My 2004 6.0 today at 73900 miles had to replace turbo. Any suggestions on how I can help prevent seizing at low mileage?
Did I get a reasonable replacement at $980 ? Mechanic said cleaning the old one was only a bandaid. He had no advice on how to prevent a recurrence. Came with a one year warranty. Jasper rebuilt model.
thanks.

 

best way is to use it. Run it hard so those vanes get some exercise.

 

Was it the vanes or the shaft that seized? Do you let the engine idle and cool down before turning it off?

 

When I purchased my '03 I quickly learned it had been used as a lawncare truck, as I pulled the bedliner out and found red mulch under it.

About 2 weeks later the Unison ring froze and it wouldn't keep the turbo boots sealed, they would blow off even under light acceleration.

I took it back to the dealer I bought it from, and the first tech they assigned it to (because their diesel guy was on vacation) didn't know his *** from a hole in the ground, he replaced all the boots, the brake booster, and the vacuum pump before the diesel guy came back, took it over, and diagnosed the turbo was bad almost immediately. I had the truck back a day after the diesel guy looked at it but still couldn't get a fifth wheel hitch put in it so my vacation that weekend was screwed. They DID only charge me for the price of the turbo, which was about $900 for a Ford Motorcraft turbo, I wouldn't give $3 for a Jasper rebuild after some of my experiences with Jasper. A diesel engine shouldn't have 3 different diameter pistons - it'll tear itself apart.

I put another 150k on that truck before I got rid of it, and never had another turbo problem.

Cleaning these variable vane turbos is a bandaid at best, because you really can't get all the soot out of them. It's best to replace them.

The best preventative maintenance for them is to run them. Get up to temp and stay there for a while to keep burning soot out, even long drives on the expressway is better than nothing, but pulling something heavy for a while is great for them. Then, when you come to a stop, unless you HAVE to shut it down right away, give it a minute or two to idle and cool off. Keep short trips where you aren't getting up to temp to a minimum (i.e. don't run to the store real quick every day and that's all you do, if you live less than 10 minutes from work drive something other than this truck, unless you then use this truck to drive around for work), and that turbo will last a LONG time.

 

Any VGT needs to be worked hard regularly and the best thing you can do is drive it like you stole it fairly often.