ok, here's the whole story. I have an 88 TII, and for the last couple of weeks I noticed an exhaust leak somewhere around my turbo. I took my turbo off the exhaust manifold and discovered a broken gaskett between my turbo and the exhaust manifold. I ordered a new one through the dealer, and guess what, those idiots ordered the wrong part. Well, I didn't want to wait another week so I made my own gaskett out of some thick sheet metal. I put it on, then put my turbo back on the engine, which brings me to my problem: My turbo now glows red hot when the engine is warmed up! I double checked all of the coolant and oil lines and they are all connected properly. I can't think of what could be doing this! Could it be the gaskett I made? Does the gaskett have to be a certain material? Also, I did not put the heat sheild/insulator cover back over the turbo, could this have an effect? I really don't see the cover making any difference in this situation, please help... also, as a side note, if your trailing plugs are mixed up and your leading plugs are mixed up, would it have any bearing on this problem? Because i had to pull all my plugs due to flooding, almost positive they are back on the right plugs though...sorry for the length

thanks,
kev

 

Good Lord, Kev! Yikes, making your gaskets out of thick sheet metal, of course your turbo is going to glow. My advice, Atkins Rotary on e-bay sells a whole gasket kit, unfortunatly it's for non-turbo only. Anyhow, I think they might sell the turbo one as well. Try contacting them at 253-848-7776. Talk to Kathy, she can help you. I bought a gasket kit and a set of apex seals from her just recently and they're better than the factory or ones that the stupid dealership orders. Good luck! I'm interested how this turns out for you.

 

I highly doubt that the homemade gasket is the problem. What is probably going on is that your car is running quite rich, and since you installed a leaky gasket air is getting into the turbo and the unburnt fuel is combusting there.

First, get a real gasket.

Now, fix your running rich problem. Replace your O2 sensor, make sure your AFM is still oriented in the factory position, and get you injectors professionally cleaned.

 

here is a picture of the gaskett, I felt as though it fit rather nice, but I'm sure you guys are right, I'll order a new gaskett this week and see if I get any more light shows. One quick question, is the oxygen sensor the sensor on the downpipe coming off the turbo? or is that something else?

thanks,
kev

 

I doubt it's the gasket, must turbo cars make them glow after driving hard.

 

Could it be possible that you have a clogged precat or main cat and you never noticed the glowing turbo because the heat shields were on there?

Does the car pulled hard? Has it lost power recently? are there similar t2 around to compare your power with?

My 87 and 89 turbocharger never glowed red unless they had been driven very hard.

If your turbo is glowing at idle (and your idle is around 1,000 rpm), I would guess there is a problem, whether you have clogged cats or maybe some other problem.

 

I know there is something wrong because my turbo should definitely not be glowing this red. To give you an idea of how hot this sucker is getting - I put the heat sheild back on and eventually the insulation material on the inside of the sheild caught on fire. I've heard that TII turbos are supposed to glow a little, but not this much!

 

I think Aaron Cake has the best idea of what is going on, because my car does run a little rich. I'll see what I can do when the new gaskett comes in

-kev

 

Running rich can be caused from a few things, including low compression on my last motor. It certaintly caused my Turbo to glow red. No problem with the new motor. Get the car on a 4 gas to see what's really going on, do a compression test, etc.