Canadian turbo vert project

[Cairn]

So now comes the fun part. I decided now’s the time to finally make this car forced induction. While putting on the exhaust manifold gaskets, I placed my TCD turbo manifold onto the engine with the turbo and wastegate already attached. I needed small copper nuts to really be able to tighten it down. It was more of a pain to do than I would have expected. I also tapped the intake manifold vacuum distributor to screw a 90 degree fitting and send a vacuum line out to my wastegate.


Then I researched and marked where to drill into the oil pan for the turbo to return oil to the pan, used a step drill bit, and made a nice big hole in the side of the oil pan, using as much grease as possible to catch metal shavings. I initially thought I could just flush oil through the pan a couple of times and not have to remove the oil pan, but no. 6 oil flushes in, there were still metal shavings coming out when I’d drain it, so I needed to drop the oil pan. That’s okay because it was leaking oil anyway because I had used Permatex Ultra Copper when first changing oil pans after my crash into the ditch, and didn’t clean the surfaces well enough.


This time I dropped the oil pan myself. Since the pan was off, I decided to get my oil return fitting welded onto it. Denny Stephanou at HBW Fabrication in Montreal knocked it out of the park. This is a 12AN fitting to make extra sure the oil drains from the turbo without backing up.


I reinstalled the oil pan with Permatex Ultra Black after cleaning the mating surfaces thoroughly.

I then started mocking up my universal ebay charge piping to imagine how to piece it all together. I made approximate measurements and marked the pipes where they should be cut.

[Panici]

Drain bung looks good.
If you end up cutting those ebay wastegate pipes for fitment, throw a bead roll on the ends.
I got away without bead rolls until I hit about 8psi on my miata, then I started to blow charge pipes off.

[Cairn]

My friend Etienne offered to weld up my exhaust pieces for me. He also offered to help me with charge pipes eventually too, so my plan was to get the car up and running and spinning the turbo just without charge pipes so I could drive the car to him to cut and weld the charge pipes correctly.



I went home and installed the exhaust. This was my first experience with V-bands (one of the clamps is broken but still works alright), and I think I’d eventually like to update to newer V-bands that have the flange, because getting it right was a bit of a pain. I think learning to weld could be something I’d like to learn in my future.

I then started getting oil lines mocked up. The turbo’s seller told me the turbo drain would be 12AN, but I quickly found out that it was actually 10AN. Since I already had a 12AN fitting welded into my oil pan and already had 12AN braided hose, I had to figure out adapting 10AN to 12AN. I found a Vibrant 10AN-12AN expander and put that between the two 45° angle pieces. Unfortunately, this caused the lower 45° hose fitting to collide with the steering rack, so I had to hammer it to a slightly tighter angle. After that, it cleared the steering rack, and I got everything connected. Here's to hoping the slight uphill over the steering rack wouldn't cause any oil drainage issues.


I had 3AN already going to my oil pressure sender, so I teed off there and ran 3AN to the turbo feed.

This doesn't look the neatest so I might change the feed setup in the future.

[Tibboy12]

Awesome progress man! Dope to see you're still with the vert and starting the turbo build. I think I'm a few years from doing a turbo swap as well, but I will be doing the yellow tag rack swap that you performed. Looking forward to more updates!

[Cairn]

Awesome progress man! Dope to see you're still with the vert and starting the turbo build. I think I'm a few years from doing a turbo swap as well, but I will be doing the yellow tag rack swap that you performed. Looking forward to more updates!

Thanks! I'd like this car to be a long-term keeper :) You'll definitely enjoy the rack swap a lot

[Cairn]

With everything in place, I ran the starter for a couple of seconds with no fuel pump until I saw some oil pressure to prime the turbo, and then did its first start with the turbo connected.

I let it idle for a while to make sure I wasn’t spraying oil anywhere or anything else, and after maybe two minutes of idling, as the car started to warm up, a bunch of smoke started filling the garage, so I shut it off. This left me frightened at first. I decided I’d get the car out of the garage and let it idle again so I could breathe fresh air while I see where the smoke is coming from. It was coming out from the exhaust. More on this later.

Alright, so I drove the car to Etienne’s to get the charge pipes cut. We got them cut.



Unfortunately, he didn’t have enough experience to weld the ebay aluminum universal charge pipes correctly, so we got them fitting as closely as possible for me to use my ugly red silicone joints and clamps that came with the charge pipe kit for now until I factor in more budget for aesthetics. I don't have a bead roller, so Etienne welded a chunk on one of my old locking pliers, and I clamped around the edge of each pipe to create a flare to ensure no charge pipes would burst free under boost.



When I got home, I drilled two holes into the intake elbow with a step bit, and sealed two bungs with Permatex Ultra Black into the holes for the idle control valve in the stock location and the intake air temperature sensor hidden on the bottom.


For the Y in the brake booster vacuum lines on top of the brake fluid reservoir, I tapped the inside of it so I could screw in another vacuum line fitting to run hose to my blow off valve.

[Cairn]

I attached my BOV, a Greddy RZ knock-off that I thought was real when I bought it second-hand (whatever, it’ll be fine).


