Turbo Blew

2003 Jetta GL TDI… which would be an ALH correct? 5 speed with 150K

Ok so I dropped off my car at a Firestone Auto Center to get an oil change, tire rotation, state inspection, brake rotors and look at the turbo (the MIL light was on). Car drove in there and kind of low power. They changed the oil and when doing so, saw what looked like to be brass flakes. They also hooked up the vacuum lines to the turbo and tested it down the street when the turbo wound up as usual and then blew. When they put it back on the back oil in then engine compartment and then they checked the oil level and it was high. They drained the oil and it appeared to be more watery. Their assumption was that when the turbo blew and oil and coolant all mixed together.

When they drained the oil something came from the pan, they believe that it is some gasket or O-Ring, but not sure because it is in a few pieces. They feel that they no longer want to work on it as they now feel in over their heads and recommended to take it to the dealer.

The dealer wants to check it out on Monday and open up the engine to make sure that the engine is not damaged and it was only the turbo. The dealer wants to charge me $2,488 ($1,683 for parts: Turbo ($1,450), gaskets, glow plugs (needed anyway) and turbo feed line, + $85 taxes + $720 labor). I found with Bora Parts a Borg-Warner for $850.

My questions are:
Has anyone seen this happen?
Does it sound like the dealer is taking me to the cleaners aside from the turbo?

Any help or experience in this matter is very much appreciated!
Brooks

Firestone Auto Center owes you a new turbo.

don't take it to the dealer.. also I have a hard time understanding the events at the oil change place.

what line did they blow?

how did the anti freeze end up in the turbo? probably thrugh the egr cooler? there is no coolant in the turbo..

They should have realized that they were over their heads before they killed your car. First of all, did you take the proper oil with you to the Firestone? If no, what oil did they put in?

Went from low power when you took it in to blown turbo? Oops, we broke your car...we now think it is beyond our capabilities to fix... Have a nice day (elsewhere). Is that how the conversation went?

The other thing is...hey, we saw metal flakes in your oil, let's take your car out for some WOT runs to make sure it is OK...

Also having a hard time understanding what happened before they blew the turbo. They disconnected a vacuum line, then reattached? Unfortunately the description is so vague that you don't know if they had a runaway (if they did indeed pull the seal out with the oil...) or what. You need to have someone very familiar with ALH look at it.

Check the "trusted mechanics by state" thread at the top of the 101 forum.

Most shops and certainly all national chains should have insurance to cover accidental damage to a customer's vehicle. Had a friend take a Toyota Sienna to the dealer to get the oil change and they somehow managed to drop it off a lift onto its side...like a beached whale. Needless to say, they got him exactly the replacement vehicle he wanted after first offering to have it fixed by their body shop... I told him I wouldn't take the car back. There is just no knowing what a 4' drop onto its side may do to a vehicle. Maybe if they had offered to extend the warranty another 100K...maybe.

Get a guru...

I can't really understand what exactly you wrote but:
1. Don't take your car to the dealer. Period.
2. The BW turbo is wrong for your car if its an 03. You need the Garrett VNT 15.
3. $1400 at the dealer is probably a reman turbo, which you should avoid, especially when new OEM ones are around $800. Does this give you an idea why dealers LOVE to replace turbos?
4. There's probably more going on than a blown turbo, and actually nothing in your post points to a blown turbo except the fact that the idiots at Firestone told you. Coolant/oil mixture has nothing to do with it.

You really need to find the right mechanic; look up the trusted mechanics on this forum. Good luck!

Thanks for the help folks, the dealership just called and informed me that there is a hole in my engine block now! They said that when they tried to crank it up there was a horrible knocking sound and opened up the engine and the #2 valve is bent and there is a hole in block now.

Just to check, I asked, "Is there anyway I would have been able to drive this car on Thursday if there was a hole in the block?" Dealership replied with "HAHA no."

Anybody know of Firestone's policy on destroying a car and paying the owner?

You knew there was water in the oil and they tried to crank the motor up? That doesn't sound like a very good decision either. Does the dealer now owe you parts too?

