Hi there,
I have just joined hoping someone can help as our local garage cant pinpoint the problem. We have a 98 GT TDi with 70k on the clock. Recently the turbo has started to cut out at about 3-4000rpm. There is no warning lights, no smoke & no oil. It just goes leaving a very sluggish engine. Last night I tried it after collecting it from the garage & it did it again after about 5mls. As I was on a quiet road, i stopped, switched off & re started. It then roared off with a perfect turbo. 10 mins later it cut out again. Can ANYONE help?? Overtaking is becoming very risky especially when the turbo lets go halfway past an artic!!!!!

Any suggestions much appreciated............

Andy

 

Alright...I talked to one of my turbo guy's...he thinks it might be a bad bearing. Really to be sure is to remove the intake so you can get access to the turbo wheel..the fins inside the turbo. Check if there's any play of the wheel...in and out, or side to side, if there is..more likely a bad bearing. Solution...get a new turbo, or have it repaired.

Meh, I'm sure you dont' live anywhere near me....check the yellow pages for some local turbo reman guy's, your best bet. If you go to the dealer, consider yourself broke for a long time.

-Jeff

 

Hi mount.................what you have here is either one of two things , when you drive the car spiritedly does your car lose power if so this condition is called ( limp home mode or limp mode for short ) and is caused by a very small split in one of the vacuum hoses that go to and from the n75 m18 actuation valves that move the arm of on the turbo .

Check all of these hoses and depending on your mileage change the 2 valves as well which are at the top rear of the engine bay just down from the bonnet rubber seal , the second thing it could be is your maf sensor and i've even seen new ones from the stealaship be bad right out the box so don't be fobbed off with these guy's.

From your description i would not think in any way that your turbo is shot , for one thing when the vnt turbo begins to have play you will get oil migration through the seals the the boost tubes and into the intercooler...........and you said there's no smoke which would suggest the turbo is spooling/working ok , but with out knowing a bit more on how the motor drives/runs at w.o.t. and off the bottom i would start at condition 1 then 2 and hey these are a lot more cost effective than spending £1,200 at the vw center of turbo shop of which may i add have been known to wrongly diagnose this condition with a new turbo ....................lets just say A LOT.

Another thing poeple should be doing with these tdi's is have the valve that's connected to the inlet manifold called the egr valve for coaking up , if you take this valve out or undo one side you can look down the pipe just to make shaw it hasn't blocked or restricted the tube size with crud.

 

My friend had a 98 Beetle TDI and it did the same exact thing. A vacuum hose was leaking really bad and VW charged him $75 for the hose. You are better off going to a shop, or if you know what you are doing, check out the hoses and see if there is a lot of oil and crap in the engine compartment. Good luck