When I registered for this forum, I was the proud owner of a 1G TSi AWD. As I make this post, it's parked, awaiting a new 4G63.
It started Saturday morning, I picked up the car, and I was off to pickup my gf for lunch. On the way I ran into an Integra with altezzas that was weaving through traffic, and... nature ran its course After this, I discovered what heat soak feels like, so I cranked my heating to max, and opened my windows. All was good, I went out with my gf, and we had a great lunch. I got home, and after some time, my friends and I got a craving for some burritos from Burrito Boyz downtown. Hop in the Talon and off we go. I pick up one of them, and they say they want to try it out. No harm in that, I tell him that he's only going to get a few good pulls before it heat soaks, so to make it count. The car pulls like a dream, and everything is good. At this point, my gas gauge is low, and I decide 94 octane is a better choice than the 91 currently in it (I couldn't find 94 earlier in the day), because that's what the previous owner told me it was tuned for. I fill up with 94 and off we go! I'm staying out of boost and buzzing along the 401, when I notice the car infront of me is doing like 90, and the car beside me is pretty much matching my speed, so I'm going to get locked in. That wasn't going to work, so I plant my foot, the turbo spools, and we're off! I blow by both cars as if they're standing still and then all of a sudden, I lose power and I see black smoke streaking out the back of my car. I pull to the side of the highway and pop my hood to inspect the damage. There's nothing visible, and we're almost downtown, so I close it back up and decide to just continue on my burrito run, but stay out of boost. This was a very bad decision. When I get downtown and turn off the car, I can't seem to turn it back on, it keeps stalling. I give it some gas to keep it "awake" and we're off to home. On the highway, I don't even notice my oil gauge getting lower and lower, and then the CEL came on. I shat bricks at this point, but limped it home at 60, and staying out of boost. In the morning, I topped off the oil, and bought a 4L jug of oil and I was off to my friend's place who is a nissan master tech and has a turbo car of his own. On the way, my oil gets low again, so I pull to the side of the road and top it off. This happens again, and by the time I get to his house, I've used a full 4L of oil. He looks at the car, concludes my turbo is gone, but says he needs me to take it to his friend's shop so he can get it on a hoist and really look at it. I buy another 4L jug of oil, and set off for his friend's shop. I run low again and top it off, but after a little while, my engine starts to make noises and I realize that just topping off the oil all the time wasn't cutting it, and I definitely should not have been driving the car in that state. I pull to the side of the road for the last time. The car will not turn over anymore at this point. I call for a tow while smoke is starting to enter my interior. I open my windows and sit there freezing, listening to the radio and waiting for the tow. At some point the radio stops working. I see two DSMs drive by, and I'm cursing my fate at this point... Why is mine the broken one? Why am I the one at the side of the road?

The car is parked now, and I'll be getting a new engine soon, but I want to know... Why did I blow the turbo? Would an oil pressure gauge have told me that there's something wrong? How can I know in the future that something is wrong, and to back off? I know very well why the motor is gone, but how do I prevent the turbo from blowing again?

This is what the car had/has:
JDM 6-bolt engine
ARP headstuds
OEM headgasket
Braided SS oil lines for the turbo
2G MAF
450CC injectors
Walbro 190lph pump
Boost controller, running 17 psi
ACT 2100 clutch
3" turboback exhaust
VDO Boost gauge
Weird short gear tranny that puts me at 4500rpm when I'm only doing 120km/h

I was thinking of getting a front mount with all SS piping, silicone couplers and T-bolt clamps, an oil pressure gauge, and turning the boost down until I get an SAFC and can tune the car properly. Any input would be greatly appreciated, because quite frankly, I don't want to be swapping another motor anytime soon.

Turbos can blow in many different ways. How did this one 'blow'?

When your car starts pouring black smoke out the back out of nowhere..Back off....

You said you're already getting a new engine but are you positive your engine is blown? You may just need a new/rebuild turbo and to give your intake system a really good cleaning.

I would suggest you get your car running properly stock before you start throwing mods at it.

That's a good question... All I'm aware of is the aftermath of it blowing. I was making no boost, and oil was being devoured at a silly rate. It was going in one (or both) of two places: into the intake and through my motor, then out the tailpipe, or just straight down the DP and then out the tailpipe.
Now, all of yesterday, people were telling me how much of a POS these cars are. First my mechanic friend, then all of the 240SX guys I talk with (I had one for about 3 years a year back), and then even the tow truck operator, who kept talking about how his friend has a really nicely done up Eclipse, with a ton of money into it and much lower mileage than my car, but still breaks all the time anyway.
Considering that I blew the motor in one day, a less spiteful person would tend to agree with them. But I bought this damn car, and I'll be damned if I'm just going to lose my money and get rid of it. There has to be a way to make this thing reliable, especially considering that I'm not asking for huge power levels out of it. To me, this is just a beater so that I don't have to risk the G in the winter, so I don't need 500whp or something silly like that. For now, I don't intend to do any power upgrades, but just any necessary reliability ones so that I can get used to the car the way it is, and be able to drive it daily with no major problems. Then when I'm done that, I plan to move on to a 16G turbo and crank up the boost. But it's not something that I intend to have happen until I am fairly confident in the car.

