Is this ecoboom?

[Marko80]

Has my mustang also experienced infamous ecoboom?

Let me first briefly describe the agony of the last month...

About a month ago, while driving, I noticed that the car was somehow not working properly, there was a vibration that was not there before, but there was no warning light...

I immediately checked the oil level and found out that the oil was "not there at all" or it was below the dipstick level... and this only 2 weeks after changing the oil and oil filter!!!

I had the car towed for service.

The mechanic noticed that the ignition coils were literally swimming in oil, so he assumed a damaged valve cover or gasket was the reason (so he said). He then replaced this and added misising oil. When we did a test drive, the check engine light came on, the tester indicated a misfire on cylinder 2, so he replaced the ignition coil. The error was gone...

Next day I drove to work and back and drove about 100 km, but the car was still not OK, the feeling while driving was not right, the car was shaking more, it somehow lacked power... like someone shot 100 horses...

I took it back to the service, where we found that it had used approx. 1L-1.5 L of oil in those 100km... Based on the symptoms, the mechanic assumed that the head gasket was damaged.

He replaced the head gasket and did a test drive. Only during the test drive, which lasted 10-15 km, the car smoked heavily, turned off during slow driving and indicated an ignition error. In only 10-15km the car consumed as much oil as is the difference between the min and max mark on the dipstick .

I should add that the coolant level was the same all the time.

I'm from Europe, the mechanic has never encountered anything like this, has no experience with that kind of symptoms...

Considering everything, he suggests changing the entire engine because he can't determine the cause of the abnormal oil consumption and all other problems...

Is this also an ecoboom or is this something else?

Has anyone encountered such symptoms, how did you solve it, did you replace the engine or is there any other, hopefully cheaper solution? The replacement cost is huge... €10,000..

Thank you for your answers...

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[Skye]

Can he run a compression test on all cylinders, while paying particular attention to cylinder 2?

Edit,

Better still, if he has a bore scope, visually inspect and perform a compression test on all cylinders.

 

[Wolfys11]

^ you can check cylinders, however you can also check if you have abnormal oil in the charge pipes, check intercooler, check inside the charge pipe post turbo, its possible the turbo is leaking oil, maybe the pcv system is failing, and the engine runs like crap due to burning the oil

 

[Wolfys11]

Has my mustang also experienced infamous ecoboom?

Let me first briefly describe the agony of the last month...

About a month ago, while driving, I noticed that the car was somehow not working properly, there was a vibration that was not there before, but there was no warning light...

I immediately checked the oil level and found out that the oil was "not there at all" or it was below the dipstick level... and this only 2 weeks after changing the oil and oil filter!!!

I had the car towed for service.

The mechanic noticed that the ignition coils were literally swimming in oil, so he assumed a damaged valve cover or gasket was the reason (so he said). He then replaced this and added misising oil. When we did a test drive, the check engine light came on, the tester indicated a misfire on cylinder 2, so he replaced the ignition coil. The error was gone...

Next day I drove to work and back and drove about 100 km, but the car was still not OK, the feeling while driving was not right, the car was shaking more, it somehow lacked power... like someone shot 100 horses...

I took it back to the service, where we found that it had used approx. 1L-1.5 L of oil in those 100km... Based on the symptoms, the mechanic assumed that the head gasket was damaged.

He replaced the head gasket and did a test drive. Only during the test drive, which lasted 10-15 km, the car smoked heavily, turned off during slow driving and indicated an ignition error. In only 10-15km the car consumed as much oil as is the difference between the min and max mark on the dipstick .

I should add that the coolant level was the same all the time.

I'm from Europe, the mechanic has never encountered anything like this, has no experience with that kind of symptoms...

Considering everything, he suggests changing the entire engine because he can't determine the cause of the abnormal oil consumption and all other problems...

Is this also an ecoboom or is this something else?

Has anyone encountered such symptoms, how did you solve it, did you replace the engine or is there any other, hopefully cheaper solution? The replacement cost is huge... €10,000..

Thank you for your answers...

Do you see smoke out of the exhaust? Oil losing at this rate means it goes somewhere- it could be burnt so it goes in the exhaust and you will see blue smoke out of the exhaust, as well as oil in the intake manifold and charge pipes if its leaking in thru turbo/pcv

If not, then the oil has to go somewhere- coolant, leaking somewhere

Typically an ecoboom results in a bent rod- clicking noising of a shorter rod height causing piston hitting crank, or a ripped rod which is a blown up motor in pieces. I had both happen but both were easy to tell. Usually an ecoboom is not a questionable thing like the only symptom being oil loss

 

[Buldawg76]

Cylinder compression tests and leak down tests will give you condition of piston ring's ability to seal both oil from going past rings into compression chamber and cylinder pressure from going past rings into crankcase.

