86 xt turbo intercooler hose leak & bad head gasket ??

[angeltali]

I took my xt to replace what I believe is the PITA intercooler hose leaking. The soob shop doesn't want to touch the hose without running a diagnosis on what seems to be a bad gasket in-between the turbo and exhaust. They were telling me I most likely have a bad head gasket and probably a cracked head. I have had no issues with over heating poor performance or constantly having to refill coolant. Ofcourse when this hose blew a leak two days ago it got hot but was shut off quickly.

 

Not sure what is what on this car posting pics of where the leaks are

Looking for where I can get the right hose and and anything else I should do since the turbo will be out.

 

Don't want to shell out 150 for diagnosis on something that didn't seem to be an issue. Is this common?

[angeltali]

[angeltali]

[angeltali]

[idosubaru]

these motors loose coolant, oil, overheat, and blow gaskets/hoses a lot. their concern is they don't want to charge you $150 only to find the car is still overheating/problematic.

 

might want to get a second opinion - maybe a member here familiar with EA82T's could help? it's very helpful to have some EA82 specific experience on this motor.

 

if you have a visual external leak, yeah that needs to be fixed.

 

i'd replace every hose/gasket you can between the turbo and the engine, i would not just replace one thing. at 25 years old and all the heat a turbo generates it's usually best to replace hoses/clamps/gaskets all at once on these things.

 

this motor does blow headgaskets and crack heads quickly if overheated...but they shouldn't "randomly" blow a headgasket too often and if it was previously perfectly fine and wasn't run into the red it should be fine.

[88 EA82T]

If you have an external leak then you should try to fix it. I had the same motor in my car and I ended up replacing all the coolant lines just because they were old and I kept getting leaks.

 

The one in your picture is the coolant return from the bottom of the turbo and the supply line comes from the thermostat housing and runs under the intake manifold straight back to the turbo. I had to remove the turbo to replace that hose, it's not hard it just takes some time. I got the hose from the dealer along with the turbo inlet and outlet gaskets. No other place is going to stock that hose and it was about $28 bucks and comes with the heat shield on it. My turbo also had the white residue coming out of it like that but once I got all my leaks fixed it really didn't use too much coolant. I figured a little bit of coolant added at each oil change was cheaper than a new turbo. I wouldn't worry about it unless you are using a lot of coolant quickly.

 

You will get a lot of opinions on this board about the EA82 turbo's and how bad they are but most people that have had issues with them either tried to modify them and run more boost or got a motor that wasn't maintained well before they got it. If you know what it is capable of (not much) and watch the temperature gauge constantly (turn the AC off going up hills and sitting in traffic) it will run well for a long time. I also upgraded to a 2-row radiator which increases the cooling capacity but I am not sure what the XT's came with? So that would be something to check too.

 

Oh, just a naming mistake but your car doesn't have an intercooler. Intercoolers are a big radiators between the turbo and intake manifold to cool the air down after it gets compressed in the turbo so denser colder air is fed to the motor. Makes more power and helps the motor run cooler. The hood scoop on WRXs is to flow air over the intercooler for this purpose.

 

Good luck. Hopefully it isn't a head gasket.

[angeltali]

Thanks for the info. I think I'll do the hoses and what not and run more tests if I notice something actually seeming off. Funny that isn't what its called I could swear that's what the guy at the shop said.

[Turbone]

I dont think the guy at the shop knows anything about old school turbo'd Subaru's.