See it to believe it . My HKS T04R
 

Last night When I took my FD out. and when I decide to do some testing. so I floor at 2 gear,WOT. Boost to 12PSI, (At this time I feel my car is not fast as before). and when I let go the GAS I hread a very strange sound front RHD side of engine bay.(I was thinking mabe the BOV's Vac hose was loose). Today. I decide to do some more testing. so I took MY FD out again. fill 5 GAL of racing GAS at 76. and find a empty street. and do another WOT 2 gear pull. this time the boost only went to 4 PSI. and car is very very slow and I heard another strange noise from RHD how ever it is different from last night . so I was think (mm.. mabe my EVC V is not function right) so I turn it off. and do another WOT pull. This time Turbo wont even boost.... and I dont even heard my Turbo's sound. This is getting worse. so I better head back to do some Dignostic. on the way back, few thing pop in my head. mabe wastegate stock open. or the vacm line etc etc.

When I head back to my house. I open my hood. and checking the waste gate . it seen to be fine. so I decide to took MY HKS filter off. I just cant believe my eye. when I took off the filter. The T04R is not turning.... it stack there the engine is still runing. so I got my light and give a better look. I can see the NUT hold down Turbin wheel on compresson wheel is missing. and the fin have a little bit of chip... and all smash against the turbo.then I start to look for the nut. I find it inside of my HKS filter. and I was checking the nut. I look around tread area. It did not strip. so what da hell it fell off... I just dont believe it. this

I know HKS tubo kit dont come with warranty. but I only have this kit for less than 2 year/ and put about 3K mile and I never boost over 14 PSI and this is hight mode. usually I did a 12 PSI and I just got retune at XS at that time not thing went wrong. so I better call HKS USA. and hope they can give a better answer

and did any of you have similar experience. or it just pure bad luck....

That bullet nut is known to come off. Mine came off on the T51R kai turbo. The good news is that T04R turbo is pretty cheap. You can get one for around $900-950 brand new. To get it rebuilt, it should cost about $500 including replacing your compressor wheel if the turbine shaft is not bent. If it's bent, you are better off just replacing the whole turbo with a new one.


Chuck Huang

wow good thing its didnt do that much damage

good luck man

t88 ????

damn sorry to hear that bro

I'm sorry, I thought you said cheap :p:

Is it known for all Singles for that nut to come loose ? Going single in a few months and wondering if it is common, what can we do to prevent this from happening other than checking that nut every time we take out the 7.

I had the same thing happen to me, in one of my twins the nut came off, lucky for the intercooler otherwise my motor would of been trashed.

I beleive you not gonna need a new turbo or a rebuild unless the shaft or the compressor wheel are bent which I strongly doubt, it looks OK, definitely worth giving it a shot, you'll need some good lock tight and put the nut back, take it for test and you'll see...

So chuck did this happend to you too?. May I know what did HKSUSA did about warranty? or did they offer you a trade in price? I am 100% sure this is not my fault. or install. I cant believe. THe bullet nut will ever got loose. since turbo spend CW wise. it should tide down the nut even harder ? And HKS is NO1 aftermarket company in japan. this should not happend. oh well we will see


YA this moring I call HKS USA, and one of kid there(Every one went to SEMA) he told me to call XS( the last shop who tune my car back in AUG/2004). Hope they can give me a better answer....

Yeah, it happened to my T51R kai turbo which uses the same bullet nut.

I had the turbo kit on the car for 3 years before this happened so it already passed the warranty period. I just got it rebuilt myself.

Chuck Huang

Loc-tite? :p:

Man, I would be pretty pissed if my $2,000 HKS turbo did that! I'm with Jim on this one, some high temp Loc-tite should be the ticket.

YA The "HKS T04R" retail about 2950 US dollor from HKS USA. It does have some advantage compare to regular T04R. I done a back to back test. and my HKS T04R just feel better? and stronger..

So I still think this should not happend. and when I look at bullet nut. I did not find any trace of loc-tide.....

Any way need to wait HKS GUY come back from SEMA show. Hope they will give me a better answer..

So any advise from you guys ?
thanks in advance

I remember when Dragon's HKS T-04R did this. Talk about carnage!

