102PS with 2 Turbo Failures - was re-map to blame?

[Fluff34567]

For anyone thinking about remapping a 204ps for more torque there are two different DMF’s installed, one for 450Nm max and another for 500Nm max.
View attachment 98107

I read it the 204 has 1 type for 500nm and all others has the 2nd type for 450nm.

 

[Fluff34567]

After reading through it looks like no one has checked the oil flow input or output to the turbo or the pressure? After the first turbo failure that's a basic thing to check before just banging on another and saying off you go go mate.

It also explains why the 2nd one lasted a few minutes.

I will bet there is close to zero or zero oil supply.

 

[Loz]

After reading through it looks like no one has checked the oil flow input or output to the turbo or the pressure? After the first turbo failure that's a basic thing to check before just banging on another and saying off you go go mate.

It also explains why the 2nd one lasted a few minutes.

I will bet there is close to zero or zero oil supply.

This is what I am thinking.
I would write back to the dealer and say you have had extensive discussions with the map suppliers and they dispute any influence on the failed new turbo.
Then go on to say you have sought advice from mechanical engineers who unanimously say the fitting of the second turbo, in particular, the testing of oil flow and possibly not cleaning up debris from the first turbo as the most likely cause of the second turbo failure. Remember to point out that they obviously did not do a propper road test.
Say you want the first and second turbos for 3rd party examination. (They may not be able to produce these and you can say that they are covering up evidence of bad fitting.)
Then apply polite pressure to replace the second one under its warranty.
Escalate this to the dealer principal.
Keep contemporaneous notes with dates etc.
Keep this up and they may buckle, you have nothing to lose at this point.

 

[Fluff34567]

This situation reminded me of a youtube video I saw a while ago....

 

[Robert]

OK, on reflection post chat with Quantum file mapping guy I'm still a little sceptical. I can't help but go back to the fact that it's school boy physics in my view: To get more power you will need more fuel with more air, i.e.more oxygen for combustion. Simply pumping more fuel in may generate a little more power on a diesel, but its has to be a very limited effect. If there isn'y enough oxygen to burn the extra fuel then no more power - just inefficient combustion. Now having said that I do remember those videos of diesel powered tractor drag races belching out huge volumes of black some at full throttle, but I suspect that was them using over fuelling to every ounce of extra power they could get. If a re-mapped road going vehicle did that, you sure would hear about it. And it would be silly to think that the DPF could process that amount of extra soot.

So the only way I can see I can get irrefutable proof of the 102ps to 170ps power gain is via a rolling road. Anyone know of anyone having been done this with a Quantum re-map???

The more I'm reading the more I'm thinking a re-map should really not be an off the shelf affair, but a carefully developed incremental change via a rolling road to assess the change in engine parameters as each mapping look up table value is careful modified. This will ensure the re-map takes account of your particular engine's condition.

More facts to consider, I have owned the van from new. It is my 3rd b new transporter over the years. I was always a little disappointed with the power from this one from new, but if the turbo was not spooling up properly from new it would not have lasted 40,000 mikes without any further appreciable loss in performance. There has been no noticeable further loss in performance from new. The EGR was replaced after approx 18 months the from new.

So far my current thoughts are thus:
The re-map power gains claims were simply unrealistic.
There was a small gain in power, but it just didn't meet my expectations - hence me not being sure there was much of an effect.
Coincidentally the turbo failed just after the re-map because of an unrelated fault.
The garage failed to diagnose the root cause of the failure
The garage weren't confident that they had identified the cause of the turbo failure and sneakily figured they'd cover their butts by adding the turbo warranty disclaimer without ever saying anything about it.
The second turbo failure could be due to lack of oil feed, but why did it start up and run fine for a drive around the block and then in the 2 miles I drove it, fail catastrophically
The re-mapping being the cause is a complete red herring.
Legal advice as it stands is based on the balance of probability and the only way I'm going to to get the re-mapping monkey off my back is for someone to confirm the cause of failure.
Proving the oil feed pressure and flow to the turbo is not an easy thing to do. A VAG master Tech suggested that only way this can be done is to crank the engine with the oil feed to the turbo disconnected and monitor the output. Is a regular mechanic like to do that?
I'm struggling to accept that the new VAG supplied turbo was faulty. Modern quality control processes practically eliminate this kind of occurrence, but the compressor/impeller nut had come off the end of the main spindle, which is odd unless as I said before, it simply wound off, due to rotation inertia when the turbo locked up. Assuming the the turbo did sieze again shearing the spindle and releasing the oil - this has not been confirmed other that a lot of engine oil was sucked through the engine when it failed second time around.

