So I finally had some free time last night and I decided to pull the 7 in the garage and see what I could figure out. Needless to say working on this and working on the pushrod engines I have my whole life isn't exactly the same thing. One thing i've seen however is this car is manageable to work on you just have to take your time and figure out your easiest path of operation.........but I digress.

I started it up and gave it some gas. With the car in gear it lugs down real bad like it wants to stall. With the car in neutral it will rev to redline but the first 3k rpms arn't really fast. When it gets to 3k or so I can hear the turbo spooling under the hood and the needle skates to redline without a problem. The problem appeared to be some blue tinted smoke that was now filling the garage.

I removed the intercooler inlet pipe to check for oil "I read it in the faq" I didn't find any oil just a normal residue. For the life of me guys I can't find out where a diagram is of the turbo inlet duct so I can check the shaft play of the turbine. I know where the turbo is and it appears that you would have to remove it to check the shaft play on the housing. Yet reading different articles on how to check it makes it sound like something you don't have to pull it apart to do. If anyone can help me i'd appericate it. Thanks.

 

I think you'd have to pull the TID to check the turbo for shaft play, unless you have long fingers.

 

Yea remove the black S shaped turbo inlet duct behind the AFM. Then there's the shaft for the turbo, so you can spin it and push and pull on it.