Oil in Intercooler

Tug68 · 03-03-2010, 08:40 AM

I took off my intercooler to get polished yesterday and found a little bit of oil on the turbo side of the intercooler. Question is should I be concerned and what would cause this?

x98boardwell · x98boardwell's Garage

No concern what so ever... as long as it is a little bit as described. We all have that in our IC's. You will know if it is a problem if it is smoking on a regular basis... then you could be burning that oil if you had a turbo seal failure.

Thanks,
Bryan

jwasbury · 03-03-2010, 10:15 AM

Oil in IC may indicate leaking seals in the turbo as stated.

If you have the stock airbox configuration, the oil tank and crankcase breather are plumbed to the aibox, so oil in the IC also will come from crankcase blowby. All engines will have blowby to some degree. My car had a lot, which is why I am rebuilding the engine. When you pulled the oil filler cap on my car, you could see an exhaust-like puff puff puff of steam...that's crankcase pressure for you.

I always found a nice puddle of oil at the top of the turbo up pipe when I removed the IC...but my car never smoked from the exhaust. I guess Brad Penn burns clean...

Tug68 · 03-03-2010, 10:54 AM

Thanks guy`s. I think the turbo is seeping a little oil on the outside so maybe you are correct about the seals. Thanks again. Jacob we should try and get the tri-state 930`s together someday what do you think?????

krasuskyp · 03-03-2010, 11:15 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tug68

Jacob we should try and get the tri-state 930`s together someday what do you think?????

*ThreadJack*

Coupla things come to mind on 'that' thought.

Justin & I have often talked about the possibility of organizing a NE turboPALOOZA (hmmm, need catchy name: loserPALOOZA? no wait, that'd just be me - hmmm). Would be a fall foliage type thing through northern New England.

It's conceptua... for now. Be good to start getting a rough count of the potential tho.

In the meantime, consider coming on out for die Vorlage //SFest, it's an Audi gig I run annually but there's ALWAYS a gaggle of Porsche's of interest, and a host of other gnarly iron (or carbon fiber, as the case may be heh heh). It's 8/28 weekend this year, like Woodstock but with uber cars and great folks. Typically north of 120 cool cars.

hope to meet you sometime

anywho

mark houghton · 03-03-2010, 11:39 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by jwasbury

I always found a nice puddle of oil at the top of the turbo up pipe when I removed the IC...but my car never smoked from the exhaust. I guess Brad Penn burns clean...

Ditto mine as well, but I don't get the puff-puff of steam when pulling the oil tank cap as you did. Little oil pooled in the up-pipe, no smoking.

911st · 03-04-2010, 06:50 AM

We might consider flushing the intercooler one a year or whatever to keep pressure drop and IC efficiency at its best.

mark houghton · 07:32 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by 911st

We might consider flushing the intercooler one a year or whatever to keep pressure drop and IC efficiency at its best.

Yep, I do that to keep the heat exchange efficiency where it belongs. I just slosh a bunch of gasoline around inside, drain it out and immediately put the IC back on the car. On initial startup, you get this loud explosion and a huge fireball goes rolling across the driveway. Pretty cool, setting fire to anything within 50 feet.

Drane · 03-04-2010, 07:47 AM

Plenty funny Mark!! Long ago I had engine failure on 930 blowing oil up the intercooler. Guru told me the engine oil if it makes it to the combustion chamber burns very hot n detonates the rods out the case which it did -- keep an eye on what goes.

JFairman · 03-04-2010, 09:35 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by mark houghton

Yep, I do that to keep the heat exchange efficiency where it belongs. I just slosh a bunch of gasoline around inside, drain it out and immediately put the IC back on the car. On initial startup, you get this loud explosion and a huge fireball goes rolling across the driveway. Pretty cool, setting fire to anything within 50 feet.

lol...
Mark, I've sloshed gas around in mine while upside down to rinse out most of the the oil after the turbo failures I had in the past.
After that I fill my bathtub with hot water and Tide powder laundry detergent and submerge the intercooler upside down in the soapy water, slosh it around and pour it out again and again.... then repeat with cold clean water to rinse it, shake out as much of the water as possible and then install it on the car and drive it for a while on the interstate to dry it out internally.