Bit of luck for you guys out there with turbo's whistling away. FINALLY Taken it to a good garage down the road from my work and they have diagnosed it as a bearing or two gone in the turbo. What made me take it down there was one of the fellas that work there came into work the other day and said they had a A3 in there the other day with the same sound as mine and it has blown the turbo to pieces.

So dont say I didnt warn you! mine is on 24,000 miles and probably started a good month or two ago so around the 20,000 mark.

Luckily my warranty covers it : D

You have been warned! : )

Old news - check out my pain.

https://www.fiatforum.com/grande-punto/244451-worn-u-s-turbo-changed-mjet.html

I know, I was following it : P

What's the problem?

Im almost afraid to ask this, but has this anything to do with the fact you have remapped your cars? I only ask this due to me taking delivery of my mjet and am also considering a remap?

Mine was making the sound wayy before the map but I dont think it helps a breaking turbo. If you look at ffoxy, his gp is simular power to mine and he is on what 67,000 miles ish.. so I would say no. My friends dad who is a mechanic said it wouldnt do anything to the turbo. The damage can be caused by the exhaust getting too hot or something or other ( he was using big words) : P

So my answer would be no. But if it is on its way out I would say yes.

Reddot listen for any turbo problems and they said they could hear the howling sound and said wheather I wanted to do to map or not. Me being young and eager said yes! : ) Knowingly that hopefully it would be done under warranty : )

The turbo problem seems to be on most '06 plate Gp's that ive seen anyway.

I think that a good question to ask.

I could be due to the re-map who knows, however the map i had done did not change the turbo boost only the fuel settings.

I have more of a theory that i had one service done where they did not use the correct oil. It is well known that the selena oil that has to be used contains a unique mineral required that is not used in your general multi-grades. But like i said to find the root cause for this would be difficult.

The turbo technics website says the average life of a turbo is less than 70k. Seems a short life span to me but i have never run a car this long before to compare.

As time goes by and more cars hit this short of mileage i am sure we find out if there is a pattern forming between turbo failure and a re-map.

What i do know is that some re-mappers now ask has the turbo been replaced before they will do a remap - again it is well known there were a large batch of faulty turbos installed on some of the early models.

Might be worth someone doing a poll to see if there is any connection with remaps.

Mine did this took it to get mapped when i picked it up the turbo was noisy fiat changed it under warranty, Just be careful with remaps, turbos that have never seen that kinda boost can be pushed over the edge.
But my remap was the best thing I've ever done!
Drove down doing 45mpg came back doing 57mpg with way better power and flat spots removed
+ a lot of it is how you drive revving from 1st start up, not letting the turbo cool or spool down after a run, also shock loading the turbo, ie stamping on the pedal a lot puts pressure on the bearings, all these listed reduces turbo life greatly.

Mine started howling, 6 months ago at 20k, was replaced under warranty along with the egr valve(was stuck fully closed ). This turbo has now started howling like a police siren so will be booking it in again. It's lasted 6k , and they only fit recon turbos under warranty, when I took it in they replaced turbo, but then rang me and said I can't have it back yet as the recon turbo that they fitted was worse than the howling one, had dodgy seals and nearly sucked my sump dry! Not much faith that whoever recons the turbos does it right?!

Shauncorwyn said:

I think that a good question to ask.

I could be due to the re-map who knows, however the map i had done did not change the turbo boost only the fuel settings.

I have more of a theory that i had one service done where they did not use the correct oil. It is well known that the selena oil that has to be used contains a unique mineral required that is not used in your general multi-grades. But like i said to find the root cause for this would be difficult.

The turbo technics website says the average life of a turbo is less than 70k. Seems a short life span to me but i have never run a car this long before to compare.

As time goes by and more cars hit this short of mileage i am sure we find out if there is a pattern forming between turbo failure and a re-map.

What i do know is that some re-mappers now ask has the turbo been replaced before they will do a remap - again it is well known there were a large batch of faulty turbos installed on some of the early models.

Might be worth someone doing a poll to see if there is any connection with remaps.

Click to expand...

73,000 clocked up now & no problems so I'd say spot on to Shauncorwyn... Sharkrider has clocked over 100k miles too, its not the re-mapping that causes the problem, if anything its how the car is abused and / or neglected at certain times in its life, whether due to ignorance or plain neglect.
I serviced early, 15k miles instead of 18k. Insisted on the correct oil type & grade, and ALWAYS took care of the engine & turbo when cold or hot. Still schweet... for the next owner :yum:

They are the answers I wanted to hear but may make Stanford hall a good excuse to nip down to Watford and also time for me to get used to the new motor(and save for the remap and induction)

Ffoxy said:

73,000 clocked up now & no problems so I'd say spot on to Shauncorwyn... Sharkrider has clocked over 100k miles too, its not the re-mapping that causes the problem, if anything its how the car is abused and / or neglected at certain times in its life, whether due to ignorance or plain neglect.
I serviced early, 15k miles instead of 18k. Insisted on the correct oil type & grade, and ALWAYS took care of the engine & turbo when cold or hot. Still schweet... for the next owner :yum:

Click to expand...

indeed, mine was mapped at 4k (by angel though, not reddot) and I'm now over 100k without problems,recently went to RR session, and still giving the same power, no drop off in performance, mine does however whistle, always has, my fiat tech says its not a problem, says he has replaced turbos on whistling cars only to have the new one whistle anyway.... so I'm not in the least bit concerned.
Other cars do this too. most notably the PD140 VAG engines, a friend of mine has an octy II PD140 (mapped to 180bhp) which whistles like mine, and he has done over 80k and its still going strong.
If you can get it replaced under warrenty , fine, why not? if you are out of warrenty (like me!) I wouldn't worry about it, mine is still going strong...

as someone else said though (depending on the mapper) boost levels are only increased a very small ammount on these engines,if at all, the rest is done with fuelling, so a map shouldn't ruin the life of your turbo.

I never boot it from cold, and always let it "cool" with a gentle last mile or so before switching off... (also stuck to fiat 18k service intervals, of course using the correct selina oil, this may be very important (the oil) ,I know the VAG engines die if the specific oil isn't used. I have also never had to top up the oil in the 100,350 miles I have done!) this is my philosophy for a long life for your turbo.