A windowed block could certainly lead to coolant in oil, oil everywhere, etc. If they are not more than eager to pay to have your engine replaced, contact your insurance company and file a claim, and let them turn their lawyers loose on Firestone.

Insurance company said that since there was a code and they ran the diagnostics on it and the turbo was under powered and they worked on it this is considered normal engine wear and the insurance company said that this does not fall under comprehensive or accidental and therefore not under my policy.

Perhaps an expert witness could successfully argue otherwise.

TDIRugger, I feel you pain. Hope you find a satisfactory solution to this mess. I guess you tought the car was in limp mode therefore the CEL and low power which can be the consequence of many different causes some very inocuous, but.
In the other hand, when they spotted metal particles in the oil, they should have immediately recommended a tow to an specialist, nothing else.

Something doesn't make sense to me, sounds like there is missing more info on how, what, where happened. Only one story we hear, need to hear both sides of stories, sorry budd but to me sounds like their is a key information that is missing in your posts. Not trying to say that I don't believe you what you wrote or that possible Firestone destroyed your engine, but there is always two sides of stories.

Based on what you wrote I understood that:
1. You had CEL on & low power, so tells me there was already something wrong with your car before you took for oil change.
2. They (Firestone) did you oil change and found out some brass flakes (could be from turbo seals, bearings) so in otherwords the engine already suffered some damaged before oil change.
3.Here is where Firestone could be liable for their actions, they had know clue what they were doing when checking turbo, with vacuum line disconnected and possible they used manual vacuum pump they opened up vanes causing turbo to overboost and snap a shaft (turbo failure).

What doesn't make sense to me is how/where would water/coolant would get into oil from turbo failure? unless you already had prexisting problem like leaking oil cooler (haven't seen one to fail on TDI), or blown headgasket causing coolant leak into cylinders.

From what you posted to me at moment sounds like it ws just coincidence that engine failure occured at Firestone posesion from already existing issue with your engine.

Please post a DTC that was pulled from when you brought vehicle to firestone.

Ok, let me see what I might be able to clear up.
I was driving the car and yes it was a bit underpowered and the MIL or CEL was on. I originally dropped it off to get oil changed, state inspection, tire rotation and get the brakes looked at.
The car passed inspection and oil change and they said that there were flakes in the oil and wanted to run a diagnostic check on it. They did so and found glow plug needed to be replaced and turbo was underpowered. They did something with the vacuum lines on the turbo and drove it down the street. They said that the turbo wound up and then blew. When they brought it back it they said it looked like when the turbo blew it mixed the coolant and oil together and that I needed a new turbo and they believed that might fix the problem but they didn’t have access to any turbos quickly and then called me back and said that they did not feel comfortable working on it any longer and felt that they were in over their head and that I should get it towed to the dealer.
I did this and then the dealer said when they were looking at it that the turbo was blown and wondered if the engine was in time. They checked this and opened up the engine and saw that the #2 valve was bent and there was a hole in the engine block.
They said that there is no way that I would have been able to drive the car with a hole in the block.

It seems to me that while they had it and toying with the turbo they blew the hole in the block when the turbo went. I drove the car there and had to get it towed to the dealer and now it has a hole in the block.

lawyer up, sounds like Firestone messed with some of the coolant lines, broke something and in the process, you had hydrolock.

Good luck

Dave

I am going today to VW and they are going to provide me with a statement that says "There is no way I could have driven this engine to Firestone with a hole in the block" and then I will be taking some pictures.

Does anyone know of any policies that places like Firestone have as a corporation regarding issues where they total someone's car? I would prefer not to go the lawyer route as finances are tight enough as is.

TDIRugger, thank you for clearing up on what exactly happened. With your last statement now we all can get clearer picture what happened.

So they blew a turbo and oil filled cylinders causing hydrolock engine bending valves and busting thru the wall where coolant passage is and all coolant went into oil pan. Get yourself a lawyer and take pictures of damaged caused and have dealer write a letter on explaining how damaged could have occured and estimate of repair cost. With letter from dealer & estimate of repair cost and lawyer meet up with the owner of firestone and talk to them if they would resolve this in house. If they are not willing to negotiate on deal then file a claim with their insurance and court.