Jeez I'm not feeling I'm getting close to the truth yet.....

Can you post complete list of replaced components?

 

[DXX]

The mechanic took the inlet hose off the compressor outlet of the turbo and found the retaining nut had come off and that the compressor turbine was floating around inside its housing. I suspect the spindle has sheared again, probably due to the rotation inertia of the nut at the point of failure.

I would think the nut is a cleaveloc which should be extremely resistant to backing off. That said if the exhaust turbine and shaft seize and the compressor impeller continues to rotate it may unscrew. This would depend on the direction of rotor and retaining thread. All speculation as I’ve never had one of these apart.
There is another recent thread where the failed turbocharger compressor nut has released:

hi thanks 2016 t6 76000 went 30000 between services. first turbo went not long after i had service and cam belt ect changed. Garage said the turbo fan shaft was rattling inside the turbo. So i ordered new turbo with all pipes, gaskets and even the oil from vw van centre birmingham. and my garage fitted new turbo had the dpf taken off and flused clean and tested for flow and re fitted that. Ran for about 80 miles no noise ran so smooth no warning lights just ran great and then the next day ran for 2 miles and the engine management light came on and i heard a loud pop, then lose of power and rolled the 2 miles home with little power. The garage that fitted the turbo came out and had a look and said turbo faulty and when the took the filter box and pipe of that goes to the turbo there was a little nut loose in the pipe which had come off the shaft with the fans on in turbo.
Waited 3 weeks with it on the drive had it low loaded so not to run the engine back to vw birmingham who said they had to inspect the fitting of the turbo befor they would replace as i had only had it a few weeks.
They phoned on friday just gone and said yes it had been fitted ok even said good job by who ever fitted it but need to speak with warranty guy on monday to get it ordered. And then today after i had waited til after lunch i phone them and they said they would not replace unless i can prove thta the oil high presure stage had been activated.
I phone my garage and they had never heard of this, i then checked with several vw repair guys and garages and no one had ever heard of this when replacing a turbo. Vw then said its in there repair manual and thats why the turbo failed and i will have yo buy anew turbo and bits which would cost me another £1400.
At no time when i bought the parts did anyone say the turbo needs to be fitted in a certain way or if certain things are not done then this will happen, as my garage said and so did many more the nut coming off is the issue and the turbo is faulty and should be replaced. i attache photo of turbo also email vw sent showing small print in there repair manual. which also states this pressure stage is not always available to set. Thanks

View attachment 98343

 

[Daffy]

OK, on reflection post chat with Quantum file mapping guy I'm still a little sceptical. I can't help but go back to the fact that it's school boy physics in my view: To get more power you will need more fuel with more air, i.e.more oxygen for combustion. Simply pumping more fuel in may generate a little more power on a diesel, but its has to be a very limited effect. If there isn'y enough oxygen to burn the extra fuel then no more power - just inefficient combustion. Now having said that I do remember those videos of diesel powered tractor drag races belching out huge volumes of black some at full throttle, but I suspect that was them using over fuelling to every ounce of extra power they could get. If a re-mapped road going vehicle did that, you sure would hear about it. And it would be silly to think that the DPF could process that amount of extra soot.