So, new motor is on the way, with stock turbo, a turbo timer, an oil pressure gauge and more than likely a frontmount and piping. Is there anything else I should invest in if I'm just looking for reliability for now?

Edit: I'm fairly certain the motor is blown, because it got oil starved and it felt like it seized.

Poor DSM...

They always take the blame.

Yeah Rob, this car didn't even have a chance...

Antonio, you beat the engine to death when it was trying to tell you something. You might have had just a small problem if you stopped and had it towed the first time. Now you've got a bigger problem.

Talons can be reliable if you take care of them, you didn't and now you pay the price.

Get it up and going under stock conditions, then worry about modding it afterwards.

Oh, I'm well aware why the motor is gone, and that it's my fault. What I'm curious about is how to prevent blowouts like what happened in the first place. There's quite a few turbocharged daily drivers out there that are reliable with proper care and maintenance, and I'd like to know what needs to be done to make my Talon like that. I just can't deal with towing my car on a regular basis, it's a bit of a silly way to go about things. I'd much rather spend the money up front, and do all that's required to keep it running nicely instead.

Before you can decide how to stop a "blowout" you'll have to find out for SURE what went wrong in the first place.

Any idea how your friend "concluded" your turbo was gone?

Another question that comes to mind is: How are you compensating for the 2G MAF? I didn't see mention of an SAFC or other airflow/fuel mods..

Wow, he says he still has to get an SAFC...
If it really does have a 2G MAFS, I bet there's also a hole in a piston.

20% more air without the fuel to go with it, is a pretty efficient way to melt things.

Heat soak? Are you sure it was heat soak and not knocking REALLY bad causing timing to be pulled?

Well, the turbo being gone was pretty obvious, the car wasn't making any boost, oil was being consumed, and blue smoke was coming out the exhaust.

The 2G MAF isn't being compensated for I believe. The prev owner told me it "was okay" because it has the 190 walbro, but I'm beginning to think that it's not the case.

I'm pretty sure it was heat soak, because I believe I would've noticed knocking.

So far, it would appear I need to: get SAFC, tune for 2G maf, lower boost to stock. Anything else?

A car with some blown ring lands, and holed pistons won't make much boost, will consume oil, and will blow tonnes of blue smoke.

A pump upgrade will NOT compensate for a 2G MAF.

When your DSM "knocks" you won't hear it. It will pull ignition timing without you knowing (unless you have some way of watching knocksum or timing advance).

I'm putting my money on the problem being that 2G MAF, and as a result you running A/F ratios of ~12:1 with way too much timing on pump gas.

Aah, okay. So what would be my best course of action? Would the SAFC + tune be appropriate?

I have a short block for you if you need one...

Yes, before you start it again, install the SAFC and start off with everything at ~ +20%.

Just to add to that, you are also going to need to do some work. Installing the SAFC and firing it up (Which I'm sure Steve wasn't referring to, but I am going to add on what he's probably thinking) isn't going to fix it. You have to do some troubleshooting.

You are going to have to prepare yourself for the most extreme, which is a motor teardown/rebuild or engine swap, however check the following:

If your turbo is blown and you're burning oil, you can check this by pulling the turbo and inspecting the compressor housing for oil. Also, a large amount of shaft play will tell the tale whether or not the turbo is done.

Next, run a compression test. This will tell you if you have low compression in one/all of your cylinders. This is the easiest test to verify whether or not you have blown rings.

If you can, a leakdown test will confirm pressure loss through blow-by.

If you are burning oil through the turbo, your pipes and intercooler are going to be coated in it, you will have to clean that out. Your intake will also have oil, hard to clean out, however a good degreaser will help.

If you have blown up your motor (which by the sounds of it you did), you are going to have to either rebuild it or replace it. You said it has a JDM motor in it, indicating it's probably a 6 bolt. Save the core and build a new engine over time, or rebuild it as it sits.

Next, read up on this car. It sounds like you bought it modified, beat the hell out of it, and within 1 day, blew it up. Classic case of too much foot, not enough knowledge.

