Ok I recently bought an 88 turbo II with a s5 engine, turbo and manifolds. When I picked the car up it smoked a bit but quit after a short warm up period. I suspected the turbo was the culprit as I was told the engine had been rebuilt recently. (I had concerns about the quality of the rebuild for various reasons but the price was right) After doing a few test drives and tightening up quite a few loose nuts, bolts, etc. I wound up with a massive oil burn problem, to the tune of 1/2 quart in 15 minutes of gentle driving. I have now checked the turbo (cold side) and pulled the UIM off to get the turbo out and check the wiring under the manifold. The cold side of the turbo was pretty clean as well as the rest of the intake path. Shaft play was minimal and the turbo spins freely so I don't think its the problem but my turbocharger experience is limited so I may have missed something. All 4 of the plugs do have some oil on them but not nearly as much as I would expect considering the quantity of smoke coming out of the tail pipe. Could it be the hot side of the turbo? How would I go about nailing down exactly what the problem is? If it is the rotor side seals can I replace just those seals and what would cause them to go out like that?

 

block off the turbo feed line from the front plate and then check if it still smokes or uses oil. if it does then you know you're gonna have to replace the oil seals. also if the turbo was using oil you wouldn't see oil on the plugs so find a bolt to block that hole in the front cover and keep your fingers crossed and hope that's the problem people always use that "the engine was rebuilt" i had a customer's car who someone told him that. **** wasn't rebuilt. hopefully that's no your case.

 

Make sure the vacuum line coming off the oil fill tube is not capped.

 

Well I thought the same thing about the plugs when I found no oil in the intake but I was hoping. Wouldn't blocking off the feed tube damage the turbo even further (assuming it is the turbo in the first place).

I'm checking into the PCV system while I tear it down. I just finished fixing this on the Volvo Would that be able to pass this much oil?

 

blocking the feed line wouldn't damage the turbo if you're just checking to see if the smoke will stop. driving the car without it for awhile will damage the turbo.