Oil Chg on Turbo Vehicle

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OK, so back in the day when I used to work in auto repair shops... I remember some special thing we had to do when changing the oil on a turbo vehicle.

I though it was once you get the new oil in the engine... you would disable it's ability to start and then hit the starter for a few seconds so the engine is turning over which helps get oil up to the turbo so when you do start the vehicle there is oil in the turbo and it's not starting dry.

Somebody please re-fresh my memory and let me know if this is the correct procedure and if it is not... what is?
 
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Walmart says to prefill the oil filter. Not once have I seen someone do it, and some of those cars have 200k+ miles on them. On my VW i just put it on since it sits at a 90 degree angle. Just dont rev the engine after starting it. Let it run a couple minutes (as long as you put enough oil in it) at idle then check it, thats what i do. No failures yet.
 
Pre-filling the filter helps on any engine, but the main thing to observe on a turbo car is don't rev it for 20-30 secs while the oil gets to the turbo. But that's good practice on any engine, so there's really nothing different.

If it was necessary to prime the system on a turbo engine (cranking before starting) then we'd see
about a 90% higher failure rate on turbos than we currently see.
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Once you shut the engine off before an oil change - the old oil is still in the turbo and it will take a few hours to COMPLETELY drain off. So some residual oil is always there and that should be plenty for the turbo until new oil gets to it. Turbo gets more damage on a cold start (anything below 50°F, or 6+ hours of sitting is considered a cold start, compared to normal engine operating temperatures), than the oil change procedure.
 
IMHO, there's no difference between parking a car overnight and starting it in the morning and starting a car after an oil change.
 
At idle, the turbo is spinning, but not very fast at all.

You should see how the turbo Cummins powered GSE is operated by the Air Force....
Shut down at full RPM and load while the turbo is dull red.......
then the engine cools of to 20*F for 24 hours and
then started and immediately brought to full throttle!!!

Such abuse like that........
 
I like to prefill the oil filter. Other than that, I don't see any additional requirement. I've been operating turbocharged cars and turbocharged race cars for 35 years with no oil related failures. I do believe in quality synthetic oils for turbocharger protection and prevention of coking.
 
Our 2005 Legacy turbo owned since new has 220k miles running factory turbo.

I mostly changed the oil every 4k with conventional and never wasted my time prefilling the filter or any special method. I let you all know when the turbo blows up!
 
I've never deviated from how i do a turbo oil change as compared to a NA one either.

Originally Posted By: madRiver
Our 2005 Legacy turbo owned since new has 220k miles running factory turbo.
I mostly changed the oil every 4k with conventional and never wasted my time prefilling the filter or any special method. I let you all know when the turbo blows up!
 
Originally Posted By: madRiver
Our 2005 Legacy turbo owned since new has 220k miles running factory turbo.

I mostly changed the oil every 4k with conventional and never wasted my time prefilling the filter or any special method. I let you all know when the turbo blows up!

What?!?!?!? You need to be entered into the Subaru turbo owner's hall of fame!!

I presume you're also still running the turbo and AVCS banjo bolt filters? Interesting that you heeded SoA's recommended oci for your model year (technically you exceed it by 250 miles
smile.gif
) but you didn't heed their recommendation to use "synthetic" oil.

My first turbo was replaced at 62k due to excessive oil getting past the seals and that one lasted only 20k miles because I didn't heed Subaru's OCI and followed advice on bitog based on good uoa's and pushed my intervals to 7-8k miles.
frown.gif
 
Pretty much as soon as the oil light goes out or the gauge shows pressure oil will be pumped to the turbo. Letting it idle while you put on the seat belt means the oil in the turbo will be flushed out and you are good to go.
Similarly, letting the engine idle for a few seconds before shutting it off is also good practice.

If you are installing a replacement turbo they normally come with a few cc's of oil for pre lubing the bearings, but that is irrelevant to this thread.

Claud.
 
OK, just to be on the safe side... I'll disable the engine's ability to start so I can turn it over for a few seconds to ensure the new oil is circulated up in to the turbo before the engine is actually started.
 
Originally Posted By: FordBroncoVWJeta
Walmart says to prefill the oil filter. Not once have I seen someone do it, and some of those cars have 200k+ miles on them. On my VW i just put it on since it sits at a 90 degree angle. Just dont rev the engine after starting it. Let it run a couple minutes (as long as you put enough oil in it) at idle then check it, thats what i do. No failures yet.


I do this on both my Duramax and Corolla. Although the filter on the Duramax is slightly tilted so it isn't totally full.
 
If I don't prefill the oil filter on the Mustang it will knock for a few seconds upon first startup every time.
 
Originally Posted By: rooflessVW
IMHO, there's no difference between parking a car overnight and starting it in the morning and starting a car after an oil change.

Not the same. After removing the filter we removed all of the remaining oil in galleries. ADBV job is to keep those pre-filled.
 
Originally Posted By: chrisri
Originally Posted By: rooflessVW
IMHO, there's no difference between parking a car overnight and starting it in the morning and starting a car after an oil change.

Not the same. After removing the filter we removed all of the remaining oil in galleries. ADBV job is to keep those pre-filled.

You sure about that hoss? Gravity will drain the turbo feed and drain line unless there's a check valve in the turbo's oil system somewhere. Nothing to do with the filter ADBV. That's for the filter.
 
I changed the oil twice on our 2017 2.3 EcoBoost Explorer and never experienced "dry" start up noises after the oil change during the initial start up or afterwards for that matter. The first time was changing the oil hot and the second time was changing the oil "cold" after it was driven onto the ramps hot the night before. Both times upon restart, after the oil/filter change, resulted in quiet start ups. This is just my observations, no scientific proof. Just let the engine idle upon start up and don't rev it.

Whimsey
 
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