Hey everyone,

I'm new to the forum but far from new to Mitsubishis. I wanted to share a little carnage with you guys.

I picked up this 04 RS at an auction in Maryland last week, it was actually a members car on here (easily identifiable), but I have no clue what transpired between his ownership and the auction.

Anyway the car arrived and I did some preliminaries which were all OK, so I took it for a brief (2-3 mile) spin. I gave it 1/2 throttle and that was about it (wanting to verify no abnormal drive train noises only), and it ran pretty well considering the high (125k) mileage, plus knowing what the previous owner had done to it.
So I get back toward the shop and give it one last minor goose and I hear TINK. Awesome.

I pull the car in and listen around and I can hear some light metallic pings from what sounded like the hotside or O2 housing. I check the waste gate like usual and make sure it is loaded, no problem there.
I pull the down pipe and find a small metal fragment, but see that someone had just welded shut an O2 bung (brilliant) and thought maybe I blew some slag off it right? Yeah not so much.

Unsatisfied I pulled the hotside and in addition to what looked almost like gravel collected at the waste gate, I get a glimpse of this:




I don't know the full details of what that turbo went through, but it sure looks like an unhappy life.



And if anyone cares here is the painfully identifiable feature (now removed) of the car:

 

yummy

 

Sorry to hear about this, perfect time to upgrade!! Looks like the bearings have been bad for quite awhile.

 

Yeah I was ticked. I got the car for a song, even with shipping and auction fees, but still sucks especially with some of the other issues (already ordered a new decklid, will probably get new bumpers too, plus some interior bits that are jacked up). I'm just hoping there are no surprises waiting in the engine. I'm half tempted to just tear it down here and now, I don't really have the disposable for that right now though.

I work at a dealership and it is very rare I see these with more than 80k or, so as they are usually on the 1490235th owner by then etc. I was more than a little shocked at the severity.

I'm dancing around a IX turbo at the moment (just tore that one down tonight). I have no real tuning support here though so I will be forced to do it myself which I am not too keen on.

 

there are other options available for tuning such as email tunes which are just as good as the tuner being there when using ecuflash and evoscan.

sucks to hear you bought the car and barely got the chance to have any fun before having to make a repair. BUT, on the bright side, you might need to consider your plans for the car in the future. why buy a 9 turbo if your going to shoot for 600hp? if you are considering building this is might be better to find a cheap used 8 turbo and save some money for a better replacement if the 9 turbo wont reach your goals.

 

I have no lofty plans at this time anyway. I just ordered a used 9 as it was not much more than the 8s I had found with noted shaft play etc.

I did check the serial number today and it is not the original block. I'm not sure if that makes me feel better or worse. I'm wondering if the PO blew the engine and slammed a yard engine in there.
I'm still curious as to what happened in there, as I found significant debris in the housing (***** of metal) that I am guessing began the damage, but the engine runs too well to be a piece fo piston landing or anything like that.

 

Thats sucks man, I would assume the seals are compromised as well. How does the compressor wheel look like?

* also what is stamped on the compressor housing(TD05HRA) is there an A in the code? is it a magnesium turbine wheel

 

compressor is near perfect; There is no A.... TD05HR-16G6-9.8C

 

Thats enough to make a man cringe. Hopefully thats the worst that could happen!

 

With the added knowledge of the engine being swapped, I'm leaning toward the PO grenaded the engine, blasted a piston landing off or something and it exited the engine. The engine was replaced with a salvage unit (there is faint evidence of writing on the exhaust manifold), and never cleaned out the turbine inlet. I can't imagine any other scenario where there would be such metal debris in the hotside (2 large chunks of metal, bigger than a BB among much smaller debris too), yet have no evidence of failure in the engine (smooth idle etc).

I was really hoping the PO would respond to a PM here so I could ask a few questions, it doesn't look like that is going to happen though. I'd love to know the whole story.

 

If you dont want the carbon fiber air ducts PM me, I can get them off your hands.

 

I may take you up on that; I am debating doing one of the following:

Repair bottom of bumper and straighten ducts out (fit is not perfect)
Repair bottom of bumper and fill the rivet holes
Replace bumper entirely (price went up last week, otherwise I would have already done this)

2/3 choices end with ducts getting sold (and a rear exhaust protector too) I'm trying to plan bumper work about a month to two months out.

New decklid arrived today (last RS decklid in the country, had to jump on it) and it is getting painted tomorrow/next week, hopefully I'll be on the road with it in a week or so. I've made a lot of progress with the clutter.

 

That is definitely an older EVO8 9.8cm hotside turbo.. IIRC the RS in 04 came with the 10.5cm hotside available on the 05 MR. I might suspect that it was a replacement turbo on there.

EVO 9 turbo is 10.5cm hotside. slight difference on the cold side only