So, the seals on the Mercedes turbo on the Accent finally started to leak today. I can get a full rebuild kit from Garrett for $78 plus shipping. I called Garrett and they stated that they balance the turbochargers as well. I’m pretty confident I can rebuild it myself, but has anyone torn into one and done this? I’ve seen some places charge 275-350 for a rebuild, but would rather save the money and have a decent weekend project.
Re-balancing isnt necessary. I’ve rebuilt a couple myself that turned out fine.
You got the labor rate pretty much spot on too…
Even if you rebuild it yourself you will need to have it ballanced in order for the turbo to last more than a few miles. I would send it to garret to have the pros do it. Or maybe its time to think about upgrading.
Good luck.
rebuilding them is easy. I would send it out to get balanced or it will definetly fail not to long down the road. If you really don’t want to balance it before you loosen the compressor wheel from the turbine take some white out or something and draw a line going from the center to the edge on a spot of both wheels so you can put them back together at relatively the same location since thats where the factory balanced them at.
rebuilding turbo’s does not require rebalancing UNLESS the wheels touched the housings.
The turbine is independently balanced from the compressor wheel. Each are balanced themselves. You’ll never get them back on in the same spot, it would have to be accurate to the 0.0001", which im guessing your not going to eyeball.
im by no means an expert on turbo’s, but it seems to me that balancing the turbo would be worth it just for the piece of mind, i mean the wheels in those turbos spin at well over 100k rpm, as i said im no expert, but it seems to me like it would be a good idea to have it balanced
its easy. just mark the shaft and wheel before you remove them. we rebuilt a few of mine.
yeah just mark the wheels. Its cake.