How hard?

My reasoning is that

1) i’m not a complete idiot
2) the car’s dead anyway at the minute, so I might as well learn something

Bump (cos it seemed to have vanished)

Surely YouTube is your friend on this?

Do not think it should be that hard however do you understand why the old on has failed (oil starvation?) and does this need addressed.

In theory, this is relatively easy. In theory. Turbo bolts to exhaust and intake manifolds, has either wring or vacuum (or something) to manage the boost and/or wastegate, and some oil feeds.

In theory, you should just need some gaskets, some spanners, a lot of patience and a good memory.

Ive done a turbo change exactly once after the Nissan Silvia I had broke an oil feed banjo and just barfed high pressure oil on the floor. This was a mid-80’s car and things were a lot simpler then. If it’s a modern car with a lot of controlling electronics, all bets are off.

YouTube will probably get you a really god idea of what needs to be done, the workshop manual should tell you what bits you need and how long it would take. Be prepared for swearing, stuck bolts/nuts and a lot of fiddling. Exhausts or bastards for seized things.

Also, try and find out why the turbo broke. That could make the new one break too, or highlight what else needs to be fixed like, say, cleaning bits of turbine out of the inlet manifold or head.

I don’t know much or anything but every reply is a bump

If the old turbo bearing broke up and entered the sump and oil system getting those bits out is apparently difficult and crucial

Just a thought, depending on how it’s installed you could save yourself some pain by just replacing the cartridge and leaving the casing (and all the other connected parts) in place?

I would guess it really depends on what type of engine. The TSI Engine in the wife’s old Ibiza looked easy enough, the turbo was a tiny little thing right there in front of your when you opened the bonnet. I’m fairly confident I could take it off and bolt another one in it’s place, whether that’s all you need to do and there’s not a dozen ‘gotchas’ awaiting the amateur mechanic.

My Superb which has a similar engine to a Golf GTD I wouldn’t know where to start, it’s there’s pipe work everywhere, lots of heat shields and covers.

Turbo bolts to exhaust and intake manifolds,

I’ve never changed a turbo – but every time I’ve gone near something bolted to an exhaust that’s been on a while I’ve found its one of those jobs that’s likely to be much easier for a garage with proper tools (and experience freeing seized bolts) and likely to result in swearing/grazed knuckles/broken bolts/going to the expert anyway…

This may not be true for this – but worth considering.

As said above, any kind of bolt or nut anywhere near an exhaust system will put up a fight, so be prepared for that.

Also, if you have to work under the car at any point, make sure it is on flat ground and use axle stands. Do not trust a jack.

It’s 25 years since I worked on cars. In principle, most stuff is easy but little details can trip you up. Problem with turbos is that they can destroy the entire engine if you get them wrong. Diagnosing why it failed is step number one. Making sure you fix the underlying problem is step number two.

Having said that, the only way to learn is to take stuff apart and see how it works. YouTube videos will make this much easier. Take photos of everything and be very careful. If things don’t want to come apart, there may be hidden fasteners so getting in there with a crowbar is a last resort after you have absolutely confirmed that you have removed every single fastener.

The first job on removing the Turbo will be to soak all of the bolts that hold it onto the exhaust/inlet systems in copious amounts of plusgas/WD40 fast release pentrant (not vanilla WD40 – the “specialist” stuff)

Anyone else here waiting for the anticipated “I’ve sourced the largest possible replacement turbocharger that I can find” content?

My first thought was that this was a secret first step to bolting a huge turbo in place of the old “broken” one…

The OP, after a weekend of work.

I suspect you’ll struggle without tools. And even if you have basic tools you’ll probably struggle as I would expect access to some bolts might be tricky with out some fancy knuckle attachments and long reach extensions for your socket set. Any bolts on the exhaust system are likely to be very difficult to remove too.

Other than that you’ll need gasket kits, jubilee clips as I’d expect the original metal clips will be crimp clips, so without the right crimp tool you’ll have to use jubilee clips. Then there is the inevitable stuff you’ll find while you’re in there.

In principle, like alot of jobs, the turbo change wont be difficult, its getting to it and putting it all back together again afterwards.

Definitely you a job you can do without experience if you do your homework in advance and have the time and space to take your time to be methodical and deal with issues as you find them. But you’ll need tools, gaskets and probably some other sundry items you wont know you’ll need until you get in there.

I am a constant home fettler of vehicles. Induction and exhaust systems on modern diseasles are terrible. Riddled with add-ons to try and cludge their way through emissions tests. It’s no wonder that Toyota gave up in lieu of hybrid tech as its much simpler to sort from a packaging point of view.

If you wish to open Pandora’s box, I’d do the following:

Clean the engine now with a pressure washer and Gunk. Then soak everything in plusgas, daily, for a week. Invest in some decent sockets, an LED inspection lamp and probably a set of swivel head ratchet spanners. Halfords advanced stuff is amazing. Mechanix gloves are ace and save you from cut knuckles & blisters. They’re essentially identical to MTB gloves so if you’ve an old pair you can re-use them. Baby wipes are awesome for cleaning up. There is no solvent for exhaust carbon so expect to rattle around for a few days with black knuckles and fingernails.

Make a plan on A3 paper in large letters & stick it to the garage wall. Take photos as you go. Label all connectors with masking tape and a sharpie – on both sides of the connection! Make yourself a Kanban box – put in only the tools & parts you’re gonna need for that part of the job. If you take anything off, put it and its fasteners in a ziplock bag & label it, put that in a separate box. Once that section is done take the Kanban back to your toolbox and restock for the next bit. Makes cleaning up so much quicker & you’re not likely to miss anything – especially if you have to abort half way due to weather.