As Steve said, you can't hear knocking. The heat of the FMIC didn't help matters, however when you heat soak, you ARE knocking, that is how you know. Hot air (aka. Compressed air) will ignite your fuel before your spark does, causing knock. As a result, you put undo stress on your rods/pistons/rings and probably blew your motor up. Your piston was still too far into the compression stroke when your fuel ignited. I'm not going to go into the science behind it as you can probably figure out what happened, however in short, the pressure of the explosion in your cylinder shoved past your rings. I wouldn't doubt it if one or 2 of your rings are actually split. Not to mention, the undo heat from the high A/F ratio REALLY didn't help much. Fuel, as crazy as it sounds, actually cools down your cylinder temperatures. When you have too much compressed air from the turbo, your cylinders get hot, QUICK.

So, the long of the short of it is, you ran too lean, knocked the hell out of your motor, probably melted a ring or two and now you're burning oil.

I know it sucks, but live and learn right?

With the amount of oil you were burning, it's not your turbo. 4L in 10 minutes? Your turbo will not go through that much, especially at low RPMs.

So, pick up a Haynes Manual, go to www.1000aaq.com and www.vfaq.com , read up and don't blow the next one up!

Edit:

I read through your post a little more. Your friends sound like they don't know what they're talking about (no offence intended) but when you ROAST them in your "unreliable" DSM, they'll turn the other cheek and realize these cars are great.

If you take care of them.

How do you prevent this from happening in the future?

Read. Lots of reading. Get as much knowledge as you can about your car, and you'll be gold. Little do you know, but the configuration of your car right now can put you deep into the 13's, high 12's if you can drive it.

While you're getting that FMIC, grab yourself a set of 680cc injectors. You won't have enough fuel. Also, do a pump re-wire.

The setup you have is great! A 16G will put you into the 300-325WHP range at about 20psi.

Just take care of the car. Don't beat on it. If the body's in good shape, clean and all that, you've got a hell of a car on your hands my man.

What happened first could be anything, but it got driven into thr ground. I'm surprised it actually ran that long. The DSM is as reliable as any other turbo car, but even if you build it for longevity and take care of it, stupid little things can happen. It sounds like your 'heat soak' was something else. In the middle of winter? Come on!

As for the 2G MAF, TONS of people were doing this 'back in the day', with no ill effects that I can remember. More fuel was good, but not necessary as far as I can remember.

Excellent write-up, Ryan. Sounds like Antonio has enough ca$h to just buy another engine, though.

Thanks for the great, informative posts!
The choice between buying and building is largely based on cost, because the guy that sold me the car, told me that he would swap in a motor for free for me, and that he could source me one for between $5-600.
Depending on what's wrong with my current motor, I see a rebuild easily exceeding that. I mean, just to get my block properly inspected and honed to accept the new pistons would be close to that. Rings would be in the 150 range, but pistons are easily 300, if the rods need replacing, that's also atleast 300. Another 200 for bearings, 150 for main and head studs, 150 for headgasket, it adds up to way more. Admittedly, that would give me a really stout motor that I wouldn't have to worry about, vs. an imported JDM one that I'll have to hope is in good condition, but I'm not sure if I actually have the 1200-1500 ish to get it rebuilt. Then again, all these price estimates are based on rebuilding a Nissan KA or SR series motor, I have no clue if it's more or less for a 4G63. The rule of thumb for those was if you plan to run high power, build it, if not just get another short block and drop it in for way less than a rebuild. Is that the same with these cars, or no?

Troy: I believe you're thinking of people running a 2G MAF with 550 cc injectors. Not 450s.

Antonio, some of your estimates are high, some are low. When you DO want parts, email me and I will get you good pricing.

I think I'm going to open up the motor first and see exactly what needs to be done, and go from there.

Probably, Steve. Raising the fuel pressure (this was before the Walbros were common, I think) and/or the 550s would do it.

Otherwise, it's the beating on the car that does it. Don't drive it so hard, and quite a few flaws will be 'ignored' by the car.

The reason the DSM has so many haterz, 'tonio is that you actually have to LEARN about them before you uncork the potential. They'd rather take a no-brainer approach.

Poor dsm - Oh well these things happen to everyone. I'm also surprised that nobody here mentioned the fact that... you should not be street racing!! save the car for the quarter mile. This is how dsm's get a bad rep.

Haha, yes, it's definitely not something I practice, but first day with a car that is new to you is often enough for a person to get carried away

I'll admit, when I got my 1'st DSM in Missy a few years ago, I did a little bit of pedal to the floor, but she was ALL stock, so it could take it.

I was so used to driving N/A that feeling boost in 2nd gear was weird, I was almost scared.

Now AHH CAN'T GIT ENUFF!!!

Okay, something very relevant just occured to me. The previous owner was using the car as it was before the motor blew, and always ran 94 in it. When I picked it up, he said it had 91 in it, because that's all he could find, and told me to run 94. Who's fault is it that the motor is blown right now? I admit negligence on my part, but if he sold me a car, that was not suitable to be run in the condition that he sold me it, and told me it was fine, I'm going to demand that he pay for the motor.

