The replacement turbo went pop on our 07 plate 1.6 diesel last week after only 2.5K miles. The bearings collapsed on this one and the company we bought it off said they’ll do a warranty replacement but the cost of labour is down to me.

I’m a bit confused as it’s the turbo’s defective bearings which were at fault and not not the work done to install it. The guy spouted a load of bull on the phone saying it was a Ford design fault the engine that puts exhaust debris into the oil that causes the failure, so they cannot be held responsible for it.

Has anyone else experienced this and had multiple turbos fail on them in quick succession?

Hmmm… sounds like bolleaux to me.

Turbos mostly have fluid bearings (I think) which means a metal sleeve bearing with engine oil forced in between the surfaces, because ball bearings would be hard to manufacture well enough to cope with the speeds.

A common cause of failure is lack of oil, so if your engine oil goes low it can kill your turbo.

As for exhaust debris in the engine oil – that’s one of the oil’s jobs as far as I know, to contain combustion products whilst still providing lubrication.

I’d say they can be held responsible for it unless there was another fault that caused it. Hard to prove, but you might well have some other fault because you’ve gone through two turbos.

Labour isn’t generally much though, I’ve replaced a turbo. Where are you based?

Get the turbo replaced under warranty. i think that is a good deal if i’m honest! my focus 1.6 did the same. suffer the cost of labour.

GET RID ASAP, BEFORE IT IS UNECONOMICAL TO DO. as was my situation.

The problem is the oil supply to the turbo bearings. if the engine “rebuild” process inst followed to the letter when bolting on the new turbo the they will just keep failing. As seems to have happened to you. The local ford dealer refused to quote for the job. they wanted to put in a new engine.

There are lots of old threads on here about this, the same engine is used in a lot of cars/vans. I feel your pain.

Are you sure it’s the turbo? I know of a few hoses that have blown off due to a rubbish clip on them, which I think just get replaced with a jubilee clip. Father in laws hire Torneo (?) people carrier thing did it

If you do a bit of research you will see that your issue is very common with the 1.6 turbo. I think its to do with the turbo not getting enough oil. If i were you I would punt it as you can bet that it will happen again.

Did it have full stamped service history ? I wouldnt buy a psa /ford hdi without one- even then id still service it my self before using it

These are PSA engines(Peugeot /Citroen)shared with lots of manufacturers and are known for going pop… Oil change at smaller intervals such as 6000 miles and make sure it’s the right type for your motor is the best advice, also let the engine cool properly after a hard run or high (for a diesel) revs and don’t thrash from cold.. but they are not a good engine for reliability to be honest.

do a search on the 1.6HDI PSA (citroen/peugeot) engine and turbo failures(that’s what yours is)and you’ll find loads.

The turbo will be failing due to poor oil flow, caused by the oilways blocking up with carbon deposits caused by extended periods between oil changes or from not using fully syntheic oil.

There is a is a specific procedure to be carrried out when changing the turbo that involved mutiple flushes of the oil system and replacing oil pipes. If this is not done the turbo’s will just keep failing. It’s about 9 hrs work!

If the item is a warranty item, can’t the garage claim off the manuf. for their labour costs?

Yeah i remember when I got my Fiesta 1.6 TDCI Zetec S and I had it checked over as soon as i got it. First thing the mechanic did was ask me how long i was planning on keeping it as the engines are known as ‘plastic’ engines and don’t last much longer than about 120k. That said I’ve been running mine for 2 and a half years now and put 25k miles on it and the only thing i’ve had to touch is the engine seals (a £30 quid job). And thats with a fairly stampy right foot… Touch wood it’ll last me another year until I’m planning on getting another one. Gonna miss it though, the first proper car I bought and even though its pretty battered now I still love driving it.

I looked into this before buying my 1.6hdi Dispatch van which shares that engine along with gazillions of other cars.
Basicallly, what michaelbowden said.
Once the turbo goes and is replaced, best advice seems to be to get shot as soon as you can.

Molgrips:

We’re in London but the car is up in Rochdale as the turbo popped en route. Not much fun going 50 mph in the middle lane with a truck up your jacksie flashing you.

The mechanic who fitted it has taken it apart and checked it out. Oil is fine and all the pipes are clean. The bearings collapsed there was oil in them to it wasn’t a feed problem.

As soon as it’s done, I’ll chop in.

My wife and I both like the focus so might get a newer one. Do they have better engines?