Good luck with it, also post pics of engine so we figure out more on how it happend.

Some pictures too

So the dealer typed up for me this statement:
“Customer advises vehicle was diagnosed with bad turbo check and give estimate.
Vehicle was towed in for blown turbo and glow plug replacement upon inspection glow plugs found #2 glow plug had been in contact with piston checked timing and timing was in. Called customer to authorize pulling head to check for internal damage pulled head and found cylinder #2 with valve damage and piston damaged as well as hole in front part of #2 cylinder wall. Noticed no coolant came out of head and also none in coolant bottle. Engine appears to be overheated and turbo oil feed line was welded itself to turbo. Vehicle would not be drivable in this condition.”
The mechanic at VW said that even if the turbo was underpowered the car would drive and if there was a hole in the cylinder it would not basically, if the oil was somehow bypassing through the turbo it would be burning and smoking out of the exhaust and the exhaust is dry and clean, at least clean for a diesel exhaust system, no liquid oil in the exhaust system.
Also when they looked at the turbo, the fan in the turbo was still free spinning and tight. Meaning the bearing for this part was not wore out and putting brass shavings in system.
This is my first diesel car, I am still not 100% knowledgeable on the TDI engine, at least not as well versed in it as I was my Jeep 4.0L straight 6, so there may be things with this system I might be missing. However, to me it sounds the car dove in there, Firestone did something, hole blows in my cylinder, they then tell me the turbo is blown and take it to the dealership and I have to have it towed to VW. The long and short of it, I drove it there Thursday and had it towed out Friday.
I will be taking this info to Firestone tomorrow; the manager was not in when I stopped by around 5:30.
Anyone have any thoughts on this?
All of this help is very much appreciated. Also the bluebook on this is around $5,800.

Yikes


That is an epic FAIL! My head hurts just trying to figure out how a hole was blown in that part of the block... As you described above, I had imagined that a Firestone monkey had bypassed the n75 solenoid and driven the car, causing over boost and turbo failure, leading to hydrolock and a thrown rod, but this?!!
WOW
I have been following this thread for a little while and I'm sorry that you are having to go through this. I hope that you come out on top and wind up getting to experience a TDi the way it is meant to be. Hopefully, others can learn from this and only trust their TDis to mechanics who are familiar with these engines.

In your post #13, you say that Firestone decided that the turbo was underpowered... They later claim to be over their heads. If they adjusted the actuator linkage to demand more turbo could that have caused the turbo to grenade?

Maybe they forgot/didn't recognize that it was a diesel and thought, "this 1.8T doesn't have any balls...let's adjust the turbo????" What could they have done that would cause the turbo to grenade?

Buddha, the turbo didn't blow (even more mysterious) read post #17 of the findings from dealer.
I would like to know how you can open a hole in your block. This Firestone people are really something else!

Sounds like the Firestone people had a runaway during the test drive. If that is the case is it really their fault? They knew they turbo was failing but never checked the intercooler for excessive oil. Which given the experience with an oil change place, I wouldn't expect them to even know that was a possibility.

I guess the most troubling aspect is that you are taking your TDI to a firestone place for service... and then topping it off with a dealership. Epic fail all around.

So many people have no business going close to these cars with anything resembling a wrench.

Well the Firestone Claims dept is supposed to call me.

Can you post biger picture of the hole in cylinder block? its very hard to see clearer picture on what would cause such a mess.

Once they do, go to the Trusted TDI Mechanics thread in the TDI101 Forum, and find the nearest Guru. Stay away from the dealer.

What I am going to try to do is get Firestone to give me blue book for my car. The dealership said a used engine out run about $4K and new up to $8K maybe and the blue book is ~$6K. I would think that Firestone might just buy it out.... at least that is what I am hoping.

Good luck, I'll doubt you will have much luck without a lawyer.

Firestone has begun the claim process and they will be in touch with me and the VW dealership. I am hoping that it is pretty cut and dry, let's hope so.

Run, don't walk AWAY from the dealer!

Well at this point the dealer is not doing any work on the vehicle. They are not repairing it. I'm going to see what Firestone will do to compensate me for blowing my engine.