Think its fooked

For a while there has been a bit of a stink from my pulsar especially when its at traffic lights, sort of a hot oily pong and ive not been able to locate it. Well, Yesterday was given it a bit of stick and all seemed fine until i started going down a steep windy hill so was engine breaking a lot and noticed large puffs of smoke coming out of the exhaust. When on boost engine seems to run fairly clean with no smoke or loss in power. but as soon as i get any ammount of engine vacuum it smokes a fair bit. i've taken top mount of and thats fairly clear of oil. The turbo was new about 1500 miles ago and the engine was rebuilt buy the previous owner apparently and has only just been run in. any ideas? turbo shot, rings or seals?

First thing id do is a compression test see whats what fella.

yeah gonna do that next week as i'm a bit depressed and have to go to work in a bit

Well pinkies crossed for you mate think thats the first port of call i would do then least you know.

Valve stem seals, worn valve guides, piston rings either 2nd hand or worn or not bedded in.

Hi toaster,

What colour is the smoke. dans probably right but if the smoke is whiteish in colour and it's happening after accelerating and not before it could be turbo related, ie seals

What a div. ... I forgot to ask what colour smoke it was

smokes bluey grey , its fine on start up just normal steam you would expect at this time of year then drive about a mile and once i start engine breaking it smokes, mostly when engine pulls vacuum, its a bit annoying as the car is set up on all the standard settings and boost and not really been driven much at all. i'm gonna compression test it on weekend as i'm currently 200 miles away from it

Good luck with your compression test. That seems your best option.

Comp test will tell you next to nothing, look at the plug colour and a leak down test is best.

I do agree to a certain extent but it will tell you if its even holding pressure at all or low in each chamber and if you do a dry and wet test it will atleast give you some indication as well as the state of the plugs ideally a leak test would be great but not everybody has got an air compresser and tester to check.

The shit heap I bought a few years back did the same, but mine was plooms of smoke as soon as I backed off or changed gear while on boost.
Compression tested it and two chambers were low, ended up rebuilding the engine as the ringlands on two pistons had broke off.

compression test might not throw up anything wrong, mine passed a compression test but still blue smoke either piston rings or valve seals, if nothing shows on compression it may be the oil rings

i would initially do a comp test on it to see if any cylinders are down compared to others.
if so then that will give you a sneaky insight.

next thing to do would be remove ex manifold and see if any of the ex ports are oily wet if so then that will be your problem cylinder.

having said that......if you had the turbo rebuilt a short while back then i would also take a good look at that as a lot of these turbo rebuilds just do not last long and thats a fact!

cheers for all the usefull comments lads, looks like i'll have a busy weekend!

right guys, did compression test today and got 165,160,158,165. plugs looked fine with no oily deposits and the pistons looked ok when i boroscoped them. rebuilt car and took it out again with a mate looking out back window, any way it seems to be only smoking after boost and when pulling vacuum after a bit, for example boosted hard then drove down hill engine braking no smoke after letting off for first 2 hundred yards then smokes for about 2 hundred yards then clears until car is boosted again.... so does it look like turbo gone as i would of thought if it was rings the smoke wouldn't clear after a bit and would be continuous on engine braking/pulling vacuum. havent got round to dropping turbo and manifold yet as i want to be sure of problem as bits are expensive and pulling stuff unnecessarily just costs money.

So its a possible turbo mate well i guess its cheaper than a rebuild. where did you or previous owner get the tubby recon done. ?

Pull the ic pipe off see if there is oil from turbo. Wont cost you nothing

yeah intercooler is clear of oil, so prob exhaust side if that is possible, the turbo is one i bought from aet turbos last year and in typical fashion is three weeks past its twelve month warranty and only has only around 1800 miles on it!

Bloody typical. ..... I always found it strange why re con turbos dont last long you would think it should be as good as a oem part really

yeah its a shitter alright i got another turbo from them ages ago and thats got 60000 miles on it now and is still going strong, just luck i suppose, oh well, will remove it over crimbo and take it to be checked. Probably have a 360 degree bearing bunged in as well. but at least it gives me an excuse to fit the tubular manifold i got of bob a few months ago.

yep it certainly sounds like the turbo as comps all seem very good.

my one recently blew up on my trackcar and that was just over a year old too, dont seem like they last long nowdays
check for endfloat in the turbo shaft or excess lateral movement

What have you done with the breathers on the rocker cover?

breathers are all routed as per manual and everything is set to factory, the only mods on car at the mo are scorpion exhaust and hks filter and a prof dump valve, oh and hks pistons, steel rods, cosworth h/g and acl bearings, but apart from that its standard.

Which ic pipe have you looked in?
Another pipe to check is the one on the intake side of the turbo, take it off at the turbo and feel I side for oil. If the seals are going there will be oil residue both sides of the turbo.