The HKS to4r is built by Garrett Japan. The US To4R is actually the same spec. There is nothing different between the two except that freaking bullet nut which comes off anyway.

You feel stronger or better on yours maybe it's because the difference in turbine housing A/R.

Don't waste your money on HKS to4r. Just buy a Garrett US one if they are not going to replace it for free. Or you can take this chance to get a T0RZ turbo which is the same spec as the To4R but ball bearing.

Chuck Huang

Thanks for posting that, I have a t51 with the same style nut, that I have not run yet, its a used turbo, but still better to do something about it first.... How is old that turbo?

I bought this turbo kit brand new back in 2002 sep from http://www.sp-power.com/. install at 2002 dec by http://www.tripointengineering.com. then first tune by XS http://www.xs-engineering.com/index....nav=subnav.jsp at 2003/ jun. and retune it at 2004/aug.

So even thought I have this turbo kit for two year. But most of time it just sit there in my engine bay. the auctural time I use is about a year mabe less. and I dont drive my FD that much(I got my other car to drive for daily)

As you guys can see, all my tuner and installer, they are one of best in the field.so they are no way they done a mistake like this. so from my understanding this is all cause by HKS T04R ? I know I already pass warranty period but hey I did not run this Turbo at hight boost( meaning 14 psi +). run with air filter. did not drive that much. and one day the stubid bullet nut just fall off from it's place and destroy my turbo.
Hope HKSUSA will give a better answer when they come back from SEMA

Loc-tite has failed, I wouldn't count on it.

So what do you recommend?

This what they said about HKS T04Z "Lock nut of shaft is counter clockwise for safety"

bump for answer.

hey chuck, how much did it cost you to rebuilt your t51r kai?

Just throwing one in the dark here, but is there a chance its compressor surge+inertia undoing the nuts?.... According to some of the papers on surge caused from the throttle plates being shut abruptly, it can momentarily stop the compressor wheel in its tracts, even from high shaft speeds...I have nver been driving with my head stuck under the hood with the air filter remove to see the effects of surge, however at a local turbo shop, I did see some T3's, K series, and some guys t04b with sheared shafts from surge..Max

Loc-tite has failed on what?

I guess it's all relative. $950 is pretty cheap compared to the $2000 HKS / Japan Garrett one. ;)

Chuck

My theory is that compressor surge causes it. During compressor surge, the compressor wheel is stopping but the nut still wants to spin. That bullet nut has higher rotational inertia than the regular small nut. That's why it came loose.

The regular nut should work just fine. Most turbo builders put lock-tite on the nut.

Chuck Huang

The compressor wheel is damaged and it was pretty hard to find the replacement compressor wheel. Total cost on rebuilding and replacement of compressor wheel is around $800 if I remember correctly. I switched to the regular nut and I never had any problem after that. HKS says the bullet nut is supposed to increase the efficiency by 1-2%. I don't think that's worth it in my opinion.

Chuck Huang

On being used in this situation.

That's not what your post implied. It implied that you had knowledge that Loc-tite had failed when used in the past, and that you can't count on it. Is that the case?

I've rebuilt my HKS t51r kai 3 times without failure to my nuts.

No, it hasn't failed on me in other circumstances, I figured it was implied in this thread that I would be referring to this subject sorry for the confusion.

:rlaugh:
That's good to know.

:rlaugh: :rlaugh: :rlaugh:

Care to share the joke?

Hi...

I have the exact same HKS turbo and i have tryed the same...
We were just starting to fine tuning it on the streets when the nut just fell off. It did smashed the compressor wheel so bad that i could not work again.

It was the HKS dealer in my country who was driving it at the time so he talked to HKS in England and they want me to send the turbo to Japan to see what went wrong.

After 3 weeks they send a new turbo to me with no expense at all.

I have now had this turbo for 1 year and it still works fine.

HKS has never contact me again with some kind of explanation so i think the turbo was wrong from the start..

I think you should contact HKS and explain the situation and then hoping they will help you...:)

Thank you for your advice Seven93.

May I know what time did this happend? and is this within warranty period?

YA I already contact the HKS USA 2 day ago. still waiting for them to call back...

