Okay, so today my wife was drivin behind me, and i was in 2nd gear and got on it about 50% throttle from about 2-3.5g rpm's. She said that when i was accelerating there was Black smoke coming out of my exhaust. Now, i have a full 3" exhaust with no cat, and no tune. I am thinking that it is just from it runnin rich, but upon thinking about this, i have noticed that the past couple days when i am driven it a bit harder and come to a stop i seem to smell a little bit of a burnt oil smell..

Usually an oil leak is grey smoke, and runnin rich is black.... not?

My question, Is there any way to tell if the turbo is burning oil? or going bad?
I am new to turbo set ups and appreciate all the help.

If there is any additional info i can give ya, justask.... thanks in advance... Eric

an oil leak isnt' grey, it's blue....

White is usually from cooling...

Black can be from just about anything, but running rich is a good possiblitly

my buddy has a scanner... i wish i had more time so we could get together and scan it... i suppose we could tell from that if its just runnin rich correct...?

A wide band would be a better bet.

i just dumped 1300.00 into my clutch and flywheel... and am mad cuz they didn't remind me to replace my syncro's... lol... no money for a wideband till next season now.. with that and the hard pipes that are in the mail... i blew my whole budget on moddin for most of the year...

there are a couple reasons you could be smelling the burnt oil

yes, black smoke is running rich.

the burnt smell could be a leaky turbo oil inlet (not uncommon) and when you give it more throttle the heat that is produced burns the oil off of the center cartridge.

is there alot of oil and grime buildup around your turbo, or turbo manifold? next time you do this pop the hood and see if you can smell it under there or coming from the exhaust

it is clean there, but i will smell for it next time... the only place i know its leaking is on the oil return line... but there is nothing that hot down there.....

It may not be hot there but when that oil drips on to your exhaust and underbody during driving speeds it will burn off your exhaust.

no... i know its not from the oil return line... positive.. it only leaks about a drop every 30 minutes... what is the best way to determine if the turbo is burnin oil?

Check for shaft play.

i just started another post, but there is oil all over the upper in cooler pipe... i mean caked... i guess this means my turbo is shot then.. right?

ok, nevermind.. i just checked for shaft play and there was barely any, but when i pulled my fingers out they were caked with oil... i guess i found my answer. i am seriously gettin tired of this... 1300 on the clutch and now this.... maybe its time to sell...

I don't know how it would get to your upper intercooler pipe. is it the stock turbo or do you have a j-pipe?

consider this though. if your return line is dripping oil, even slowly, when you drive there is wind. as the drop falls from the line it is caught in the wind, possibly hits the down pipe and then smokes creating the burnt oil smell.

oil caked in places doesn't necessarily mean your turbo is toast.

just so we are clear... the car is burning oil when the turbo is spoolin...

now, today i went to put on an upper intercooler pipe and when i pulled it off i noticed oil... i pulled the intake off to check for shaft play and noticed an excessive amount of oil inside the turbo inlet and a pool of it in the intake... like if i tip the intake up it would drip out...

there is "minimal" shaft play, meaning i can tell that it moves...

It is a evo 3 16 g turbo.. the numbers that i can see on it are.. (these are cast on it) TD05H and then by the serial number it has 48178-01 if this means anything