C5 - Turbo Gone -30,000 Miles ???

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gec
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C5 - Turbo Gone -30,000 Miles ???

Post by gec »

The garage have just told me that my Turbo seals have gone on my C5 estate 05 Reg and only 30,000 miles. Couple of questions? Why would it go at such a low mileage and do I have any comeback on citroen?
Also, is this a complete turbo replacement and what kind of costs am I looking at?
Thanks in advance for any replies.
HDI
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Post by HDI »

Thats far less than the service life expected from the turbo but , turbo life is significantly affected by user habits and maintenance. Have you had the car from new ? If so do you allow at least 30 seconds or so before turning the engine of after a journey ? Have oil changes been on time ?
If you haven't had the car from new then it's a lottery as to how the previous owner treated the vehicle.
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Post by Old-Guy »

As HDI suggests, the twin 'killers' of turbos are dirty engine oil and not allowing the turbo to cool down with the engine idling. Turbo bearing and seals depend on a good flow of oil to keep them cool - the exhaust turbine gets red hot - and particles in dirty oil abrade oil seal lips. Turbos whistle like miniature jet engines because they spin at similar speeds - tens of thousands of rpms.

Hasty stops at motorway services are a really bad idea (not only because of inflated fuel prices!). Belting down the M? (at the legal limit :lol: ), you spot the services sign, brakes on all the way to the pump, on with the hand-brake (operates on the discs remember), and switch off.

The turbo is still nearly red hot and the discs not much cooler. With the engine off, there's no oil cooling the turbo so the oil behind the exhaust side seal cooks until it's carbonised. When the turbo is spinning, the carbonised oil erodes the lip of the oil seal.

With the handbrake on, hot disks cool unevenly because the pads locally retain the heat, progressively warping the discs.
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Post by Deanxm »

Hi Gents

It could have died through natural causes although unlikely and if its a Deisel the egt isnt really high enough to cause problems with oil overheating as much as petrols where the cool down idle period is more important.

I would be thinking more along the lines of an obstructed oilway, either through something physicaly blocking it or the oil feedpipe being kinked or degraded, then of course do you trust your garage? its not unheard of for garages to blame and replace expensive components for faults that perhaps they are not responsible for.
What problem have you been suffering with?? smoke? lack of power? noises?

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Post by KevMayer »

Which engine do you have?

What are the symptoms?
Cheers, Kev

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Post by Peter.N. »

If its a diesel they very rarely ever fail, petrols are not so reliable but I agree with previous comments.
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Post by ken newbold »

A friend of mine has recently come across this on an HDi, although not sure which one.

He said there is a filter on the oil feed pipe that gets blocked and starves the turbo of oil. A local Citroen main dealer fitted 2 brand new turbo's before the problem was found!

Makes you wonder if it'd be worth taking the filter out, but then the warranty would probably be void :evil:
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Post by uncle buck »

ken newbold wrote:A friend of mine has recently come across this on an HDi, although not sure which one.

He said there is a filter on the oil feed pipe that gets blocked and starves the turbo of oil. A local Citroen main dealer fitted 2 brand new turbo's before the problem was found!

Makes you wonder if it'd be worth taking the filter out, but then the warranty would probably be void :evil:
Interesting.....Years ago I noticed a photo in the Citroen ZX Haynes manual showing a filter fitted in the oil feed pipe for the 1.9 TD....I asked about this filter at the dealers as mine did not have one ...the filter wasn't shown on the parts list that the parts department had so the helpful parts man made a phone call to "Head office" to enquire about the filter, he was told that the filters were fitted from the factory but they were removed at the cars first service!

Turbos on modern common rail Diesels now seem to fail on a very regular basis...they are failing on all makes of cars not just Citroen's...I'm convinced it has something to do with Exhaust Gas Recirculation systems.
There has to be some reason why Turbos have started to fail on a regular basis.....You never really heard of any Turbo problems on the XUD TD engines.


Cheers.
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Post by Peter.N. »

It seems that every aspect of reliability has declined since the '90s. I have been running Citroen diesel turbo's since the CX, probably for over 25 years and half a million miles or more and have never had a turbo fail. The engines were good for 300,00 miles or more, I think modern cars are rubbish, I will stick with XM's for as long as I can repair them.

