So recently someone very kind gave me an S4 turbo. No shaft play at all. Turning is semi-stiff. Like spinning something with crud caked on it. However, in turning it, I can hear some metal clinking once in a while. I was told that the motor it came off blew and that the apex seals may have come out the exhaust and into the turbo.

What are my options for

a) getting it to turn freely (how freely should it turn??)
b) getting this peice of apex seal or whatever is in there out?

Looking at the turbo, I don't see any easy way of tearing it apart, without completely tearing it apart.. if that makes sense....

 

take the hot side out and check it out

 

blowthrough it with an air blower and see if you can get it to come out...blow gently and tip it around, shake it and stuff....

thats pretty well correct, if your gonna take the hotside off the turbo....you may as well rebuild it because the whole thing is going to be apart

 

I just pulled some bolts off of the hotside... Had 3 metal spacers or something that were held down by 6 bolts... do i need to hammer the hotside off? I'm not entirely sure how this thing goes together and I can seem to find anything that shows it in an exploded view.

I searched and used FSM and have Haynes manual in front of me...

 

ok... got the front housing off and the nut that's on the shaft with the fins.... how do i get the fin off? tried unscrewing it.. that doesn't work... can't seem to knock it off.... any suggestions?

 

yea big rubber hammer if you have one. Any of the fins have damage?

 

Front fins in great shape.. can't seem to get to the rear section though hehe

 

dont touch the wheels you dont need to.

 

aren't the wheels holding the two housings together? Not actually holding them together, but in the way of me removing the hot side? Cuz this damn thing won't budge

 

PB Blaster is your friend, along with a dead blow mallet.

 

Ok.. so witht he 6 rear bolts out (or slightly in because I can't get them all the way out with the oil and coolant inputs in the way) i just need to bash the son of a bitch till it falls off? It will disconnect somewhere in the middle and the whole backside will come off? I don't need to remove anything from the shaft(s) to get the hotside off of the blower side?

Sorry... I know ABSOLUTELY nothing about the internals of these things and I do not want to screw it up...

 

you have the compressor side off now? with the shaft bare?

once thats off and the bolts on the exhaust side are loose (since they do jam) just be persitent....

 

No.. i was unable to get the wheel off. Not sure how it comes off of the shaft. I really want to get it out of the way

 

there is a nut on the top of the compressor wheel..hold the exhaust turbine while you undo it...onice the nut is off and the bolts out of the compressor housing it should all slip off (on the compressor side anyways)

 

got nut off.. but the wheel isn't sliding off... it don't wanna budge.. affraid to mess with it lol.. anyone got an exploded view of the turbo?? stupid manual just says throw the damn thing away and get a new one.. but with no shaft play... i ain't givin up

 

should come right off with no nut....get some penetrating oil and a HUGE can of paitence - hehe

 

Why did you take off the wheel? There was no reason too just extra work. keep loosening the bolts on the hotside and they will eventually help push the hotside away from the cartridge. do it in a star pattern if possible to make sure it comes off evenly.

 

ok got it open and got a peice of apex seal for my efforts...

Now... seems the hot side wheel is rubbing against the cap'ish type thing behind it... also looks like the seal behind the cap is garbage... might leak oil? What are my options from here?

 

Is it safe to use a dremel and grind away the surface rust where the hot wheel comes out the exhaust? The wheel is scraping at the rust...

 

Sorry for more questions... how freely should it spin? I put it all together and decided to sand out the rust anyways... Before I completely tightened the Hotside bolts down... It spun almost like on a bearing and ran pretty well.. After tightening the hot side all the way down.. i give it a spin and it spins fast but slows down quite quickly.. is this normal?

 

yes, it is normal its not supposed to keep spinning for like 10 seconds, make sure that turbo is ok though.. if you found an apex seal in there.

 

Well it spins freely without noise. No shaft play at all. Forward/Backward clockwise/counter... Hooked up a dremel and spun it. Not sure how fast it got to, but it was blowing some air. The bit for my dremel ended up melting hehe.

Other than not being sure of it's free spinning ability, everything seems very good. Both wheels are in beautiful condition with no bends or chips. This is an S4 Turbo... so the wastegate is that little lever on the back correct? If I'll be running a pretty wide open exhaust, I should port that right? You port on the other side of the Valve? that damn hole is pretty tiny.

 

yes you'll need to port the wastegate and enlarge your flapper to run a full exhaust (at least its recommened to prevent boost creep)

there are TONNES of good threads on this kicking aorund

 

you'll probably need to send the turbo out for balancing and re assembly now since you took it apart.
or am I wrong?

 

I never got any of the wheels off? I put it back in pretty much exactly as it came out also, except my two housings might be a little crooked, but I wouldn't think that would change the operation of the turbo?