Just like the title says I've just about had it with my turbo setup on my 98 Z 2.4. I have been without the car for about three months now and I'm sure some of you can feel my pain. I have tried everything I could think of, everything that was suggested, and spent way too much money to turbo a car that three months later has yet to see boost....

I found that the drain on a 2.4 cannot go back into the pan because the pan is constanly full. So I bough a (Very expensive) turbo oil bildge pump, no change Still copious ammounts of smoke out the exhaust (oil smoke) just idling, (unbearable when revved up). This is all with about a 1/8" feed line with a .060" restrictor. So I figured it must be the turbo, sent it off to florida for a $350 rebuild. Got it back and put it back in, two minutes of clear idleing then again with the smoke...everywhere. I'm at my wits end, unless I solve this problem and soon all this crap is getting sold. Please Help me...

What brand turbo are you using and is the car burning oil or is the turbo consuming it? Also, why not tap the block for the return line? I'm not sure what your engine mods are or if you have rebuilt your motor but i am rebuilding mine because my piston rings are worn and my valve guides and seals are shot. This made my car burn a lot of oil.

wow man that sucks. throw a stock exhaust manifold on it with a stock dp for a minute and see how that runs, if it doesnt burn oil you know where the problem lies, if it does, then again you know what the problem is



LE61T PTE6262 Powered

The turbo is a Garrett T3 super 60. The guy who rebuilt it for me actually broke it down that the guy who sold me the turbo (eBay) ripped me because the turbo has a Turbo Coupe compressor side, Mercedes Benz exhaust housing, and a Buick GN Turbine wheel, which all had to be machined to make it fit together right. But Its is good for sure, I'm thinking it must be the drain setup still thats clogging oil in the turbo and blowing past the seals... The engine never burned any oil before the turbo install and is in very good mechanical condition.

Tapping the block is something to consider but I'm not sure where/how to do that and how to get the oil shavings out If I do...

half way down the page is where my oil drain back was at when my cav had a turbo , never had smoking issues , and had a regular braided oil line for the feed -6 i think

http://www.cardomain.com/ride/478869/4

i had to notch the pan rail and a small portion of the block so the fitting on the hose would screw on , the fitting welded in to the pan went in on a slight angle as well as it being a 45 degree fitting

To tap the block, you would need to disassemble it completely to be 100% safe. I know its a pain but it is an alternative if you are not comfortable tapping into the pan. To see pics of a tapped block, check out Skilz cardomain page. One question, is the turbo clocked so the oil can drain strait down? Other than that, do what QBE said and that will tell you if it is the engine or turbo for sure. If you do all this and it's still pissing oil, I hate to say it but it's probably the turbo itself that you should replace. Goodluck

yeah, if everything was machined to fit, thousands of years tell us man is not perfect. that MAY be a good starting point. but make sure your return is straight down and into the highest point on the pan



LE61T PTE6262 Powered

You have a 2.4 and so do I. I have a turbo 2.4 you can have the drain go into the oil pan and no issues. It needs to be high on the pan, but many people have done this route. I also have no restrictor on my oil feed and no issues. I would be preforming a compression check and leak down test on your motor.



FU Tuning

I also have a 2.4 with a turbo...tapped right at the top of the pan and have had no issues will anything leaking or being consumed...hope you figure something out..

Well crap, I dont know why but I am 100% sure that the oil in the pan was all the way up to the gasket on the top, I had the return at the very very top right under the lip and still had oil back-feeding into the drain line. The only thing that leaves me to suspect is that the PCV system is still not venting crankcase pressure, I must be pressurizing the pan...I dunno I'll look into it, I appreciate all your help guys, I really want this thing to work!!

I bought a brand new turbo had the same prob. smoking all the time. I new my car didn't burn oil prior so I pulled the turbo. It was wet brand new turbo... Junk got it rebuilt, everything ok other than fuel issues. Its always something. Im ready to sell Mine to tired of all this crap after spending thousands of dollars on a crapy cavalier.

Good side for you though It really shouldn't be your return in the pan, as long as it is high and goes down hill from turbo to the pan. I ran a 3/4 line. The first time i hooked the turbo up I just used clear plastic hose. I crawled under the car to see if the oil was flowing ok. So that is something else you can try.


2nd Place is the first loser

Mine would smoke. I bought a Function 7 oil inlet restrictor off of ebay and am using 4 AN line and as soon as I installed that it stopped smoking white. My oil pan is tapped at the highest point inline with the turbo exit.


~Boost. Its what's for dinner!~

Ummm... silly question, but have you run the car for more than 2 minutes after putting the turbo on, or did you say F@#$ it and walk away? Reason is, I know the exhaust pipes probably have a nice coating of oil inside which needs to be burned off. BTDT, actually.

-->Slow

Yeah I have run it numerous times, and I actually drilled a hole in the lowest point of the exhuast and let it drip for a few days till it stopped.

So Here's my next question: How many of you who posted above have the HO manifold and where did you run your PCV hoses?

idk if you'd want to try it or not, but could you drain maybe 2 quarts of oil out of the pan (one might even work) and see if it runs fine then... you would know for a fact that the oil would be draining into the pan correctly then, if it doesnt... you have an issue with something else.

are you even sure that the oil is going THROUGH the line to the pan? maybe its clogged? id really think you would have checked that before blowing all that money first though.. just throwing ideas out there man!

Like z yaaaa said are you sure the oil is going through the line? If I were you I would run clear hose from the turbo to the pan and make sure the oil is flowing. Once the clear line is on quick crawl under the car and check it. Don't wait to long cause that stuff cant handle much heat.

