I have been spending a lot of time and money on creating my dream car. I like to go fast so there for I bought a car with a turbo. The thing about turbos is that they also make bigger ones. And so I proceed in upgrading the necessary components to support such an endeavor while simultaneously catching fire to my wallet. No regrets. So far.
Turbo was installed along with the reprogrammed ecu and upgraded fuel injectors come to find out my car is running extremely rich. After trouble shooting and looking back on the parameters the ecu was set we figured out the fuel injectors we installed were too big. Fixed that checked for boost leaks. Car is running much better.
Until right before I get home as I’m pulling up to my house I suddenly heard a pop and I’ve lost boost. Look under the hood and find the vacuum hose has bursted off the solenoid nipple going to the waste gate. Also my turbo pressure blow off valve located on the charge pipe entering the throttle body has apparently been shooting oil as it releases said pressure which has shot out between the crack of my hood onto the top of my hood and my front bumper.
Sorry investigate. I take off the charge pipes from my intercooler and find out that there is oil, more than usual collected all throughout the charge system coming from the turbo. The is also oil coming from the breather and ventilation system and the breather valve on the waste gate solenoid. Hoping it is not a oil seal leak on my new turbo I then change out my PVC valve and clean up as much oil as I can.
I have just fixed the vacuum line and replace the PVC valve and started the car to find there’s still oil going through the system.
Could this just between the remaining oil still trapped in the system and that I have found the source of the leak?
Or could this truly be a sealant leak in the turbo charger which i’m still wavering on whether or not it is possible considering from what I understand if there was a leak in the seal it would run through oil courts at a time leaving my engine to start and then lock up.
Or could there be something internally wrong with my engine such as something wrong with the camshaft?
I’m pretty sure my catalytic converter is clogged because all of the carbon building up from it running so rich and probably from all the oil coming out of it possibly. I don’t know how worried I really should be.
IMHO the probability of it NOT being a turbo seal is about .0000000001.
You have a shaft with an impeller on one end being spun by the pressure of the exhaust system, an impeller on the other end with relative vacuum from the induction system, being heated nice and hot by the exhaust stream and spinning at perhaps 200,000 rpm, with an oil feed between them, the oil being held in by rubber seals… IMHO it’s a wonder ALL turbos don’t get oil drawn into the induction system!
I assume by “courts at a time” you meant “quarts at a time”. Leaks don’t have to be major to be leaks. Especially when you have high pressure on one side or a seal and vacuum on the other.
So with all this upgrade work, did you upgrade the crankcase evacuation system? Boosted engines (even factory turbo engines) can pressurize the crankcase from blow-by. It happens, rings aren’t perfect. Add to that, vacuum lines become pressure lines when the engine is on boost… so they pop off if they are not clamped, same for PCV lines. This is what happens when you modify engines, you push the failure point to the next weak link, you fix that next weak link and find the NEXT weak link.
BTW, did you increase the size of the fuel pump? High boost can require more boost than can be supplied resulting in a lean condition that burns a hole in the piston. Did you reprogram the ECU? On a dyno with a wideband O2 sensor in the car? If you didn’t you are playing with fire. If you can’t reprogram the Hyundai ECU, you will need to replace it with one you can, like a Haltech.
First off, @the_same_mountainbik is right, check the turbo. If the turbo seal is blown, you will see oil at the outlet side of the turbo plumbing all the way to the engine. If the evac system is the issue, you will see it from the evac line to the engine… So then either replace the turbo or re-engineer the evac system.
Either a turbocharger seal is leaking or there’s a crankcase ventilation problem would be my guesses and a clossed converter is also a possibility.
The easiest way to check for a clogged converter would be to use a vacuum gauge. Those gauges are cheap to purchase and very easy to use. A new gauge should come with an instruction sheet showing how to interpret gauge readings.
When it comes to clogged exhaust the gauge can exhibit several different readings although the instruction sheets only show one.
The odd one out is to rev the engine quickly at idle and let off. The needle should drop instantly to zero and then return to a higher than normal at-idle reading. The needle will then drop off slowly to the normal at-idle reading.
This is all assuming there are no vacuum leaks and the engine is sound mechanically.
The gauge will also show you instantly if there’s a mechanical problem with the engine itself. Hope that helps and good luck.