Wednesday, March 28, 2007
Pictures of the new turbo and the manifold autopsy
I took a picture of the new GT40 turbo next to the old Mitsubishi turbo today. That's the GT40 on the left and the Mitsu TE04H on the right. The intake diameter on the GT40 is nearly as big as the compressor housing on the itsy-bitsy Mitsubishi. The round thing, which is nearly as big as the TE04H, is a TiAl external wastegate.
I also took some pictures of the cracks in the manifold. Several of the cracks had black soot, indicating the crack went all the way through the manifold. The last picture shows where a small leak (blue arrow) had leaked out enough soot to leave a mark on the flange (red circle).
The guys at AutoFab wanted to see if they could smash the flange off the manifold with a sledgehammer. Of course, I said to go ahead. After all, the manifold was already not something I wanted repaired, and I figured it would tell me a bit about the damage and how well built the manifold was. And, of course, destruction is fun.
With the flange off, I got a good look at the weld area. The sides looked like the welds extended all the way through the metal, but the top and was not quite as solid. Blackened areas in the crack show where exhaust had leaked through the crack. The last picture shows more about the leak shown earlier. There are two holes (red arrows) clearly visible in the photo. It appears that these were defects in the original welding.
The article on slantsix.org claimed the manifold had 15,000 miles put on it since the flange was welded on, and it may have racked up several thousand more since. I know I didn't put more than a thousand on it myself. So it may have lasted about 30,000 miles or less before it started to crack.
Labels: Dodge Dart
