Personally, I'd still ship the old one to DriftMotion (or another turbo shop) to see what they can do... unless it's got so much play that it's been eating the compressor housing you really don't know until you actually disassemble it... but if you've got more than a couple millimeters of axial play at the end of the spindle, it is a good bet that it's shot. This is a specialized field and while a mechanic gets a good idea from past experience they still may be mistaken.
I agree about cheap turbos... they usually don't last and if they grenade they really do a ton of damage. I don't trust used turbos either (more accurately I don't trust the judgment of the sellers)... half the time you finally receive it and it's completely worthless or only has another 20,000 miles of life left in it (still rebuilding one is cheaper than a new, good turbo).
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Last edited by cre; 02-18-2010 at 11:29 PM.
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