Well, I know this isnt a Tbird site but cant get any respanses elsewhere and so I wanted to try here. I have an '85 Tbird Turbocoupe. Well I have a huge problem with it. a few months back i was driving my car and out of the blue the turbo made a high pitched whiny noise but produced hardly any boost. Could that be a bad bearing and oil be seeping through? Second, one day my car decited to die out and never ran the same again. I figured out the problem, it was the fuel pump. replaced it with a new one from checker, bad idea! the pump was a dud. It was a piece and didnt work right and the car would die like 30 seconds later from start up. Then i replaced it with another pump from the junkyard. ran fine. Then now, when i drove it it ran good until about 3000rpm. Once the boost would kick in, the power would be laggy til like 4 or 4500rpms. then would kick in "better." Then about a month ago i drove it home because i moved from across town to the other side, it just pretty much gave ass!! I drove it home with it wanting to stall and stuff and when I would try to accelerate, the car would die. I have a list of possible problems: Could it be a jacked head gasket? Maybe the fuel pump again, or having something to do with the fuel system? Or maybe the the turbo leaking oil into the cylinders, possibly fouling the plugs, because there is a bit of crusty burnt oil on each plug. If anyone has had a problem like this before or may be able to possibly diagnose my problem, I would GREATLY appreciate the help. I think im going to do a compression test and fuel pressure test as well. Any help would be appreciated greatly. Thank you for your help. Larry
do a tune up on it, check the tfi module, its on the distributor, the grey thing. make sure the intake tube going into the turbo isnt collapsing under boost, hard to tell but it will make the car cut off under boost. Then the turbo, the turbo sounds like it has given up, take the inlet tube off the turbo and check the impeller, spin it around a little, it wont hurt anything to do this btw, if it moves or has shaft play it toast, it will need to be rebuilt.
Turbo is toast, pull the hose going into it to verify. Once you look inside, you should see the carnage, or be able to touch the compressor wheel and see that's it's got a ton of play in it... Next step would be to replace it with a used one and see how it runs.
Check the turbo and see if the ECU has logged any trouble codes. Your car doesn't have a check engine light(CEL), so it won't remind you that there is a fault somewhere.
Ditto. Just for the heck of it, check your manifold for cracks. Those older E3s tend to crack a lot and this could be a good time to replace it while the turbo is removed.
