Thread: Laser = toast?

So the last few days the laser has been having some issues. Was making full boost but not accelerating. Hesitating a lot. Wasn't able to tear into it and try and figure out the problem. Went to pick roommate up from airport. Halfway home it starts making a loud clanking sound. Park it, pop the hood. Turbo is glowing red hot which has never happened before and I wasn't even driving the car hard. Temperature gauge was normal right in the middle. It sounds like it's resonating off the exhaust manifold heatshield too in the vid clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=http:...?v=NMl6tgfZaOM

Spun bearing?

Yeah it still builds boost.

My old gst did that when it threw a balance shaft rod. First, do a simple compression test. Then, drain your oil and check the consistancy. That will narrow alot down. If the compression is in check and your oil is silver, I'm better its the rear shaft bearing. If it is the balance shaft, you may be able to get away with just doing the bshaft removal mod. I did it to the old gst and got away with a few more thousand miles before pulling it out to do a 6bolt swap.

Manny

Looked at it some more today. I believe the turbo is blown. Sound definately sounds like it's coming right from the turbo. Gets louder when you accelerate and sometimes completely goes away for a split second right when you let off the gas whether in gear or revving in neutral. Also the turbo is heating up fucking quick, 15 minute drive not driving it hard is enough to make the exhaust housing glow bright red. It's fucking hot right now but once it cools down I'm going to pull the intake pipe off and see if I can tell any damage from that side. Talked to a friend at school that had his turbo blow in his 2g when he used to be in to DSMs and he said his did the same thing.

Scratch the idea about the turbo I don't think that's it. Turbo has very minimal side to side shaft play, same as it did when I bought the car, and no in and out shaft play at all. Spins perfectly without any noise or anything.

At this point I don't really know what else to do. What else CAN I do to narrow down the problem? If it's a thrown bearing is there really any way to know for sure before the motor is pulled apart? I disabled fuel and just cranked the motor over and just cranking it over you can hear it too although obviously not as loud.

My compression tester was left up in Washington so I can't compression test it. I don't even have a decent place to work on the car as the apartment parking lot is less than ideal.

Ok well looks like I spun a bearing. With the engine running i removed and replaced the spark plug wires one after another. When I removed the spark plug wire for the number one cylinder the knocking almost completely went away. Hooray, now I need to find a place where I can take my car to be able to work on it. I'm not going to rebuild it I don't have time for that I think I'm going to just put in another long block. Anyone have a 7 bolt long block for sale?

Compression gauges are $20 at Autozone and if you can't afford one, I'm sure someone here can bring one to the meet for you to borrow. I'll see if I can find mine. If your compression checks out, then go for the oil and drain it. See if the oil has silver in it or shards come out. It's the only way I know of to take a first glimpse at what your motor is doing before tearing it apart; short of leakdown test and dropping the oil pan.

Manny