Turbo Labs 25G Turbo Failed in less then 2 months!
I Contacted Austin from TL explaining to him what i noticed and why i think my turbo is going to fail, long story short he was giving me every possibility to why its not my turbo and i need to make sure i have a VTA VC which i do on the intake side but im still running stock PVC on Manifold / VC side (which shouldnt cause the turbo to fail). Ok so i decided to do some more trouble shooting in hopes its not my turbo so i took the down pipe off and what did i see dripping from the turbo? hmmm oil....i ONCE AGAIN called Turbo Labs (austin) and told him "listen i think my turbo is blown because im getting A LOT of white smoke coming out of my exhaust muffler. He once again stated that its because 1 i dont have a catch can 2 my car isnt tuned properly 3 something wrong with my engine yada yada yada...and proceeded to sell me a "Rebuild kit" at this point i realized he was NOT going to help me and i purchased the rebuild kit off of him for $60 that he gets from this site
Dont buy from these guys they have no reputation as a company, have no type of warranty service and they didnt offer to take a look and see what they could do considering i dropped almost 800$ with them. If there customer service was anywhere near FP or PTE i would not be here wasting my time posting this on EVOM. No one helped me no one offered to help nor did anyone care.
My gripe with said company is here. When OP called and got the run around. They should have taken the turbo back in and diagnosed the issue. Foreign object damage or not.
If it was determined that was the cause so be it. OP pays for repairs. But to get a run around when contacting the company is not the way to do business
u see how they treat there customers calling people "tools" LOL
next time learn how to read "i took the filter off and saw NO METAL FLAKES" even when i rebuilt my motor there were more metal flakes from the break in period then from when the turbo gave. and i wasnt even boosting the car for the first two oil changes.
This turbo has MASSIVE SHAFT PLAY after 2 weeks of running it which i brought to the attention to "Austin @ turbo labs" but they still insisted it was normal.
I have a video of the amount of shaft play this turbo was having after 3-4 weeks of install.
Last edited by IFuXwiTuZ; Sep 11, 2013 at 07:16 AM.
My gripe with said company is here. When OP called and got the run around. They should have taken the turbo back in and diagnosed the issue. Foreign object damage or not.
If it was determined that was the cause so be it. OP pays for repairs. But to get a run around when contacting the company is not the way to do business
If it was determined that was the cause so be it. OP pays for repairs. But to get a run around when contacting the company is not the way to do business
THANK YOU FINALLY SOMEONE GETS THE POINT OF THE STORY!
All i asked for was
and instead i get BASHED and called names @ on there FACEBOOK GROUP which is totally UNPROFESSIONAL. Cause $800 grows on trees. Example: Evo 9 turbo 40,000 miles and still running.
This^
that is why I asked what went through the turbine wheel.. the clip he had in his hand would have been mangled if it had caused the eating of the turbine wheel like is shown in the last picture. In the picture of the thrust bearing there was no irregular wear and there was no coking on the shaft from getting hot. FOD would cause that big chip out of the turbine wheel for sure, my guess is a piece of porcelain
that is why I asked what went through the turbine wheel.. the clip he had in his hand would have been mangled if it had caused the eating of the turbine wheel like is shown in the last picture. In the picture of the thrust bearing there was no irregular wear and there was no coking on the shaft from getting hot. FOD would cause that big chip out of the turbine wheel for sure, my guess is a piece of porcelain
The turbine wheel was shaved down to fit the hotside .....i think TL shaved it like that because thats how it looked when it was new....
Im telling you bro i bet they shaved it to fit the hotside....the cuts are just way to consistent / even, for it to be a piece of metal going through it.
Whats even funnier to me is they KNOW how to come here and make posts but no one is responding to my calls / txts since the 9th, i just want my turbo fixed i already paid for the rebuild kit. Like the least they could do is fix it, this is there REP as a company but what do you expect from them they not professional @ ALL.
I dont even wanna send them the turbo back @ this point because knowing them they wont return it.
last txt i got is when i sent them $60 for the rebuild kit. lol
Im trying to be very fair but @ this point its like freak this...im trying to hard not to cuss here its unreal. everyone that knows me personally as a friend knows Im flipping out in my mind and if they were in my face it wouldnt be good for them.
I dont even wanna send them the turbo back @ this point because knowing them they wont return it.
last txt i got is when i sent them $60 for the rebuild kit. lol
Im trying to be very fair but @ this point its like freak this...im trying to hard not to cuss here its unreal. everyone that knows me personally as a friend knows Im flipping out in my mind and if they were in my face it wouldnt be good for them.
