After 8 years, oil in intake & exhaust of STS kit?
09-14-2013, 06:10 PM
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After 8 years, oil in intake & exhaust of STS kit? So I've had an STS kit since '05 and have 50k-60k miles on it. Bought it brand new, had it installed by an STS dealer. Haven't had any serious problems with it. I run 6.5lbs of boost. Car was my daily driver until 2 years ago. I got a truck and tend to drive that to work more now. As a result, the Camaro only gets driven about every 6-8weeks.
Today, I went to change the wastegate spring (had started not holding full boost and was using a cheapo boost controller to make it up been like that for few years), moved the car, changed the spring, checked all the fluids, no puddles, everything looks good. I fire her up again and go around the block, notice smoke under acceleration (looked like I had seafoamed the car). Take her back to the house, notice oil drops and a puddle in the driveway from when I left. The car is literally spewing oil out of the exhaust. Pull the intake pipes, sure enough there's oil there too.
So I pull the oil fill cap, turn the key to on but don't start. Oil comes out of the fill cap return line. I repeat this four or five times. I put the oil cap in a container and run the car for 20-30 seconds, the container fills with a qt+ of oil. So it looks like the pump is still working. By the way, I still have the original STS oil pump and the resistor.
I ran the car with the 2/3 charge pipes disconnected and oil was streaming out although it looked like there was less coming out of the exhaust.
The obvious answers are pump or turbo oil seals but is it normal for there to be no problem and then wham, you can't drive it? I drove maybe a mile and went from full to add (~qt) on the dipstick. I know the STS pump isn't the greatest but I'm leaning towards the turbo seals. Sitting for 2months at a time cause the seals to crap out like that?
Today, I went to change the wastegate spring (had started not holding full boost and was using a cheapo boost controller to make it up been like that for few years), moved the car, changed the spring, checked all the fluids, no puddles, everything looks good. I fire her up again and go around the block, notice smoke under acceleration (looked like I had seafoamed the car). Take her back to the house, notice oil drops and a puddle in the driveway from when I left. The car is literally spewing oil out of the exhaust. Pull the intake pipes, sure enough there's oil there too.
So I pull the oil fill cap, turn the key to on but don't start. Oil comes out of the fill cap return line. I repeat this four or five times. I put the oil cap in a container and run the car for 20-30 seconds, the container fills with a qt+ of oil. So it looks like the pump is still working. By the way, I still have the original STS oil pump and the resistor.
I ran the car with the 2/3 charge pipes disconnected and oil was streaming out although it looked like there was less coming out of the exhaust.
The obvious answers are pump or turbo oil seals but is it normal for there to be no problem and then wham, you can't drive it? I drove maybe a mile and went from full to add (~qt) on the dipstick. I know the STS pump isn't the greatest but I'm leaning towards the turbo seals. Sitting for 2months at a time cause the seals to crap out like that?
09-14-2013, 07:47 PM
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Update: I cleaned out the exhaust pipe with brake cleaner and shop towels. I then disconnected the 1st charge pipe (2tablespoons of oil came out) and sprayed brake cleaner into there as well. I then started the car (intake pipes disconnected) and rev it several time (4k) and didn't notice oil coming out of either.
Does this sound like maybe the check valve went schizo that one time and let residual pressure bleed into the turbo and leak past the seals. Then while running it was just blowing out the oil that had leaked?
Does this sound like maybe the check valve went schizo that one time and let residual pressure bleed into the turbo and leak past the seals. Then while running it was just blowing out the oil that had leaked?
09-30-2013, 11:46 PM
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any news on this? I was having a major oiling issue at first, but that was my fault for using a used oil pump, for emergency purposes I got one of those ebay gear oil pumps and for now its holding up. im still getting a bit of oil and smoke out the exhaust but only on initial startup. after that, it clears up after a few heavy accelerations.
im not sure if you go this, but on my intake side, I noticed foamy oil in my long pipe when I was doing some relocating. Almost like clean sludge since the oil isn't getting dirty. I need to clean my pipes, but did you get anything like that? im wondering if the really wet sepember had anything to do with that here in el paso too... I have a snorkel designed intake on my turbo so no water sucking here lol
im not sure if you go this, but on my intake side, I noticed foamy oil in my long pipe when I was doing some relocating. Almost like clean sludge since the oil isn't getting dirty. I need to clean my pipes, but did you get anything like that? im wondering if the really wet sepember had anything to do with that here in el paso too... I have a snorkel designed intake on my turbo so no water sucking here lol
10-01-2013, 01:39 AM
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any news on this? I was having a major oiling issue at first, but that was my fault for using a used oil pump, for emergency purposes I got one of those ebay gear oil pumps and for now its holding up. im still getting a bit of oil and smoke out the exhaust but only on initial startup. after that, it clears up after a few heavy accelerations.
im not sure if you go this, but on my intake side, I noticed foamy oil in my long pipe when I was doing some relocating. Almost like clean sludge since the oil isn't getting dirty. I need to clean my pipes, but did you get anything like that? im wondering if the really wet sepember had anything to do with that here in el paso too... I have a snorkel designed intake on my turbo so no water sucking here lol
im not sure if you go this, but on my intake side, I noticed foamy oil in my long pipe when I was doing some relocating. Almost like clean sludge since the oil isn't getting dirty. I need to clean my pipes, but did you get anything like that? im wondering if the really wet sepember had anything to do with that here in el paso too... I have a snorkel designed intake on my turbo so no water sucking here lol
Anyways I should have it together tomorrow. I'm going to change the oil filter again to make sure that's not the cause. I have a noticed a clean looking tan sludge in the oil-fill cap where the return line goes into the engine. I'm hoping that its either the filter or some sludge that's settled and needs to get cooked off. The restrictor is just so I can run it to operating temp without burning up/spraying oil everywhere.
