kfhoffman3
New member
Hello all, hoping I can get some good advice on how to best proceed from the situation I find myself in.
TL;DR - Sorry it got long... I blew my turbo and need to find a decent rebuilt one or a place to get it rebuilt since I am out of warranty and doing it myself.
I have a 2013 Passat TDI SEL (NMS/CKRA it's a US car) with 138k miles and of course the turbo just failed last week.
On my way home from work about 15 minutes into my drive just accelerating from a stop sign I had sudden loss of power, blinking glow plug light and turbo underboost code. I limped it home.
The dealership refused to service it under the extended warranty/TSB since that was only good to 120k and they wanted $5k to replace it - they verified the turbo was bad by inspection with a borescope down the intake.
I decided to do it myself since over the years I've done a number of engine/trans swaps, engine rebuilds, etc but mostly on older cars and I'm familiar with turbo systems on gas cars (my other car is an 88 Supra turbo) so I didn't think it would be too bad but this is my first real foray into the VW's and diesels.
After some grief removing the DPF and having to pick up some special tools I have the turbo off - the intake impeller is seized in the housing and the exhaust impeller is basically flopping around.
There was about 3/4 of a quart of oil that came out when I detached the front intercooler pipe but none on the exhaust side or in the DPF itself.
This one is the Borg-Warner (03L 253 056 E V 500 on the tag).
I planned to order the turbo online but the main place I see them is from is TurbochargerPros / BuyAutoParts and the reviews don't look too good, they sound like Chineese knockoffs - even if they are warrantied I have no desire to do this labor again.
Junkyard is out of the question as I will probably get another part with the TSB problem.
The dealership said they could not find anything with that part number but looking it up by VIN they show 03L 253 010 J and there is literally one in the USA at some dealer in Ohio and they want $1667.52 for it; ECS has one for $1400.
Found one by the new part number on IDParts but I don't know anything about that company.
SO here's where I could use some advice:
Is that part number a legit replacement for the existing part number?
Does anyone know of a reputable source of rebuilt turbos for this car that are preferably under $1,000?
I called a few local diesel shops and none will rebuild it, probably because it's a VNT but as soon as I said it was off a VW they had no interest.
Is there a known good place to get these rebuilt in a reasonable timeframe, preferably in the Midwest (I'm in Wisconsin).
I'm still making payments on this car and I'm paying out of pocket for a rental until I get it back in action so the quicker I can get this done the better.
Last but not least, if anyone has any other advice on the replacement procedure I'd greatly appreciate it!
Thanks for reading this far, the post got a bit long winded but I wanted to cover everything I could think of.
Looking forward to some good news, so far this whole situation has been bad.
TL;DR - Sorry it got long... I blew my turbo and need to find a decent rebuilt one or a place to get it rebuilt since I am out of warranty and doing it myself.
I have a 2013 Passat TDI SEL (NMS/CKRA it's a US car) with 138k miles and of course the turbo just failed last week.
On my way home from work about 15 minutes into my drive just accelerating from a stop sign I had sudden loss of power, blinking glow plug light and turbo underboost code. I limped it home.
The dealership refused to service it under the extended warranty/TSB since that was only good to 120k and they wanted $5k to replace it - they verified the turbo was bad by inspection with a borescope down the intake.
I decided to do it myself since over the years I've done a number of engine/trans swaps, engine rebuilds, etc but mostly on older cars and I'm familiar with turbo systems on gas cars (my other car is an 88 Supra turbo) so I didn't think it would be too bad but this is my first real foray into the VW's and diesels.
After some grief removing the DPF and having to pick up some special tools I have the turbo off - the intake impeller is seized in the housing and the exhaust impeller is basically flopping around.
There was about 3/4 of a quart of oil that came out when I detached the front intercooler pipe but none on the exhaust side or in the DPF itself.
This one is the Borg-Warner (03L 253 056 E V 500 on the tag).
I planned to order the turbo online but the main place I see them is from is TurbochargerPros / BuyAutoParts and the reviews don't look too good, they sound like Chineese knockoffs - even if they are warrantied I have no desire to do this labor again.
Junkyard is out of the question as I will probably get another part with the TSB problem.
The dealership said they could not find anything with that part number but looking it up by VIN they show 03L 253 010 J and there is literally one in the USA at some dealer in Ohio and they want $1667.52 for it; ECS has one for $1400.
Found one by the new part number on IDParts but I don't know anything about that company.
SO here's where I could use some advice:
Is that part number a legit replacement for the existing part number?
Does anyone know of a reputable source of rebuilt turbos for this car that are preferably under $1,000?
I called a few local diesel shops and none will rebuild it, probably because it's a VNT but as soon as I said it was off a VW they had no interest.
Is there a known good place to get these rebuilt in a reasonable timeframe, preferably in the Midwest (I'm in Wisconsin).
I'm still making payments on this car and I'm paying out of pocket for a rental until I get it back in action so the quicker I can get this done the better.
Last but not least, if anyone has any other advice on the replacement procedure I'd greatly appreciate it!
Thanks for reading this far, the post got a bit long winded but I wanted to cover everything I could think of.
Looking forward to some good news, so far this whole situation has been bad.