Afaik there are several different engines from which to choose. A bit of internetting should show you which to avoid.

If the oil feed was good then what other explanation is there for the failure other than a faulty part?

If you want to attempt a DIY I may be able to help.

Dodgy bearings going by what the mechanic said.

Oh I see.. he IS replacing it, but would charge labour…

The turbo will fail again, it’s an oil pressure issue. The oil pressure drops off when hot and starve the replacement turbo. It’s been discussed on here several times or google DV6 oil pressure issues. Basically engine is great but small amount of oil 3.5L , 20000 miles service intervals , incorrect oil used , not topping up between services I.e owner/driver expects to never have to open the bonnet / and tech when servicing not getting the engine fully hot before changing the oil. All lead to a blocked gauze in the sump and blockage in oil gallery’s and turbo feed pipes. I’ve just bought and repaired a van that was sold because the 2nd turbo lasted 500miles and fixed it. Ford/Peugeot/citroen/Volvo/Mazda in most cases replace the engine. But with care and effort it can be cleaned/rebuilt to restore the oil pressure.

Regular oil changes and good oil are required. Make sure the oil is left to drain for a long time to ensure all the bits come out. I have heard that the sump nut is poorly positioned, not letting all the oil drain properly.

There is also a school of thought that says the problem stems from loose injectors, particularly number 3, which cause carbon to build up and get into the oil. Once in, it’s almost impossible to get out.
The check for injector tightness is apparently only a few minutes job and requires an allen key to tighten.

see post by 1275jstrap here diesel problems

My apologies if links to other forums are not allowed.

If the item is a warranty item, can’t the garage claim off the manuf. for their labour costs?

The turbo manufacturers will only honour the warranty if the garage fitted the unit properly – the turbo is the victim of a fault not the cause of of it, so if the garage that carried out the initial replacement didn’t flush the oil, perhaps replace the pipe and filter that feeds the turbo etc – in other words remove the cause of the problem- then the turbo they fitted was condemned to fail again

rwamartin – Thanks for that link. I’ll check it out.

As far as I know the mechanic who my brother knows well and uses did the work correctly.

In this case the bearings in the turbo collapsed it wasn’t down to oil starvation as they weren’t dry.

I don’t know about it being ‘exhaust debris’ but from what I’ve seen all diesels end up with very black engine oil not long after it’s been changed, so I’d be surprised if that’s a Ford/PSA specific problem.

In this case the bearings in the turbo collapsed it wasn’t down to oil starvation as they weren’t dry.

They are rarely dry, the oil helps to cool the bearing too, unsfficient flow/pressure can/will cause the bearing to overheat and fail. You might be lucky and have a faulty turbo, but unless your mechanic has followed the PSA procedure or something very similar I’ll be surprised if it is.

IF the turbo is faulty, then you should be paying nothing for its replacement.

Chrisdiesel ^^^ works (I assume still does) for a large PSA owned dealership and I worked in the technical dept @ head office

my wife and I both like the focus so might get a newer one. Do they have better engines?

2.0 TDCi is good AFAIK (and also IME).

Also a shared-with-PSA design, but I believe completely different engine and no specific reliability gremlins.

Should add, I’m looking to swap our focus for a newer mondeo with the slightly uprated (160hp?) version in a year or two, which should give some idea of my own experience with the engine.

I had a c max fitted with the 2.0 tdci engine and once it went above 100k it gave me nothing but problems with egr valves, dpf filter and fluid etc.

This is why I went for a petrol smax this time.

I’m leaning to petrol as well. We don’t do the milage to warrant a diesel engine really.

We had the DPF recharged at last christmas – which I never new existed.

Thinking back it’s a nice car to drive, very easy to park in the village – but it’s been a bit of a pain on maintenance unlike the 1.8 petrol Zetec it replaced.

Got shot of our Focus at about the 70K mark, the injector oil seals on No.3 were leaking which is the beginning of the start of “black death”.

The engine combustion gases end up leaking into the oil which clogs up the oil ways leading to turbo failure.

The Ford technical bulletin for this fault involves taking sump off and cleaning it, replacing all the turbo pipe work and cleaning the oil pick ups as well as flushing the engine repeatedly with clean oil and measuring the flow rate to the turbo.

Failure to get this right results in turbo’s going pop every few thousand miles.

Plenty of info here:

Ford Turbo problems

If I’d have only known before. 👿