So the only way I can see I can get irrefutable proof of the 102ps to 170ps power gain is via a rolling road. Anyone know of anyone having been done this with a Quantum re-map???

The more I'm reading the more I'm thinking a re-map should really not be an off the shelf affair, but a carefully developed incremental change via a rolling road to assess the change in engine parameters as each mapping look up table value is careful modified. This will ensure the re-map takes account of your particular engine's condition.

More facts to consider, I have owned the van from new. It is my 3rd b new transporter over the years. I was always a little disappointed with the power from this one from new, but if the turbo was not spooling up properly from new it would not have lasted 40,000 mikes without any further appreciable loss in performance. There has been no noticeable further loss in performance from new. The EGR was replaced after approx 18 months the from new.

So far my current thoughts are thus:
The re-map power gains claims were simply unrealistic.
There was a small gain in power, but it just didn't meet my expectations - hence me not being sure there was much of an effect.
Coincidentally the turbo failed just after the re-map because of an unrelated fault.
The garage failed to diagnose the root cause of the failure
The garage weren't confident that they had identified the cause of the turbo failure and sneakily figured they'd cover their butts by adding the turbo warranty disclaimer without ever saying anything about it.
The second turbo failure could be due to lack of oil feed, but why did it start up and run fine for a drive around the block and then in the 2 miles I drove it, fail catastrophically
The re-mapping being the cause is a complete red herring.
Legal advice as it stands is based on the balance of probability and the only way I'm going to to get the re-mapping monkey off my back is for someone to confirm the cause of failure.
Proving the oil feed pressure and flow to the turbo is not an easy thing to do. A VAG master Tech suggested that only way this can be done is to crank the engine with the oil feed to the turbo disconnected and monitor the output. Is a regular mechanic like to do that?
I'm struggling to accept that the new VAG supplied turbo was faulty. Modern quality control processes practically eliminate this kind of occurrence, but the compressor/impeller nut had come off the end of the main spindle, which is odd unless as I said before, it simply wound off, due to rotation inertia when the turbo locked up. Assuming the the turbo did sieze again shearing the spindle and releasing the oil - this has not been confirmed other that a lot of engine oil was sucked through the engine when it failed second time around.

Jeez I'm not feeling I'm getting close to the truth yet.....

As already said you won’t get more power that you could notice without more boost, it’s just not possible so don’t complicate it further than that.

Why do you want to confirm that you have more power when the engine doesn’t run, concentrate on 1 thing at a time.

You are speculating re the old turbo and what has happened over the last 40k miles, don’t confuse yourself, stick to the facts and deal with what you can see.

It’s fairly easy to check pressure and volume on the turbo supply, basically put the end of the pipe into a jug and crank then block the pipe with a gauge and crank, that confirms pressure. I’m not sure what figures you would get but an experienced mechanic will just know..

A picture paints a thousand words so get some photos of the compressor wheel and nut and I’ll try to give you an idea, better still get someone who knows what they are doing to check the failed turbo - or ideally both.

As to the legal aspect, don’t worry about that, just get the facts and present them properly and you shouldn’t have too much of a problem unless you have been negligent in some way..

 

[JOG]

As already said you won’t get more power that you could notice without more boost, it’s just not possible so don’t complicate it further than that.

Why do you want to confirm that you have more power when the engine doesn’t run, concentrate on 1 thing at a time.

You are speculating re the old turbo and what has happened over the last 40k miles, don’t confuse yourself, stick to the facts and deal with what you can see.

It’s fairly easy to check pressure and volume on the turbo supply, basically put the end of the pipe into a jug and crank then block the pipe with a gauge and crank, that confirms pressure. I’m not sure what figures you would get but an experienced mechanic will just know..

A picture paints a thousand words so get some photos of the compressor wheel and nut and I’ll try to give you an idea, better still get someone who knows what they are doing to check the failed turbo - or ideally both.