I would strongly suspect that some of the nuts and studs will shear. Pre-purchase all new fastenings – you WILL round nuts and studs WILL come out with the self-locker still attached, never to be used again. The hose connection clamps to the intake & high pressure side of the turbo will be single use affairs if they’re original. Buy genuine Jubilee clip replacements – particularly for the high pressure side. Doubt there’ll be room to use an impact wrench of any sort as VW tend to hide their turbos at the back of the engine, everything will be threadlocked / rusted up anyway & impacts are only really any good for non gooed-up threads. A fine flamed blowtoch might help.

You’ll have to remove much more than you bargain for & probably end up under the car to do the turbo to downpipe connection. I bet the oil return goes into the sump in some dark alcove as well. Depending on the model you may need to drop the coolant. Plug all pipes / wrap them in clingfilm and zip tie it up. The last thing you need is to feed a new turbo with bits of fingernail and muck. This is especially true for the induction side and the oil feed. The very last thing you should do will be removing the blanking plug on the intake side of the new turbo. Thoroughly check all hoses leading to this before removing the plug and connecting the intake pipe. I’ve seen the aftermath of misplaces washers & nuts flying into £500 of new blower. There was much wailing and gnashing of teeth.

When you’re done, do an oil change prior to testing it all.

Good luck!

It’s easy till it’s not.

If you don’t have tools and experience take it to the garage.

If you want tools and experience and want a new hobby then crack on.

I’ve done a few. As above, Work out why it failed first

As above easy till you snap a stud.

Definitely a do it if you can afford it to be out of action longer than you think. I have two levels of car mending. The fix it on the street or the fix it in my dads massive shed where I can carry on regardless of weather and shut the door when it’s not going well and it’s 11pm and I’ve slipped a spanner for the third time and can see what I think is a bone in the bloody mess that is my knuckles.

That would be the latter in my book.

Done the job on a mazda but the turbo was at the front
Some cars have a copper alloy nut that resists corrosion , this will help.
Soak repeatedly and maybe heat cycle the exhaust side nuts first.
Do not be afraid to tighten then loosen
Repeatedly as its the rust corrosion build up that can shear bolts and studs

@joshvegas that’s a pretty descriptive scale for car fixing.

I missed out on th lovely warm garage on two of my big jobs, although I did end up using the hoist in one to fix the gearbox on what was the shitty pile of turd of a Rover I had once.

The Omega I had to fix under a tarp outside over a period of three months, which is not fun when both heads have to come off and you find that the head gaskets are for a 2.5 V6 not a 3.0 and one of the head bolts has a massive crack in the head. My ex-ex-wife was not happy I had a pair of heads in the loung under a table for weeks.

Sharpie and freezer bags is a tip I will recommend many. many times. Label all the things and be aware that a Haynes book may lie or just give instructions that are impossible in real life.

“Refitting is a reversal of removal”

How exactly do you hit something with a hammer while a handy helper is hanging off a scaffold pole on the end of a spanner… in reverse?

Brush up on your swearing

I haven’t done it on a golf, done a couple on other cars. The biggest issues were always sticky bolts/studs/nuts (because they’ve usually not been undone since the car was built and some of them get brutally hot) and access (because they’re often stuck somewhere inconvenient). Doing the oil feed on my mondeo was a 2 minute job that ended up taking about 40 miserable years, because I don’t have enough elbows nor do I have a light up eye on my index finger. But the actual spannering was always simple other than that.

As others have said renew the oil feed pipes to the turbo and when you get it off make sure it’s complete ie there are no loose bits ready to be digested by the cylinder head.

I’m doing a clutch on an old VW at the weekend. Glad to see someone else will working their neck muscles and swearing a lot.

In the middle of doing one on an 80’s car.
Does the turbo have a coolant feed? Might want to drain that first to avoid a soaking. Do it carefully so you don’t end up rolling about in it.
Any bits of the engine open to drop stuff in, I stuff with a ball of workshop blue Roll. If any drilling happens, gaffa tape too.

Magnet on a stick, a great help, as are the bolt extraction sockets which fit over the heads of stubborn bolts.

If you can’t undo some of the fittings at the turbo end in situ, it may be easier to remove the end not bolted to the turbo, then attack it out of the car as a bigger assembly.

Edit
Hot fiat covers it above.

ive done it 3 times, once on a Leon p150 & twice on my ibiza, same PD engine as most golfs, need to get the front up in the air to give some room to work underneath at the back of the engine,
the boost pipe quick clips are great when they are new & not worn, pain in the tits to keep together when there not, overall not a bad job but i wouldnt recomend it as a first mechanical job,

as you havent said what engine is in your golf its hard to advise on specifics but the EGR pipework is awkward to get disconnected, normally do away with the EGr on refit, darkside do a variety of egr removal kits,

downpipe to turbo can be fun if the bolts / studs into the turbo are tight / snap (this sucks)

as many have said i would spend some time to identify why its failed, this can normally be either the oil feed is clogged & ran the turbo dry or the vanes have been stuck & boosted it to the moon( my leon failed this way, replaced with a bigger turbo,problem solved)

going forwards once you have replaced the turbo, its important to replace the oil feed for a new one & remmeber to do an oil change,

one also other important point, depending on how the turbo has failed, you may have oil contamination through the inlet system / intercooler full of oil, this requires the full removal of the intake pipework & intercooler & cleaning as otherwise it can run away on the oil in the system on startup / under load

this requires the full removal of the intake pipework & intercooler & cleaning as otherwise it can run away on the oil in the system on startup / under load

Very good point. The intercooler on my 180bitdi t5 was full of sludgy oil. It was more by luck than judgement it hadn’t run away. My dad gave me a right bo11ocking as we took that off – if I hadn’t been replacing the cooler with an alloy one then I was going to leave it (he was once part of a team investigating a runaway diesel engine on a crane that then took out an ammonia plant!)