CAll HKS USA today.
First guy put me oh hold for like 15min...(I was looking for a guy in warranty deparment)

So I hang out the phone try to redial it again. the stubid macnine also put me on hold for like 15 min..

Finally call went throught. a LADY pick up the phone. and said the guy I was looking for was not in office today.. What da hell. IF he is not in office why should first guy put me on hold at first place.... so I leave my info and contact info to this lady. I hightly doubt, they will ever return a call. I did a same thing like monday. 3 day pass no call, no e mail, no message.

So far I am disapoint on HKS USA customer service.

Because I was so disapoint. I decide to call HKSUSA again. and Finally find a guy who told me. basically there is not thing they can do with it. already pass the warranty time. So it explain every thing ... they wont take care of this .



I am in shock of disapoint. So this what I will do now. I will try to collect how many HKS T04R(or any HKS turbo) had been like this and I will print it out and mail to them and see what will they try to do.


I wonder can Every one helping on this. E mail me the story you heard the HKS turbo bullet nut's failure. and you thought of this. or any input is welcome
please e mail to myhkst04r@yahoo.com


After all this. I still love HKS stuff. If I have chance I will choose HKS stuff again.However I have more than 7000US dollors worse of HKS stuff on my FD. and I dont think this is how I been treat....

Warranty is up. Deal with it. Call Davinci, they will fix your turbo for cheap. 618-222-1201

Get a standard Garrett so you won't have to deal with this $hit? I think a TA45 is fairly close.

THIS CERTAIN GUY IS A LIAR.

I am only gonna post this once, and will not answer to any other posts unless THIS CERTAIN GUY WANTS TO RETALIATE. HE CAN IF HE WANTS TO, BUT HE WILL BE SORRY BECAUSE I HAVE DOCUMENTS AND FIRST HAND WITNESSES TO HIS TRANSACTIONS.
THIS IS ABOUT A CERTAIN GUY WITH A CERTAIN T04R FD3S TUBO KIT.

THIS CERTAIN GUY cheated his way into getting a new turbo.
He has told different stories to everyone he has talked to.
To HKS, to SP Engineering, to XS Engineering, and to you people on the forums.

He is not even the original owner of the turbo. Or the original owner of the FD3S.
The turbo kit was bought over 2 years ago through SP Engineering.
Installed at Tri Point Engineering. The car was running on STOCK ENGINE MANAGEMENT.

There is a big gap between what happened after the car was running and up to the point where THIS CERTAIN GUY said that he brough it to XS for tuning. Almost a 2 year gap, with a change in ownership to his name.

He walked into SP Engineering with a reciept for the turbo kit for a warranty on the turbo, BUT it was more than 2 years old AND IT HAD SOMEONE ELSE'S NAME ON IT.
BTW. WARRANTY IS FOR 120 DAYS FROM THE DATE OF PURCHASE ON OFF ROAD TURBO KITS.

He LIED to SP saying he was the guy on paper, in which he was not because the OWNER OF SP ENGINEERING sold it to one of his CLOSE CUSTOMERS. Owner of SP recognized right away that he was NOT the guy on the paper reciept.

He brought in ONLY PICTURES and the bullet nut. SP, XS, and HKS asked to see the turbo, but he refused to take it off FOR SOME REASON. It would be logical to assume that if the turbo needed to be replaced anyways, he might as well have taken it off and brought it with him to show both SP and HKS if it truly was even defective. But he didn't and he refused to do so because it was extra work. I would say that's strange.

THIS CERTAIN GUY said that he had not used the kit until spring 2004. BULLSHIT

But you know what? HKS helped him get a special deal on a BETTER TURBO (TO4Z) for CHEAP, just to show good faith. Even though he had lied his way to getting a turbo. Everyone at HKS and SP Engineering knows the true story behind this liar. It angers me that he would go to lengths to try to destroy a company's reputation for his own selfish reasons.

This guy said he was on hold for 15 min, bullshit. IT WAS 5 min.
BTW THERE WAS ONLY 1 PERSON ON THE PHONE THAT WHOLE WEEK. HE CALLED DURING THE WEEK OF THE LAS VEGAS SEMA SHOW. He was totally taking advantage of the situation to make a bad situation look worse.