As to the legal aspect, don’t worry about that, just get the facts and present them properly and you shouldn’t have too much of a problem unless you have been negligent in some way..

Good approach! Determine the facts and then understand your legal position!

 

[Grim Reaper]

Damn, beat me to it

 

[Big Al]

Too many times the failure of the part isn`t investigated before the new unit is fitted. I think the garage latched onto the `remapped` engine scenario and forgot to do the basics. Hence why the unit they fitted only lasted minutes. To me, a clear indication of previous underlying problems. Also, not changing/checking the life blood of a turbo-the oil lines, was a big oversight.

 

[Niknak]

Pay peanuts and get ? .......

 

[chriscroft]

I would think the nut is a cleaveloc which should be extremely resistant to backing off. That said if the exhaust turbine and shaft seize and the compressor impeller continues to rotate it may unscrew. This would depend on the direction of rotor and retaining thread. All speculation as I’ve never had one of these apart.
There is another recent thread where the failed turbocharger compressor nut has released:

I have a pathological hatred for VW(UK) and warrantee issues. They can be the most despicable outfit I have ever had the displeasure of dealing with. just saying

 

[JOG]

I have a pathological hatred for VW(UK) and warrantee issues. They can be the most despicable outfit I have ever had the displeasure of dealing with. just saying

Worryingly, this seems to be a commonly held view. In this day and age, I am baffled how such arrogance and complacency is allowed to continue. Surely they have someone observing comments/issues/trends on sites like this? Every other multinational I’ve worked for does!!!

 

[chriscroft]

Worryingly, this seems to be a commonly held view. In this day and age, I am baffled how such arrogance and complacency is allowed to continue. Surely they have someone observing comments/issues/trends on sites like this? Every other multinational I’ve worked for does!!!

I'm hoping by the time the world has finished beating VW with the "Stick of Humility & Integrity" over their diesel gate fiasco; they will reinvent their concept of "loving their customers", we live in hope

 

[DXX]

I'm hoping by the time the world has finished beating VW with the "Stick of Humility & Integrity" over their diesel gate fiasco; they will reinvent their concept of "loving their customers", we live in hope

There’s another thread with many worried about the long delivery time for their 6.1. As long as sales are good they are normally making money and that’s the only thing that matters and always will be with shareholders to keep happy.

 

[JOG]

There’s another thread with many worried about the long delivery time for their 6.1. As long as sales are good they are normally making money and that’s the only thing that matters and always will be with shareholders to keep happy.

Nail! Head! Percussion!

 

[Niknak]

Cracks me up, so much hate for vw and yet not a manly transit or Renault traffic in sight

 

[Loz]

Just posted this to the other turbo failure thread..

I wonder if the workshop forgot to do this after fitting the second turbo?

After new components have been installed (engine/short engine, cylinder head, camshaft housing or turbocharger) the oil pressure control must be set to max. pressure for approx. 1000 km if the function is available in the engine control unit. This will compen‐ sate for the increased friction during run-in of new components, and a better transport of wear-related particles is guaranteed.
– Connect ⇒ Vehicle diagnostic tester.
– Switch on ignition.
– Activate oil pressure regulation ⇒ Vehicle diagnostic tester, 01 - Systems capable of self-diagnosis , 01 - Diesel direction injection and preglow system EDC 17 , 01 -
Engine electronics functions, Adaption, Oil pres- sure for engine operation.
– Follow further instructions displayed on ⇒ Vehicle diagnostic

 

[chriscroft]

Cracks me up, so much hate for vw and yet not a manly transit or Renault traffic in sight

No way VW is a far better van IMO, wouldn't have anything else at this minute
That's because the VW Engineers are great (mostly), but the bean counters and business managers.... can be complete and utter tw*ts.
I'm sure Ford and Renault have the same issues!

 

[Niknak]

I'm not sure if all of them are but the pumps alter the oil pressures, just seems no one listens, stop taking your vans to tin pot spanner monkeys