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Post by HDI »

Very surprised to hear that there are filters in the turbo oil feed. I reckon the reason they are removed at first service is either that they are only there initially to remove possible new engine build contamination , or , if not that , replaced at the service interval because they could become blocked and cut off the oil supply.
Turbo's should have a very long life on diesels if used with reasonable care.
Last edited by HDI on 28 Oct 2009, 21:03, edited 1 time in total.
Now using '00 Xantia LX HDI, pov spec :(
My past Citroens :-
'00 Xantia SX HDI, now dead due to accident :(
'99 Xantia HDI 110 Exclusive, RIP :(
'97 Xantia TD SX
'96 Xantia TD LX
'96 ZX TD
'89 BX TD
'88 AX GT
'79 CX2400 Pallas (scrapped :( )
& a couple of Peugeots !
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Post by Kowalski »

uncle buck wrote: Turbos on modern common rail Diesels now seem to fail on a very regular basis...they are failing on all makes of cars not just Citroen's...I'm convinced it has something to do with Exhaust Gas Recirculation systems.
There has to be some reason why Turbos have started to fail on a regular basis.....You never really heard of any Turbo problems on the XUD TD engines.
The turbos have got smaller, they spin faster and the exhaust gas temperatures have gone up substantially too as power outputs have gone up. I was wondering how turbos are able to survive the temperatures involved in FAP / DPF regeneration,
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Post by uncle buck »

HDI wrote:Very surprised to hear that there are filters in the turbo oil feed. I reckon the reason they are removed at first service is either that they are only there initially to remove possible new engine build contamination , or , if not replaced at the service interval they could become blocked and cut off the oil supply.
Turbo's should have a very long life on diesels if used with reasonable care.
Yeah I think that the reason for the filter is to catch any initial contamination.
In the Haynes it says to remove & clean or replace the filter...hence my question at the dealers.
The filter is in the end of the pipe that connects to the block.

Picture from the Citroen ZX Haynes Manual
Image
Kowalski wrote:The turbos have got smaller, they spin faster and the exhaust gas temperatures have gone up substantially too as power outputs have gone up. I was wondering how turbos are able to survive the temperatures involved in FAP / DPF regeneration,
Nah...there is something more sinister causing all of the failures....My moneys on EGR.

I totally agree with Peter....Diesel engines nowadays are an unreliable beast compared to the engines of the 90's

The fact is that modern Diesel engines are far to complicated for their own good with too many electronics involved, all this is supposed to make the engines more economical & refined with less emission output...maybe they are slightly more refined etc, however this comes at a massive cost...reliability.

I would like to see the results of an emissions test whilst a FAP regeneration was being performed...is it not just a case of saving the emissions up to let them go in one big puff.

Cheers.
Last edited by uncle buck on 28 Oct 2009, 17:42, edited 1 time in total.
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Post by gec »

Thanks very much for your replies so far - interesting comments.
The car is a C5 estate 1.6HDi. 05 Reg 30,000miles.
First symptoms I had was an anti-pollution warning which went off and on a few time over some days. Then haveing only driven 15 mins came out from the supermarket and on startup whole carpark filled with white smoke!!
Also (and this will probable be a great clue for you chaps) smoldering in the cover under the engine - right in the middle below the very lowest part of the engine! the plastic cover which has a kind of foam looking coating was pretty much on fire really!! glowing red and smouldering!

One thing I have noticed about the car from as far back as lI can remember - the cooling fan regularly stays on for a very very long time once you have swithched off? Is this a sign of a problem from maunfacture?
Any ideas what was these symptoms point to? Obviously as my first post said- garage have said turbo seals have gone - by the way the car drives perfectly?
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Post by KP »

Should see a Toyota T180 when it does this and its quiet often as well :( it also burns more diesel off when it does this. Really there will soon be an aftermarket kit to bypass these, getting rid of that DPF/FAP and tricking the ECU into believing one is always clean would be a winner of an idea for someone as loads are now able to get rid of them and the extra power and MPG they could easliy claw back would be impressive. A t180 would likely become a T200 and extra torque as well would be good :)
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Post by HDI »

Kowalski wrote: The turbos have got smaller, they spin faster and the exhaust gas temperatures have gone up substantially too as power outputs have gone up. I was wondering how turbos are able to survive the temperatures involved in FAP / DPF regeneration,
Turbo's haven't become smaller , they are sized to suit a given application and that size is dictated by the airflow requirement of the engine in that application. EGT's are no higher now than than they were , I think you are confusing with pollution treatment gas temperatures created by FAP etc techniques , but this is after the turbo. EGT of diesels is lower than petrol engines by about 100 deg C. As a consequence turbo's on diesels should have a longer life but the lower EGT can be partially mitigated by the tendency of diesel turbo's to have a higher duty cycle.
Now using '00 Xantia LX HDI, pov spec :(
My past Citroens :-
'00 Xantia SX HDI, now dead due to accident :(
'99 Xantia HDI 110 Exclusive, RIP :(
'97 Xantia TD SX
'96 Xantia TD LX
'96 ZX TD
'89 BX TD
'88 AX GT
'79 CX2400 Pallas (scrapped :( )
& a couple of Peugeots !
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