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DIY Turbo replacement

jdn112011

Well-Known Member
Oct 18, 2015
1,246
338
Truck Year
2015
Honestly a huge job, 12.5 hours of book time but 199,777 finally hit the first major failure I've experienced outside the tone wheel.

Extremely intensive disassembly, transmission out, (refreshed the tone wheel) I did it in the garage in a few days. Patience and heat as you've got to remove the studs from manifolds but it is doable. Balancing the transmission and transfer case in and out were probably the worst part of it.

Had experienced a couple overboost derates last year, then actually had underboost faults where it finally died. I thought the vgt actuator froze up as you can't really test it and there was a little linkage movement yet though I didn't know how much travel there actually should be. So ordered the cheapest 150$ one on eBay to rob the actuator. Turns out the turbo was actually completely seized.

Had some reluctance installing that one just due to the scale of the job, but the difference between a 200$ fix, 1k (and waiting a week to order a new oe turbo to arrive) or the 4k dealer quote just said screw it, get it done with what you've got.

Remove wheel liners, intake and ecm just for visibility, and you can work in the wheel well old school.

Honestly probably had 20 hours garage time into it, a lot of that was initial disassembly attempting to split to Turbo in place though to not remove manifold or exhaust studs or drop transmission. Learned I'm not as young as I once was but we figured er out and it's back on the road to tick 200k for basically nothing but my time.

Just a little inspiration it is in fact possible. Codes cleared, have boost, no coolant leaks.
 

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Tremper126

Moderator
Staff member
Feb 15, 2019
915
333
Truck Year
2014
I fear mine was starting to go when I blew a boot on intercooler piping, but it seems to be holding on. What was odd, I never received any codes indicating low boost pressure, only the dummy lightning bolt! Looking back, would a body lift kit have allowed for a few extra inches of accessing the turbo without moving the trans?
 

jdn112011

Well-Known Member
Oct 18, 2015
1,246
338
Truck Year
2015
I fear mine was starting to go when I blew a boot on intercooler piping, but it seems to be holding on. What was odd, I never received any codes indicating low boost pressure, only the dummy lightning bolt! Looking back, would a body lift kit have allowed for a few extra inches of accessing the turbo without moving the trans?
Very very slight chance it would. Even without an egr cooler in the way and that plumbing; there's a banjo oil return line that comes from above trans up and around the Turbo, as well as HAVING to remove the studs for the manifolds as they V together, (the Turbo is the collector) you just need full Access behind the engine. Had a dropped the def tank the transmission alignment would've been quite a bit easier, but the transmission cooler and hard lines run over the top and were difficult to free but in the Grand scheme dropping the transmission isn't "that bad" take that with a grain of salt.
 
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