I hope people will read this and not go down this road.

A long time back, i was on E-bay and found this TFX kit, 304 hot side, treadstone cooler and all the good parts were Turbonetics (62mm turbo,wastegate and bov) I had not found this site yet and never looked in to this type of kit, later that week i had my fisrt turbo. It looked to good to be true and i was very happy, and i knew i got a hell of a deal.

Here is the real DEAL....I have alot of pix's and i hope they show what happens over time... this car was driven 60 miles a day, 5 days a week. I want this to be about the cheap 304 stainless, not about Tfx, Vecco, Treadstone or any other copy kit.








The kit looked good and fit really well and the headers looked like chrome. then the fun started...




Tfx sent me another header cause he never seen this... that one cracked too in the same spot. Next i cut the cross over thinking it was causing stress. Doesn't look like chrome does it?





Still cracked.. never took pix's... didn't want to talk about it, or see it again. Next are the pix's when i sold it, you can see i tried to stop the cracking by adding support to it...it didn't work.




The funny thing is that before i sold it i had it welded again and all that time i had it i only had problems with the right side. When i took it all apart not only was the right side broke again but the wastegate stand-off almost fell off in my hand. Then when i looked at the left side it was also cracked in two spots!

The other part of this story is my turbo started to leak oil... Turbonetics fixed it but said that it was from too small of an air filter or an exhaust leak that caused it to leak... I never ran an air filter sooo.... The other half of that was i blew 2 head gaskets... My tuner said it was cause the oil got on the mass air meter. I think it was him but i don't know and that's why i have a carb now.




So any kit made out of cheap 304 stainless should be left alone... its not worth the time or money.... I now have a diy mild steel kit that has been on the car over a year and no problems. My turbo is also mounted solid to the frame and i have no flex joint anywhere, with solid engine mounts.

If you have good luck with 304 stainless that's fine, this is just me and the road i went down.


john

 

My turbo flange has broken off in the same spot (around the weld). I can't wait to build my own kit and put the turbo on the drivers side!

 

perfect example of why it's better to spend a little more upfront instead of doing things twice!

Great work posting up the pics! Hope you get everything straightened out

 

wow thats sucks.

 

I was hoping you would see it that way...

john

 

with all of the "conversation" in the BS section about this... this should get a sticky in the newbie secton

 

did it crack because it was too thin? isnt stainless supposed to be stronger than mild steel? where the welds to blame? elaborate on why you think it failed.

 

It's just to thin... one crack started on one side of the weld then crossed over to the other side and kept going. Cheap, cheap, cheap.

john

 

What gauge metal did it say was used on the kit?

 

interesting. i wonder what gauge ss that is. so that we know what exactly to stay away from.

 

Can I say TOLD YOU SO!

Cheap 304 has too much carbon in it, and cannot withstand the thermal cycles in the turbo application. There will be SOMEONE out there that will post up differently, but they are going to be the rarity. If you want it to live in a daily use application. Then 321 all the way. Or you can cheap out on a low carbon 304

 

They said 16 gauge, but that's not the point here.

john

 

I am going to try to find some pictures of the stuff I have seen in the past. Every single stainless kit I have ever seen off of ebay has had similar problems and worse. I even had a buddy who was racing someone for money and went into third gear and the who wastegate and flange broke off and was laying in the street. Nothing like being in front by a few cars and then having no boost. My personal oppion is that the shitty third world stainless that all of these guys are using on the ebay kits has not quality control and litterally has thin spots and week spots in it. It is prone to cracking and I have even seen it burn through.

 

OH..another thing. Do the welds on the inside look like the welds on the outside. What I am getting at it. I wonder if these were purged when welded. Or just butt welded?

 

When you put a Magnet on it...does it stick at all?

 

Here is another pix on the inside... you can see the light.

And no one "told me so" i found this out on my own and that is not my point with this thread, thanks.



john

 

No it did not.

john

 

Looks like they are NOT purged or solar fluxed. Just butt welded on the outside. Not doing this on stainless makes for a very weak weld. Cheap stainless moves at a very high rate, with the bracing they have on their kits. There is a lot of pushing and pulling going on. For the money (as you already know) it is hard to beat the cheap ole mild steel stuff. Coated of course.

 

It's just all the talk and bs about stainless lately is crazy... I just want people to see that cheap is cheap. And it kills me to hear people say to coat the stainless.... WHAT!! are you kidding me? Mild steel works every time.

john

 

I just built a set out of 18ga mild steel. painted the outside with vht high temp paint. what is the life expectancy of mild steel?