82K on first set -- as far as I know ..

Second ????

 

Thanks Guys,

Congradulations to everyone with 80k or more miles on their original turbos!!!

I'm coming up on 70k, so that is why I was interested in finding out how long they tend to last, since they are one of the big ticket items. Mine are still working fine (knock on wood), and I do let them to cool down before before I shut down the engine.

I think I'm going to start setting the money aside for a set of new turbos when the day comes. I've heard so many stories now about how the rebuilds just don't last very long.

Now I'm kind of curious as to who on the list has the set of original turbos with the most miles on them. Can anyone beat Mightyslash's 143k miles?

 

Here’s My Story..
I got to 50K exactly (only about 17K of that was my doing) about half way through my first season of autocrossing, and I failed WI emissions (typical HC off the charts). So I pulled the motor, went over everything, did a hose job (much easier with the engine on a stand), and figured I'd re-build the turbos, and ceramic coat the center section while I had them out (lots of oil in the intake, and pooling by the secondary in the back).

The rebuild lasted 1 race (which I placed 2nd to a Z06 [Story of most 7 owners these days]) and I cooked the exhaust seal. Now the turbos are out, the rotating assembly is shot, so I try to buy one from e-bay.

The new turbo’s “hairline” crack, is like 3mm wide on the center section. FedEx dropped the package, and one of the rotating assemblies cast iron housing was so brittle it cracked (FedEx says they were improperly packaged and wont honor the insurance) and these supposed 30k turbos were absolute junk, good thing I just needed one cartridge.. So I swapped it out for my bad primary.. and viola... Squeal of death (just starting on spin down)..

Actually, at this point it was my wife who suggested I just buy new. She was so pissed that I had spent all of this time taking the turbos out / fixing them / and putting them back in (about a 12 - 14 hour process), that she actually told me to go buy new ones.. I was cutting into her quality time.

So here I sit, with snow on the ground, lots of new toys, and brand spanking new stock turbos, waiting for my tools to thaw before attempting this year’s expedition.

Here's what I’ve learned.
a) turbos are very precision equipment, like a watch or a HDD, don’t expect them to work after you have messed with them.. No matter how much you clean them you will never get every last glass bead ;-)
b) e-bay bites.. If yours broke why would you expect someone else’s to be working. I would never ever buy a used turbo, even to rebuild.

I decided to go with stock turbos, I was really close to going single, but the apexi RX6 mounts where the air pump goes, and I need to pass emissions (which can be done, but just raises the price even more), So Stock type twins are left. Three Choices:

M2 BB – Looks cool, but why do they not have them on their cars and post dyno plots, what kind of Pro shop are they (no rips intended, just cant seem to figure this out).. and ultimately, they are just a rebuild, and I am running out of rebuild-able stuff. (I dubbed these as too risky to satisfy my wife’s concerns)

99 Spec – My first Choice, but on the slow boat from Japan. Mazda was predicting a month from when they ship from Japan, and they had not left by Mar 15th.

So I just went with stock, and will leave the turbos for last… I really have lost of other important mods to do before I will have to worry about the turbos being the weakest link.

Dan 94FD

 

Oh ya, my first set went for 76k miles on a completly stock car the whole time.

 

Mine went at 55K miles.
I baby the car at warmup/cooldown, but who knows about the previous owner. The stock turbos were rebuilt by Innovative Systems last month. We'll see how it goes.