The other day I was driving up a hill, about 3/4 throttle. The car was making about 5psi constant boost. Then I looked in my rear view
to see a cloud of smoke. I slowed down and a few seconds later the smoke cleared. I then stepped on it a again, and once it started making boost it started smoking again.
At first I thought I pushed out a head gasket, but I felt no loss of power, and the oil looks fine, and there is no water missing from the radiator. So I am leaning towards a bad turbo, as the motor only has about 1k on it since a rebuild, and the turbo is stock.
Questions:
1. How can I tell if a turbo is going bad?
2. If my turbo is going bad, how bad is it too continue to drive the car?
3. Can anyone recommend a replacement turbo. I would like a turbo has the same mounting as the stock turbo. The car isn't quite a daily driver, but I like to drive it alot. I would like something that is streetable and runs on 91. But I can also turn up the boost, bump up the octane and have some fun at the track.
Here is a list of the mods on my car:
cam: 206/206 .447/.447
CNC ported stock heads from ESP
Headers from Poston
60lb injectors
racing girdle, billet main caps, je pistons, stock rods & crank.
chip from Turbo tweak (of course I'll have to get a new one when i replace the turbo)
stock intercooler
2800 torque converter