This guy never even bothered to REPOST that he got a better turbo in exhcange and that HKS and SP helped him out with pateince and consideration.

This guy had the audacity to show up at the HKS booth in December for JGTC/D1 to ask for further help with his new turbo.

THIS CERTAIN GUY is shady and a liar if you ask me.
WHY DO I KNOW SO MUCH?
BECAUSE I WORK FOR HKS AND DEALT WITH HIM DIRECTLY ON THE PHONE AND ON PERSON.
I GOT IN TROUBLE FOR THE WHOLE SITUTAION WHILE HE GOT A DEAL ON A TURBO ANG GOT AWAY WITH IT.

I was nothing but nice and supportive... and I got F*!?ED.

well mr. hks fc3s certainly can spell and type a little better than mr. diyman25. i only have one thing that i noticed which sounds funny. he says that the t04r was running on stock engine management with an fd3s. just how often does that happen?

My bullet nut backed off my HKS T04R turbo. When it happened I heard a strange noise like you. I shut off my car imediatly and found the nut loose but not all the way off yet. Still damaged the wheel and housing a little. Had to get rebuilt, sent it to Forced Performance. Used a regular nut and switched to a bigger blow off valve. Just out of my warranty period too. Ive heard of too many stories about HKS units nuts falling off.

Yes the HKS stuff is very overpriced, and I wouldnt of been able to afford it unless I got my employee discount of about 45% off msrp.

I dunno if you're serious or this is a jab at HKS FC3S, but you better understand what you're trying to imply.

I dunno who this HKS FC3S is, but HKS (USA) has been known to employ people from HKS Japan.
Now, English is not the primary langauge for those HKS Japan employees, so criticizing their English is just ridiculous.
I DO know that HKS FC3S's English is better than your Japanese - I put money on it.


-Ted

well his use of caps was a little annoying, but other than that it was more of a slight jab at diyman25's rediculously bad grammar and spelling, and not even a serious one at that.

it's certainly easy to bitch about something on the internet, although a handful of pictures seems to make everyone a believer. the poster's original post is only about losing the bullet nut which several other people have stated has happened to them. as for his complaining about hks, i doubt that really diminished anyone's view of their US customer service. it may, however, have made people weary of the bullet nut on the t04r.

regardless
 

regardless of anybodys grammer, or if the person cheated, lied stole whatever, if the turbine design (this bullet nut) has a record of failure (either in or out of warranty period) then HKS needs to be made aware of the situation.

I do not have first hand experience with HKS's customer service dept. (as I have not had any failures with the few items I have bought from them) but I sincerely doubt that its as bad as represented. Its a fact that anytime a person has a negative perception of a situation they are going to tell 10~20 people. and that people with a good experience tend to tell only 5~6 this is the nature fo the beast in a business/human interface model (from a customer service viewpoint) and I sincerely doubt that HKS would ignore this simple fact (ie they replaced even though he MAY have lied cheated etc.) if so, this actually speaks volumes for their customer service in a positive viewpoint, and makes me think if I had a valid complaint myself, that they probably would be very accomodating to me as a result.

John.....is that your missus in your avatar????

She is MINT!!!!!!!!

Dan!!

HKS FC3S - Why did you get fired??? Because he said you left him on hold for 15 minutes?

Count the number of letters used and consider why someone would blank out some of them...

"F*!?ED" != FIR*ED

"F*!?ED" = FUCKED

OH ya, Most likely you will blow your engine before you blow your turbo. this doest not make any sense.





Too bad you did not read my post from begin. I call XS(took me all day to do that). and they told me not to remove turbo( I wish I recoard every thing). Ask me to took off turbo.... I did not heard this at all. The only thing HKS USA told me is your warrenty is no use any more. I can recomand you to a nice turbo rebuild shop....
what da hell. if you say this.( I already took off the old turbo out) if HKS USA want to see turbo. you will see it.


