Today I took the FD on down to Fry's and spent about an hour wandering around looking at stuff I dont need. When I got back out to the car and fired it up I got a pretty good puff of blue smoke. It cleared up in just a second and didnt smoke the rest of the drive home. I noticed this same thing about a week ago too. My guess is that when it sits about an hour some of the oil in the turbos seeps past the seal and sits in the exhaust side and burns off after I fire it up. If it sits longer maybe it drains further down the exhaust so I dont see the puff of smoke right away. Anything else that could cause this? If I had a piston motor I would swear it was valve stem seals.

 

If they aren't shot, they are on their way out. Good time to buy mine!

 

if you plan on rebuilding them, id go ahead and do it, before they become damaged. the eariler you replace them, the less it will cost.

 

Oooo oil Seals??
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Err.. you could check your turbo shaft play and also visualy check it for "wet" spots.

 

Very easy to find out.

Jack the car up on the passenger side.

Get under the car and look at the bottom of the turbos. If they look like someone vomited out two donuts with their coffee - your turbo oil seals are on their last beer run.

 

I disagree. Good sets of turbos can leak through the oil drain gaskets on the turbos, looking similar to what you so elegantly described

Look in the intake tract for excessive oil. A good place is the crossover pipe. That can tell you if the compressor side is leaking. A little oil is ok, puddles are bad.

If it is leaking through the exaust seals, it is harder to tell. A good shaft play check can give you an indication of your overall turbo condition. A little bit of side-to-side play is allowable. End-to-end play is bad.