Intercooler hoses - where does the oil come from?

[c3nturi0n]

Great work Jim and hope that patience will persevere.

Good luck with it!

[Jim Haseltine]

The oil that has come out of the pipes seems to be thicker and dirtier than the oil in rest of the car - not by much and that's just my opinion so I'm not certain but it sort of suggests to me that it's from the breathers. Thinking things over last night, there may be another factor in play here - the leak from the oil pump shaft O ring which is now approaching Exxon Valdez levels. Still, that's a job for another day.

[c3nturi0n]

Agreed... mind me asking how easy or challenging is to get to PCV's? i.e. can it be DIY'ed.

And is it worth replacing them as part of preventative maintenance?

[Jim Haseltine]

The breather pipes have 3 non-return valves - or should have. Only one (the one for the inlet manifold) was working, the other two flowed in both directions. One I've managed to clean out but no dice with the other.
Getting the PCV/oil separator off is relatively easy, you have to do it anyway to get to the rear spark plug on the RH bank. When it's off the rh non-return valve is easy, the left not so and the inlet valve is more than slightly difficult, requiring some lateral thinking and at least 3 hands. I'm not looking forwards to putting it back on.
Update:
The PCV oil separator is on back order, none in the country according to JCT600 and the non-return valves can't currently be ordered on their system so they're raising it with Audi.

[c3nturi0n]

Cheers Jim.

Maybe worth giving TPS a call?

[Jim Haseltine]

The non-return valves are held in the Audi parts DC because there's an issue with them, will be supplied as soon as they've been released.
The inlet valve was a s*d to refit as none of my hose clip tools would go anywhere near it - at least that one won't have to come off again. The breather pipes must come close to the World's Record for hose clips per metre.

[Jim Haseltine]

Well, that's something of a disappointment. I cleaned as much oil from the turbo inlet as I could yesterday, refitted everything on the top on the engine with the intention of moving the car today because it's blocking the drive but just in case I fitted some clean sleeves on the turbo outlets expecting to see nothing or very little in them today. Both sleeves have considerable amounts of oil (a round a tablespoonful) this morning. I'm going to put my scope into them and see what's there if I can.

[Jim Haseltine]

There's still loads of oil draining from the turbos outlets, a lot more than I'd expect to have come from the breathers especially as there wasn't any significant amounts in the non return valves. I can see oil in the outlets with my scope but can't work out where its draining from.
It's puzzling - there was oil pooled in front of the turbos yesterday so it's is getting there somehow. The turbo impellers look to be clean from what I can see with my scope - I'd expect them to be covered in some oil. Actually, I'd expect them to be covered if the oil is coming past the front seal and even then I can't see how it could get that far forwards when the airflow is in the opposite direction.

[Jim Haseltine]

Well, started it to clear the drive - loads of smoke. While it was running I pulled off the pipe between the oil tank and the PCV separator, there aren't enough fumes going through it to cause that much blue smoke so I'm going to go for option 1, the turbos.

[ATinOf]

Jim,

Make sure you are sitting down when you check the price of the PCV fine oil separator, I did mine as preventative maintenance (amongst other jobs) when I had the engine out at 57K....
(not that you need the engine out to do this obviously)

Fine Oil Separator 07L 103 464 D 342.10

[Jim Haseltine]

Oh, I know, I know... it's in a box in my kitchen along with a couple of working non-return valves. And a credit card bill heading my was in a week or so....