YES I got the T04Z. but what did you guys really do to help me at first place. Not thing. I have went all this to got a little justice back. all well.

what should I do that. THe turbo nut fell off. can I control the time. NO. and I did wait 15 min for nothing.( that was 3 time I call HKSUSA)

I DID


OK this part is true. he do work for HKS USA. and he was very helpful. However I dont have to do this I went all this far to got a TURBO(T04z) and the pirce I have to pay is still far more than any USA turbo you can find in the market. HE and I just a black sheeps, that got no resource against HKS USA....

I did not mean to poke fun at his grammar. I was just trying to emphasize some words of my own. This guy is foreigner with English as his second language. Therefore he has a little trouble with grammar here on his posts. It is just wrong to poke fun at someone who is trying to communicate to everyone, especially in a language not in his native tongue. I know this feeling 'cuz English is my second laguage too. I would never do such a thing. I apologize if anyone took my post that way because I didn't mean to.

Sorry for the CAPS if they annoyed anyone. It's truly annoying, now that I have re-read my own post. But I digress... let me get back to the core of the subject.

This guy is still a liar.

Lied about being the original owner of the turbo. Faked being the original owner at SP Engineering. Lied about the history of his FD and the turbo. Lied about putting the turbo on himself. So what if he says that I was helpful, because I was. I want an apology.

Looks like he has time to break apart my post and re-analyze what I have said, but he did not take time to take apart where I explained the root of where he got the turbo. Looks like he himself did not even know that the previous owner had driven the car with the T04R without any engine management for several months. This can mean a whole slew of things could have happened to the car before he owned it, things such as surging from insufficient engine management.

I have talked to XS and they never told him to not take off the turbo. They explained to the guy that XS will not take the turbo off because the turbo is out of warranty. This is after they had called in HKS about the T04R. Talk all you want, but this is what they said.

There is only one thing right about what he has finally reposted. He did not have to go this far to get a new HKS turbo. Bottom line, he didn't deserve it. We (manager, technical supervisor, and myself) all asked him to bring the tubo in so that we could look at it closer. But he refused to bring it in. His greed for a new turbo got me in a lot of trouble. HKS company aside, his lying and his greed caused a tremendous amount of trouble for me. And yes, almost got me fired.

If he could have bought a US turbo just as good and cheaper, he should have done it. There was absolutely no reason for him to even purchase another HKS turbo. If I had such a bad taste with HKS, I would think "Why the hell should I buy another expensive HKS turbo." And yes this would come out of my very own mouth, an employee at HKS, if it ever happend to me. And what? He decided to get a T04Z instead? Spend even more money on a HKS turbo, the same company that has caused him so much time and grief? And he is going to put it on? HAHAHAHA. It just does not make sense to me.

I helped him on the phone as much as I could. I have to follow a set rule of policy because I am an employee. Warranty, returns, etc., there are strict rules in which I have to follow. The turbo was out of warranty so I gave him recommendations on some really good turbo rebuild shops. What's wrong with that? I tried to help this guy as much as possible and I gave him the benefit of the doubt. I helped him get the turbo cheap.

On a side note. This guy forced himself into our building. While one of our dealers was leaving the front lobby, this guy ran in before the door closed. HKS is not open and never has been open to the retail public unless they have an appointment with someone in the office. Technically, we could have called the cops, but we didn't. I took the time to listen to him again to try to resolve his grievance.

If I was the as*h%e technical support guy, I would have just said "Sorry, nothing we can do about it because it is out of warranty... CLICK!" I am not, nor will I ever be. I just hate it when people take advantage of hard working people who truly wanted to help.

DIYMAN25. All I want is an apology from you that you lied to me, XS, SP and everyone else on this forum and other forums you have posted on. You got what you want. If you were a decent guy you would come clean. You cannot deny that you did not lie, there is too much evidence and witnessed to what happened.

Tierce: you are definetly correct about me bitching about this guy and that it is easy to do it on the internet. But, I did not post just post to bitch, but to also let people know that this guy lied and did not tell the full story of the turbo. He not only lied to me, but essentially lied to, XS Engineering, SP Engineering, and most importantly forum members. People like this are what tarnishes the fun of tuning.

I apologize for such a long winded response. I felt as though it was necessary to explain, not just on my behalf, but for the rest of the forum as well.