Check for oil in charge pipes and intercooler/intake manifold to determine if turbo is bad or possibly turbo oil drain filter pipe is plugged not allowing oil to drain back out of turbo into crankcase.

BD

 

[Marko80]

Thanks to all of you...

Today I went to the dealer in order to get some additional information. Below are all facts and symptoms regarding my problems (some from before, some new from today):
- at the beginning there were no warning lights (check engine), only car was feeling strange, shaking more than usual
- ignition coils were literally swimming in oil (suspicion of damaged valve cover or gasket --> both were changed ).
- after replacment check engine light came on (misfire on cylinder #2) --> ignition coil #2 was replaced

- after replacement car somehow felt like lacking power .. like 100 HP was missing
- approx. 1L-1.5 L of oil was lost in about 100km --> based on the symptoms, the mechanic assumed that the head gasket was damaged
- head gasket and exhaust gasket were replaced .
- During the test drive of 10-15 km, the car smoked heavily, even turned off during slow driving
- In these 10-15km the car consumed as much oil as is the difference between the min and max mark on the dipstick .
- During driving tester showed errors firstly on cylinder #2, which was working on and off, followed by signalling errors on cylinder #3 and #4, while cylinder #1 was without errors all the time
- ignition coils were again in some oil
- when car was working, exhaust from left exhaust pipe was hot, while it was cold from right side
- exhaust was "smokey", meaning some oil was combusted through exhaust

- PCV valve was checked and was OK
- charge pipe is OK
- compression test was done for all 4 cylinders and is OK.
- coolant level was the same all the time, there were no signs of decreased level of coolant.

Mechanic said that remaining possible causes could be:
- crack in head or
- crack in motor block

However, replacement of either of them is not cheap... Therefore I would like to exclude all other possibilites that could cause these issues.

Any new ideas or suggestions considering some additional information?

 

[skinnyb]

Sounds to me like a seal in the turbo has failed and the turbo is leaking massive amounts of oil into the intake... You have not mentioned checking the turbo at all... I do not have a turbo personally but have seen them fail before in my VW's in the past.

 

[Wolfys11]

Check turbo,

Why was there oil in the coil pack area? Is the valve cover leaking?

 

[Marko80]

Sounds to me like a seal in the turbo has failed and the turbo is leaking massive amounts of oil into the intake... You have not mentioned checking the turbo at all... I do not have a turbo personally but have seen them fail before in my VW's in the past.

Could be... I will ask the dealer what was checked regarding turbo... Would failed turbo seal cause also misfires in cylinder?

 

[Marko80]

Check turbo,

Why was there oil in the coil pack area? Is the valve cover leaking?

Yes, intitially the cover was not tight anymore therefore the dealer replaced it...At first - after about 100km when approx. 1-1.5L of oil was lost there was no oil in the coil pack area. However, after head gasket replacement there was some oil again...

 

[skinnyb]

Could be... I will ask the dealer what was checked regarding turbo... Would failed turbo seal cause also misfires in cylinder?

Yes, too much oil will foul the plugs and definitely cause a misfire.

 

[luca1290]

Check the turbo, it's probably gone, and you're lucky that it still has not grenaded and took the entire engine with it.

 

[Buldawg76]

Turbo definitely needs checked if it was not already inspected by dealer and also needs a cylinder leak down test which is different than a compression test.

Turbo also has a drain pipe that allows oil supplied to turbo bearings to drain back into oil pan and has a filter in the drain pipe that could be plugged not allowing oil to drain into pan which will cause oil to back up into turbo and be forced into intake under boost and cause misfires and smoking. Or turbo seals could be bad.

BD

 

[S550HPP]

Try and locate an engine at the recyclers.​

​

Sounds like you need a new mechanic they should have done above tests before doing a thing.​

 

[Marko80]

Turbo definitely needs checked if it was not already inspected by dealer and also needs a cylinder leak down test which is different than a compression test.

Turbo also has a drain pipe that allows oil supplied to turbo bearings to drain back into oil pan and has a filter in the drain pipe that could be plugged not allowing oil to drain into pan which will cause oil to back up into turbo and be forced into intake under boost and cause misfires and smoking. Or turbo seals could be bad.

BD

The dealer performed cylinder leak down test before and after head gasket replacement:
- before: 0%, 98%, 0%, 0$ (not sure about zeros, but cylinder #2 had 98%)
- after: 0%, 0%, 2%, 0%.


Additional info from test drive after head gasket replacement:
Up to 2000rpm the car was poorly responsive, lacks power, stutters, but above 3000rpm works quite fine and releases a lot of smoke. Well and uses a whole lot of oil (cca 1-1.5L in only about 10km)

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