Turbo manifold bolts fell off.
 

Is this a common issue with the stock setup? I was in the Sierra mountains in California having a good time with the turbos in 10,000ft elevation. Sometime along my ride I thought I ran over something as I heard something bouncing around the underside of the car. Shortly after I lost most of my power and I was hearing a gasket style exhaust leak *tick tick tick tick*. The turbos no longer wanted to spool either.

I parked it and tried to see what was wrong, I couldn't see much of the exhaust manifold so I couldn't tell what, or if anything fell off.

This cut my vacation in the mountains short. I waited until dark and I limped the car all the way back to Riverside which is about 300 miles away. I parked her and have yet to get underneath the car since it has been hot as hell.

Does it sound like I lost some manifold bolts? Is this a common issue?

I really dont see how the manifold bolts could come off but I guess anything is posibble.

Could also be you lost one of the clips that hold the wastegate arm to the flapper door. If the arm pops off the door, the flapper will just flap around in the breeze, and you'll have jack for boost.

That's most likely the culprit IMHO.

If so, get under the car and pop the arm back on - should be good for a while. If that is the case, arm on or not, the car is perfectly safe to drive like that.

Dale

The sound of you running over something and your loss of boost could be completely unrelated. It's a shame you cut your vacation short because it could very well be something as simple as a coupler popped off at the top of the Ypipe or on the IC. I really doubt that any of your manifold bolts popped off, haha, you'd be in big trouble if they somehow backed them selves all the way out.

Probably Didn't Lose a Bolt Unless....
 

I wouldn't be surprised if you did lose a bolt. However, unless you already lost a few others, it wouldn't cause an immediate exhaust leak / performance loss. The previous owner of my 95' replaced the stock turbo manifold studs with bolts. Apparently, studs+nuts backout less than bolts. About every 5K miles I check the bolts and at least a couple of them are loose. The only time I have had an audible exhaust leak is when ~3 or more were loose.

-Lloyd

well i pulled the shields off and all the bolts were there, the actuator arms were fine. So I decided to dig deeper. I pulled off the turbos and found nothing, the 4 main bolts for the manifold are solid. Something fell off, I heard it before my problem.
I know it is an exhaust leak, I'm sure you've heard the snapping sound of a leak when a header isn't fully tightened. I'm exhausted and will inspect the parts in the morning when my mind is clear, I've yet to really look at the gaskets, but that doesn't explain the crap i heard bouncing under my car.

well if the manifold and turbos are both solid, and you still have an exhaust leak then it's got to be further down the exhaust unless you can hear it from the turbo area, then maybe it could be that you blew the LIM gasket, which sucks to replace. Is it a stock motor? If so, that gasket is sometimes paper on the early FD's. Otherwise, if that's not the problem then I would say to check all your IC piping. Are you using the stock IC? If so you need to check the accordion pipe that is common to tear along the seams.

I really think that the sound you heard under the car could be unrelated to the issue

If it's an exhaust leak, could it be the EGR or ACV also?

you can't hear the turbos spool anymore so it is not a charge path problem. My next thing to check will be the rotor to manifold gaskets.

you can't hear the turbos spool anymore so it is not a charge path problem. My next thing to check will be the rotor to manifold gaskets. Motor is 15k miles old, metal gasket on the LIM.

this would suck if it was the egr, lol. I'd better check that ASAP. The EGR is so easy to forget about, it may be already blocked off from the previous owner, it is possible that the plate fell off.

The car has an EGR and everything checks ok. There are no visible leak marks and the gasket is intact. I noticed that this EGR has no electrical on it. It is a 93. My 94 has a harness plug on it. Is this something they changed in 94 or is it a Cali car vs non Cali car?

Tack weld the bolts on.
If your bolts and hardware is driving itself out.

GL

After 94 only california built cars had electrical on the EGR, so you're fine.

Where do you hear the exhaust noise from? I still think that the LIM gasket could be the culprit. Do you have a boost guage? If not try to hook one up and see what vaccum you're pulling at idle and if you can build any boost while driving. If you think you have a big exhaust leak it should be pretty easy to track down by sound. Maybe there is crack in the flange on your DP?

Boost was fairly non existent, i didn't try and push it. The nose came near the turbos from what I could tell. I'll also say it again, the turbos were not spooling, this is an exhaust issue.

Just got back from pulling the manifold off. Those gaskets look good. I rechecked the turbo gaskets, looks like the 5 bolt turbo gasket isn't doing too well, I flexed it a bit and part of the inner raised crush seal fell off. Also its a bit discolored around that area, I'll keep looking around but I'll bet my left nut I just found the problem.

unless the turbos are seized completely, they won't just stop spooling completely. As long as the turbo manifold is still tightened to the exhaust manifold there is going to be some spool of the turbos as the exhaust gas passes by.

When you put the turbos on the exhaust manifold, there are the 2 gaskets, the 5 bolt one you're looking at and the smaller one towards the front of the car. It's very easy for them to not be lined up when tightening down the turbos and cause leaks and other problems. If I were you and had the car all taken apart I would just go to Mazda and order a new exhaust manifold gasket set as well as turbo manifold gasket set. Replace them all while you're down there and then tighten everything back up to OEM spec. Drive for a bit to check it and then re-check the bolt torque after a few dozen miles. Very well could be you blew that gasket