I have a HO mani. I still have the line going from the timing chain housing to the oil/air separator. The other line at the separator I just put a filter on it for now, but it should go pre-turbo. where the hole is in the head, I taped it out and put a NPT fitting in it. From the fitting I ran a vac line to a check valve, from the check valve to a lawn mower fuel filter (to catch to oil). Than from the filter to the mani. You have to have the check valve in there other wise when you make boost it is going in your crank case.

Hope this help you out.


2nd Place is the first loser

Yeah the line is clear...err.. not blocked. I did run a clear line when I had the oil draining into the pan and it was backing up in the line when off and when running, I did get it to flow properly when I hooked the PCV hose directly to the intake mani but that made a horrible vacum leak sound and wouldn't have worked when boost hit, which is Why i bought the pump...

At the risk of sounding really dumb, where is this hole in the head I didn't even know there was one...

Well if you don't know about the hole in the head and don't have any of the oil/air separator lines hooked up to the mani you shouldn't have positive crank case pressure.

The hole in the head is in between 2 and 3 cylinders, I think. The hole is a passage that goes down inside the oil air separator. If you do a search look up Cylinder Head PCV Hole - 2.4 and read what skilz typed, he is right on with it.


2nd Place is the first loser

Okay I took the intake mani off and tapped the PCV hole, then I put everything back together without the turbo oil pump and just put the drain back into the pan. I hooked all the PCV hoses back up with the left (pass side) hose going to the timing cover like normal, my new tapped hole on the head to a vac port on the T/b and the right (closer to drivers' side hole I ran a long hose and put it into the intake before the Turbo. I started it up and there was only a little puff and then no smoke so thats good, I didn't get a chance to drive it I have a (dripping) oil leak to take care of still which is comming from the oil drain flange that I bought from eBay which has developed a nice huge crack and is dripping oil all down my drain line... so bottom line is I think it worked I just need to go test it once I get my leak fixed.

And on a related note; I dont have the FMU hooked up and I have the wastegate tied open but when I just revved it sitting as I went up in revs I my UEGO showed that I was running lean ? I'm not sure why I still have the stock injectors in and like I said no fuel mods hooked up.. I dunno.

Alright I tapped the manifold and ran that to vaccum, dumped the oil pump and put the drain back in the pan. I can start it up and let it idle and it will not smoke, although it does idle with a A/f ratio of like 13.2 or so, rather rich, and my boost gauge reads 20psi of Vac. ok so far so good... then i try and rev it up and the boost gauge doesn't near zero instead it reads More Vaccum...wtf #1. so thats weird, keep in mind right now I have no boost, am on stock injectors and FPR and have no fuel mods, so why doesn't it just run like stock? wtf#2. Then I tried to drive it just a little bit because I was happy the smoke seemed to be gone....nope. It started smoking like a crack-addicted carnival worker, wtf#3 And to cap it all off when i turned around my A/f ratio went off the charts lean(over 18) and the car started to sputter... I just barely made it back to the house wtf#4...so that where I'm at and i cant even look at the damn thing cause I'm so pissed off....

Okay can somoe at least shed some light on why my gauge reads more vac when I rev it? The only thing I changed was running the PCV port on the head to the manifold, isn't that what most people do?

Okay here I am four and a half months later and the car hasn't even seen boost. I am on my fifth oil drain setup, second turbo rebuild, have had the intake manifold off three times and the turbo off too many to count. My newest drain setup is a straight down as it could be with 5/8 hose and a 45* elbow into the pan. I tapped the manifold to have a port for the PCV from the head which I ran into vaccum on the intake manifold. I even ran the large PCV hose into intake vaccum before the turbo. I have an oil feed restrictor and an running about 1 qt. of oil low. I just dont know what to do with it. I cant keep borrowing people's cars to drive to work. I think that short of a miracle the turbo system is comming off and the car is going back NA.

I'd just rev the @!#$ out of it.

No but really, drive it around a lot, it could be just @!#$ caked on in there.



LE61T PTE6262 Powered

Ok. time for a reality check.
5 drain systems and no change... quit worrying about the drain.

1st, where is the oil coming from?
If its still really using oil, instead of just burning out the tailpipes as most have suggested, is the engine oil level dropping?
If its not, the oil is just left over crap in the pipes. It can take a really ............really long time to burn it out.

2nd, if it will smoke after a minute or 2 of idling, just disconnect the feed to the turbo and let it idle and see if it goes away. If it is the turbo your not hurting anything anyway. If it isnt, you still wont hurt much just idling.

Feel free to ignore your wideband at this time, the oil will affect it. It can even kill it.

3rd, I dont know what to think about the turbo anyway. The stuff the second guy told you means he's extremely good at turbos or really talking out his ass. Both sellers sound suspicious. A cracked center housing could cause all these issues.

4th, what are you running for an intake?
A really restrictive intake can suck oil into the charge tubes no matter how good it drains. The important part of a drain system isn't that it flows well, its that it flows well enough to keep pressure in the housing lower than pressure in the intake. A leak to the intake would mean charge pipes filled with oil and oil fouled plugs.

Which brings us to 5th. How's the engine? Is there a large amount of blowby evident by air blowing out when the oil cap is opened?
A pressurized crankcase = see #4.



sig not found

Okay I think I found the problem. When I opened the oil cap it nearly blew off. (<exagerating but there was still a lot of air comming out.) So that means my crankcase is pressurized..so bad rings right? If that is the case I guess its time for an overhaul. In the meantime I'm just gonna start switching it back to NA so I can at least drive it while I save up some cash... Can someone verify that that is correct? I really just want someone to verify that before I tear it all apart again.