I have no say about the customer service. That may indeed be bad. But I am very sure on the foreign object damage. they do not cut the turbine wheel to fit housing. they do cut turbine housing so wheel fits. as does everybody else.
whatever went through through the turbos is what killed this. just the proximity of the chips on the wheel indicate this. object likely jammed turbine wheel as it went out. that why thrust was broken . the ring coming out came way later after shaft gets silly loose and you cant see out your rear view mirror from all the smoke.
whatever went through through the turbos is what killed this. just the proximity of the chips on the wheel indicate this. object likely jammed turbine wheel as it went out. that why thrust was broken . the ring coming out came way later after shaft gets silly loose and you cant see out your rear view mirror from all the smoke.
I think you my friend are 100% correct.... i dont know what went wrong to be honest.
All i wanted was the service, the least they could of done was that not get flamed by people on there facebook group / avoid my phone calls / txts.
All i wanted was the service, the least they could of done was that not get flamed by people on there facebook group / avoid my phone calls / txts.
Sooo..you bought a inferior turbo, expect the same quality and customer service as that of force performance turbo for a portion of the price? GET REAL.
Evolving Member
Joined: Dec 2012
Posts: 153
Likes: 11
From: Mattawan, MI
So you blow your turbo because something foreign tears up the turbine.
You contact them about it and they run you through a standard checklist of things to check before you go yanking your turbo off and send it back to them.
You figure out the turbo is definitely bad, and you take it apart and see all the damage. So you try contacting them again.
How long between this point^ and the point where you start throwing a fit on facebook?
I understand that we all want customer service to be instant and faultless, but this is three guys running a shop that is very popular at this point with a lot of success stories. They're only human. I get that this can be very frustrating, but I work at a shop and I've waited for a week for a company to get back with me about a warranty. That these guys give out their cell numbers is amazing to me.
I can definitely see it from both sides.
The facebook group is an open group, how are they supposed to stop people bashing you? You should expect that kind of thing on the internet.
At this point, the title is misleading and this thread is useless to solving your issues.
You contact them about it and they run you through a standard checklist of things to check before you go yanking your turbo off and send it back to them.
You figure out the turbo is definitely bad, and you take it apart and see all the damage. So you try contacting them again.
How long between this point^ and the point where you start throwing a fit on facebook?
I understand that we all want customer service to be instant and faultless, but this is three guys running a shop that is very popular at this point with a lot of success stories. They're only human. I get that this can be very frustrating, but I work at a shop and I've waited for a week for a company to get back with me about a warranty. That these guys give out their cell numbers is amazing to me.
I can definitely see it from both sides.
The facebook group is an open group, how are they supposed to stop people bashing you? You should expect that kind of thing on the internet.
At this point, the title is misleading and this thread is useless to solving your issues.
I have no say about the customer service. That may indeed be bad. But I am very sure on the foreign object damage. they do not cut the turbine wheel to fit housing. they do cut turbine housing so wheel fits. as does everybody else.
whatever went through through the turbos is what killed this. just the proximity of the chips on the wheel indicate this. object likely jammed turbine wheel as it went out. that why thrust was broken . the ring coming out came way later after shaft gets silly loose and you cant see out your rear view mirror from all the smoke.
whatever went through through the turbos is what killed this. just the proximity of the chips on the wheel indicate this. object likely jammed turbine wheel as it went out. that why thrust was broken . the ring coming out came way later after shaft gets silly loose and you cant see out your rear view mirror from all the smoke.
Michael
I hate to diagnose turbos with pictures on the internet but the radial wear on this turbo was obviously quite bad. So what you may be thinking is FOD damage to the inducer tips of the turbine might actually be where the wheel came into contact with the divider wall in the turbine housing. Which would explain the uniform grooving in the inducer tips.
Michael
Michael
Last edited by 94AWDcoupe; Sep 12, 2013 at 04:46 PM.
There are only a few thou clearance between exducer and housing. usually lots more than a few clearance between tips and divider depending on turbo. I have a hard time believing that is divider wear pattern. add how deep the wear is to the initial clearance and thats a crap load of movement. if wheel moved that much the turbine ring walls would be worn down. the bearing shaft looks too dang good to think that as a logical path of destruction. and that also wouldnt explain the impact that shattered the thrust. but what dO I know. I have only seen maybe 100 damaged turbos. you have seen thousands I am sure.
Again though with the limited picture provided we might as well be trying to solve a mystery when my only evidence is a spent shell casing.
What I do know for sure is that turbo is broken. Really really really really really broken.
-Michael