freshly rebuilt turbo, did I get scammed?
But then I thought maybe it was a problem with my drain line which caused the oil to back up into the turbo. Especially since the oil was leaking by the pan before and now it had no where to leak except back up at the turbo.
Here's some pics of my drain line... Does it look restrictive? Maybe I should buy a 45° fitting for the bottom so the oil will continue to flow better toward the pan?

first 3 pics are where the oil was leaking out of the turbo...
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camera is slightly tilted in this pic... the line is really horizontal where it meets the pan

Also, could this have damaged the turbo? There was a puddle of oil about the size of a business card from the leak under the turbo.
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By d-mon
- Mon Jul 27, 2009 4:09 pm #133556 your oil drain doesn't look too restrictive.
some turbos require a restrictor in the oil feed line to prevent excessive oil pressure 'blowing' the turbo's internal seals.

if you disconnect the oil drain at the turbo and pour oil down it, does it flow quickly into the pan?
if the drain hose fills up then thats the problem.
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By teal_dx
- Mon Jul 27, 2009 4:50 pm #133566 I did use a restrictor on the turbo. I'll try the downpipe test you suggested.
Once oil has leaked through to the compressor side, does that mean the seals are blown and my turbo is in need of a rebuild?
Or after I find & correct the oil problem, is it not going to leak any more?
Once it leaks, is the damage done or did I stop it in time?

I have an apt to get the car dyno tuned this week and I don't know if I should cancel or not :?
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By d-mon
- Mon Jul 27, 2009 10:04 pm #133680 if you only had it running for a few minutes, it should not be a problem for the seals.

you can also try disconnecting the drain hose from the oil pan and get a can to catch the oil. then have someone start the car, while you watch the turbo for leaks.
obviously, don't run it very long, just enough to see what happens.
you may want plug the drain hole in the pan to prevent any possible mess for this test.

if the turbo still leaks from the waste gate arm with the drain hose going straight down into a can, then i would suspect a faulty seal (poorly rebuilt turbo?) or maybe still too much oil pressure even with the restrictor.
either way you will want to discuss your findings with the shop that rebuilt your turbo.
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By teal_dx
- Tue Jul 28, 2009 3:08 am #133739 I bought a 45° fitting today and drove out to work on the car. The new fitting was too much of an angle for the short distance. The hose did not have enough length to bend.

So I shortened the hose a little bit to make it more of a slope instead of a "L" with a curve in the corner. I also noticed that wen the car was on the ground, the angle was different than when it was on jack stands, enough to probably hurt the oil flow back to the pan. So I bent the pan fitting up a few degrees.

I had installed a 2.5bar map, 440cc injectors and a 255 LPH since the last time I started the car, so it barely ran. But I ran it for a couple min and oil dripped out from the hot side again.... but this time the oil was very dirty. The oil in my engine was very clean. The old oil had mixed with the soot in the turbo and was dripping out. Then I ran the car for a while longer and got the turbo hot enough to burn off all the oil in the hot side and sent a long oil cloud down the street :lol:
No more drips :woot:
Looks like even a few degrees on the return line can make a difference.
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By d-mon
- Tue Jul 28, 2009 2:51 pm #133810 a simple fix is the best kind.
you should post an 'after' pic, of how it looks now.

and maybe some ripper vids while your at it!
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