Nope, the car will run on 91.

Sorry Antonio, but you blew the car up, and there's no way you will get the previous owner to pay for the motor. If you wrote a contract stating that the previous owner would have warrantied the car for say 15 days no abuse, then yes, but in this case, it's all you buddy.

A 1G with a 2G MAFS and no proper compensation, is not suitable to be run.
You should give the previous owner some sh!t for that one, but overall I don't think you have any legs to stand on.

I hate to bring it up but well your in there you should check the # stamped on the top of the tranny bellhousing. Its been a long winter but 4500rmp @ 120Km doesn't sound right to me... perhaps you have a JDM AWD non-turbo manual transmission with the incorrect final drive.
If you do some more searching you'll find that you need a specific final drive to match your rear diff or you'll burn the tranny up.
There is a list around here somewhere of trannies that will work, some are unknown though like mine "C15PH" for example, and it works perfect.

Welcome to the club, I love my DSM and I wouldn't bother with anything else.

Good luck.

^^^
Yea I noticed too, the tranny is wack! Poor fuckin DSM!
Oh well, you learn and you have to start somewhere I guess. Enjoy...

Your tranny should have the numbers W5M33-#### stamped on the bellhousing right below the water pipe piece that goes to the throttle body. Get that number.

I noticed that too. With the incorrect final drive, you will be replacing a VC, Center Diff, T-Case and/or rear diff in the near future. The first to go will be the Viscous Coupler.

So what you're telling me is that it's entirely possible that the person who sold me this car is a complete hack and robbed me blind? How can I know if the final drive hasn't been changed as well, and that it is infact a mismatch?

Not a hack, more like you were blind as you didn't know what to look for. Somthing simple could have made all the oil leak out, causing the failure. If you stopped driving when you noticed the problem, you could have prevented some major failure. Oh well, good excuse to rebuild everything




There are JDM transmissions without this code that will still work, you just have to know which ones , so don't just base your conclusions on these first 5 numbers/letters.

Antonio, I would just like to point out that no matter what the previous owner did to the car, you really can't go back at him for it. You bought the car as-is, and if the previous owner didn't have any problems with it, you really won't have a leg to stand on if you go back at him for it.

You can however vent your frustrations and see what he says!

If you are rebuilding/replacing the engine, all you will have to do is swap the tranny out, and all will be good. Talk to Helder, he may have one laying around.

Or, if your in the dough, www.jackstransmissions.com or www.teamrip.com or www.sheptrans.com where you can buy built transmissions. Some require a core, some don't.

Hate to say it, but he's right. You want to beat on something and it not die? LOL.

Hey Rob, any reason why your little smiley ain't so smiley?

Lemme guess... because you can't get traction.

LMAO, no sh!t!

So the guy got a little pedal-happy with his first DSM on his first day driving it. Sure, he should have stopped driving once he found out he was losing 4L of oil in a half hour but we've all made mistakes. At least he uses proper grammar.

To Antonio,

You drive a DSM. You better own $3k worth of tools and a garage or else this is going to be one miserable ownership. When you buy a DSM, nine times out of ten, you are purchasing someone elses hack job. Most peopler here will agree with me. The key is to just cut all ties with the previous owner and fix everything right all at once.

Were you robbed blind? Probably not. The motor could have blown from a small crack in a line. The transmission is likely a JDM, which three out of five times, you get the wrong one but it's good enough to work for the time being.

It's time to move forward. Do what needs to be done and next time, take it easy on the car until you know that if it breaks, you can fix it.

I know I can fix my car, so I beat on it. Cayuga may be a far trip but it's way better than any friday night at a stupid club in downtown Toronto.

The thing is, that was changed on me from when the car was originally for sale. It was supposed to come with a freshly rebuilt tranny from Magnus, but when I was picking it up he told me that one blew and he put in a different one. I figured, whatever, a tranny is a tranny. How is it okay to blatantly lie to someone and just randomly drop parts into the car to get rid of it and have the new owner (who has never owned a DSM before) deal with it? How can you possibly condone something like that? I shouldn't have to check the stamping on every part of the car when I'm being sold a working car in "great" shape. I'm sorry, but that's a load of BS. You can't tell me that an honest seller would sell a car with a mismatched tranny and final drive that is running way too lean. That's something a crook does.

Antonio,
You will be surprised that probably more than half the people here didn't even know they had a messed up JDM tranny, or didn't even know that the final drives are different. Heck a lot of people still don't get the concept.

So don't be surprised if the previous owner had no clue to what he was doing, or what tranny it was.
Go to a JDM shop and ask for a tranny, and they do not even have a clue as to what they are giving you.
NO JDM distributor in the GTA has a clue as to which ones work with our cars.