Blew the turbo, lots of oil in the intercooler, do I need to pull the intercooler?

Like the title says, my turbo blew up a few weeks ago.
Just getting around to getting ready for the new turbo to go in.
Pulled the lower intercooler inlet line and got at least a quart of oil out of the inlet line/intercooler.

My question is do I need to pull the intercooler and get it totally cleaned out or since the inlet line is at the very bottom will it be OK to just let it drain out for a few days? I could even jack up the car on the opposite side to help it all drain out.

I guess its better that the oil all ended up in the intercooler than in the motor intake!

Thanks.

Yes you need to drain the intercooler (unless you want to hydrolock it again).

VeeDubTDI said:

Yes you need to drain the intercooler (unless you want to hydrolock it again).

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Not what he asked.

I would be inclined to remove the intercooler and clean it, especially if the compressor lost any chunks of metal. If the compressor is still intact, you might be O.K. with just draining. Of course, how can you be really sure you got all of the oil out by just draining?

He didn't say it hydrolocked. He also was asking if he needed to remove it for cleaning or just drain it.

Personally if it were my car I'd take it out and clean it. You never know what else you might find from the turbo. It's not that much work and you'll be 100% sure everything's clean. But you could probably get away with just draining, I really don't know.

edit; looks like Ole rattler beat me to it!

yes you do, been there and not done that , it will create all sorts of problems if you don't

Reading comprehension failure. Oops.

If all of the oil drained out then you probably don't need to remove the intercooler and clean it. However, people have found bits of compressor wheel lodged in the intercooler, so you may want to remove it to make sure there's nothing in there.

I've cleaned-up oil from the "bottom" of several InterCoolers without removing them. Paper towels will get 99% of it out ...................... then later, a 1000 miles down the road will put some of it back, even with a new Turbo.

I do concur that it's not an extremely tough job to remove and clean-out, as well as a good idea in the event of castrophic failure of the Turbo.

Pull those glow plugs before even LOOKING at that ignition key!

Turn that motor one rotation, and you will have bent the rods.

-Remove and clean the intercooler (metal oil etc)
-Remove the glow plugs and PULL THE MOTOR THRU BY HAND.
-Once you have made sure that no hydro-lock exists, then crank it thru with the starter (30 seconds).
-Once you have insured the cylinders are clear, reinstall the glow plugs and now you can start the motor.

Oil typically drains into the #2 and #3 cylinders after a blown turbo because of the shape of the intake pipe.

Drivbiwire said:

Pull those glow plugs before even LOOKING at that ignition key!

Turn that motor one rotation, and you will have bent the rods.

-Remove and clean the intercooler (metal oil etc)
-Remove the glow plugs and PULL THE MOTOR THRU BY HAND.
-Once you have made sure that no hydro-lock exists, then crank it thru with the starter (30 seconds).
-Once you have insured the cylinders are clear, reinstall the glow plugs and now you can start the motor.

Oil typically drains into the #2 and #3 cylinders after a blown turbo because of the shape of the intake pipe.

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do this! there are countless people on this forum who replace their turbos and dont do this and get problems that coulld have easily been avoided!

Thanks for the replies.
Glow plugs are already out. One had been bad for a while anyway causing me a CEL.

I was going to wait until it is all back together before turning it over with the glow plugs out but thanks for the idea of turning it over by hand first.

So it sounds like the general consensus is to pull the intercooler and make sure it is cleaned out. I think I will do that. The compressor wheel had grenaded so it is a good idea.

Thanks.

If it is suspected the compressor puked its guts you should remove the ducting between the TC and IC too.

I also recommend replacing the air filter and washing the turbo inlet pipe. Failures often back feed boost pressure up toward the air box. I've seen plenty of guys saying "I/such and such just replaced the turbo and now it's blown again" Typical cause of this is foreign object damage (FOD) resultant from the new turbo aspirating blown turbo bits.

This is less common on a "burst failure" (compressor wheel cracked in half) and more common on the "surge failure" (broken shaft)

aNUT said:

I also recommend replacing the air filter and washing the turbo inlet pipe. Failures often back feed boost pressure up toward the air box. I've seen plenty of guys saying "I/such and such just replaced the turbo and now it's blown again" Typical cause of this is foreign object damage (FOD) resultant from the new turbo aspirating blown turbo bits.

This is less common on a "burst failure" (compressor wheel cracked in half) and more common on the "surge failure" (broken shaft)

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Interesting info. I will pull the intake off too and take a look.
I guess I had both types of failures because the compressor wheel did spit in half but the shaft broke also.