I also got my pre-turbo intake elbow attached, ready for the K&N air filter I ordered. I drilled a hole in it to once again Permatex Ultra Black a bung into it to run fuel hose from my PCV catch can over the front of the engine, so the vacuum pre-turbo could pull from the valve cover as it did when N/A. I was hoping this could fix my smoking issue by making the engine seal from oil better internally. The air filter is pretty low, so I have a water filter over the air filter. I might want to figure out something else in the future to get my air filter higher up and right behind the front valance to protect it from water and debris better. Note for after the car is up and running.



With all that done, the car was ready to drive for the first time with the charge pipes attached. I drove the car to a friend’s house 30 minutes away avoiding boost at all costs (because my tune had nothing mapped for boost yet) to see if the car still smoked. Speaking of the tune, by the way, I still don't have my ICV working. Looked great at the gas station though.

[Cairn]

Unfortunately, the car still smokes. Here are the details:




It only smokes when idling. But not at a cold start, and not after driven on the highway for a while. Only as it warms up.


Here are some videos of it:

https://www.instagram.com/stories/highlights/17937089078308161/

To see if it was the turbo smoking:
I checked the downpipe for wet oil. Nothing.
I checked to see if there was any oil in the hot side charge pipes by the intake. Nothing.
I checked to see if there was any oil in the cold side charge pipes. Nothing.
I checked the turbo for shaft play. No in and out play, and nothing abnormal side to side.


My next thought was that slight uphills in the turbo’s drain line due to the 10AN-12AN expander after the turbo’s drain flange and needing to clear the steering rack (to see previous drain line, refer to post #33) were causing oil to back up in the turbo and leak through its seals. So I got a new drain flange and 12AN-NPT 45° adapter so I could eliminate the arch in the hose above the steering rack caused by the old 10AN-12AN expander. The oil drained downhill the whole way now.




Same smoking. I figure at this point that maybe it’s not the turbo.

Then why was it only smoking after installing the turbo? Is it possible that the stock exhaust’s catalytic converter masked smoke before? And if not, is it a coincidence that my engine is smoking only after installing the turbo, having nothing to do necessarily with the turbo itself?

[alpinaseeone]

Keen to know if you ever got the smoking issues sorted! Any updates for us?

[Panici]

What is going on with the crankcase venting now that you're boosted?
Pulling a vacuum on the crankcase helps the rings to seal.
I'd expect smoke from a valve cover breather if you've got blow by or are otherwise pressurizing the crankcase.

You're sure the smoke is from the exhaust?

[82eye]

What is going on with the crankcase venting now that you're boosted?
Pulling a vacuum on the crankcase helps the rings to seal.
I'd expect smoke from a valve cover breather if you've got blow by or are otherwise pressurizing the crankcase.

You're sure the smoke is from the exhaust?

it's just coming into driving season there now. would imagine the car was parked over the winter.

[Panici]

it's just coming into driving season there now. would imagine the car was parked over the winter.

Ah, I misread the date on the last post of the OP talking about smoking. Day and month looked right, but I was off by a year haha

[Cairn]

What is going on with the crankcase venting now that you're boosted?
Pulling a vacuum on the crankcase helps the rings to seal.
I'd expect smoke from a valve cover breather if you've got blow by or are otherwise pressurizing the crankcase.

You're sure the smoke is from the exhaust?

Hey all! I’ll be back with the car a week from now for about 3 weeks to get stuff done!

I currently have the valve cover routed to a catch can routed to the intake pre-turbo so that it pulls vacuum on the crank case. I’m 100% sure the smoke comes out from the exhaust.

Last time I started the car in the garage with a piece of cardboard behind it, sputters of oil stained the cardboard. So when I checked the downpipe in the past, I must have not done a good enough job checking for oil. My top suspicion is still that oil is leaking in the turbo’s exhaust housing at idle when there isn’t enough flow of exhaust gases to help the turbo seal.

If I didn’t have neighbours, I’d just remove the turbo from the car and let it idle and see if it smokes, but being a bottom mount doesn’t make it easy to remove and reinstall if I drove to the middle of nowhere to diagnose.

If I can’t find a convenient place to do that and make a bunch of noise idling open header for a bit, I think I’ll be removing the turbo in a month and bringing it with me to Arizona to just rebuild.

[Panici]

I currently have the valve cover routed to a catch can routed to the intake pre-turbo so that it pulls vacuum on the crank case. I’m 100% sure the smoke comes out from the exhaust.

Last time I started the car in the garage with a piece of cardboard behind it, sputters of oil stained the cardboard.

In that case, remove that line pre-turbo and vent it to atmosphere to test. Perhaps you're pulling enough vacuum on the valve cover to pick up oil? How do the plugs look?
But if you're seeing actual liquid oil out the exhaust, I'd be leaning towards turbo oil seals as well.

Silly question, but you have a restrictor on the oil feed line into the turbo right?

[Cairn]

In that case, remove that line pre-turbo and vent it to atmosphere to test. Perhaps you're pulling enough vacuum on the valve cover to pick up oil? How do the plugs look?
But if you're seeing actual liquid oil out the exhaust, I'd be leaning towards turbo oil seals as well.

Silly question, but you have a restrictor on the oil feed line into the turbo right?

PCV detached, same behaviour.
Plugs, I’ll check again today or tomorrow when I start the timing belt/cooling system maintenance.
I have a 3AN feed with a 0.065" restrictor with a 12AN return.