Originally Posted By: Jeffs2006EvoIX
but Aluminum is mainly used in 2 areas on this engine to my knowledge. The Head, and the Turbo. Could be coming off the Turbo Journal. I cant think of anything in the head itself that would "wear". The Cams themselves are not Aluminum so I am not sure.
I'm by no means an expert, but there are a ton of threads on bad turbos for these cars at the tdiclub forums. The early batch of turbos on these cars are turning out to be problematic. The shaft or impeller can loosen over time and eventually can come apart and take out the turbo. There is a VW Tech Bulletin on this, so VAG in the homeland is aware of the problem. The OEM replacement part is noticeably different on that impeller, so they seem to have targeted that issue on later versions.
Not to be alarmist or get your stress level up, as it could be anything or nothing at all. But do review some of those threads on TDIclub and see if there is a way to test/inspect to see if the shaft is loosening on yours. It's an expensive R&R ($3k) but that might still be a lot less expensive than an un-contained failure on the hwy.