Superflex

I'm not out to damage Jacob's business, but rather to encourage improvements and educate the rest of the community. I think the products he provides are a good idea poorly executed. I'll try to present my situation objectively.

I received my K04/K16v2's, a.k.a. "tribrids" in early to mid March. They were installed by a highly respected, Audi-trained mechanic who has replaced a minimum of 40 sets of turbos on the 2.7T, while working for a dealership and independently.

The day after I got my car back was a chilly morning, so it needed a while to warm up. But the first time I got above about 2000 RPM I heard this god-awful buzzing noise as it began to spool. Imagine if the devil played a kazoo.
The noise would happen under even light acceleration. After about 2 minutes the noise would start to go away and the car ran normally while warm. Every cold start brought the horrible spooling noise back.

After a while it started happening even when warm, and it was getting worse. I soon figured out that it was going through a lot of oil. It ran pretty well for another couple weeks, and finally on April 24th the noise returned and they stopped making any boost whatsoever. I limped it out to my mechanic and he soon confirmed that there were metal shavings in the IC piping. So obviously the turbos would need replacement.
It took until April 30th before he responded when I inquired about resolving the issue, and meanwhile I'm without a vehicle.

We eventually agreed that I would get the engine pulled and send back the turbos. It took a while to get scheduled in, and I don't blame anyone for that part of the downtime. I had the turbos in hand on May 14 and shipped them to arrive by May 17. Both compressor wheels were flopping around in the housing and there was extreme wear on the tips of the blades where they were rubbing against the housing. This was obviously the source of the noise.

It's now May 23. I still have no car. I don't even have confirmation that they were recieved. I have sent polite emails and a voicemail, still no response. I have a message from earlier stating that a replacement set would be made by the time the bad ones got back. This has not turned out to be the case.

I tried getting in contact with some others who had indicated issues with these turbos and heard all too familiar stories. One was posted on here back in January. Here's a reminder URL.

https://forums.audiworld.com/s4/msgs/1884586.phtml

And here's a pic of one of the bad turbos.

<IMG SRC="http://home.comcast.net/~bj_superstar/bad_compressor.JPG">

Here's an excerpt from another message I got by asking around.
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<i>Yes I did have to 'replace' them. Or rather I demanded that Jacob rebuild the units using NEW parts and not the parts bin **** he built and sent the first time. He did this free of charge but attested the failure was 'my fault' for not Pre-Oiling (Bull **** CYA) the turbos. I was not instucted by him to Pre-Oil when I ordered them. So I primmed the car adequatley before start up and the turbo pretty much failed on start up. I think this was due to him building several units with used out of spec shafts and testing them on an Out of Spec Balancer. I heard from a customer of his that he had to replace his balancer shortly after I recieved my turbos', the ones that blew. The new ones are fine.

Know this. You are not buying a new turbo. He uses remanned cores and used parts (K03 shafts, Not KO4) that are 'within spec' but not NEW. I don't think there is adequate QC going on and i'm not sure of the environment his turbo's are being built. I think at best he helped the turbo shop he used to work @ develop the hybrid and now he just sources the parts and orders them 'In' Your typical Dorm room turbo slinger. KKK turbo's suck allready and he's cracking them open, machining the compressor housing, tossing parts in and calling it a day. </i>
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I was hoping I could believe all those that kept saying, "Oh well, I'm sure Jacob will make everything all right." But so far, no dice.
All I have to show for my purchase is an extra engine pull bill, a rental car bill, and a month without my baby.

O.W. Kenobi

Thanks for sharing. Bad experiences should not be hidden away.

BLK01S4

that dont have these problems. I wasn't told to prime my turbos either but I installed them and no problems so far. *Except when I left the red oil cap on the return line but we wont't go there! * I know jacob is a busy guy he needs to hire someone to take phone calls ! I have my fingers crossed for you and hope everything will be 'OK' ! But as he told me on the phone these are *RACE* parts and there is no said warrantee :\

Stätus Josh

I'm sorry you are having a problem! Give him a chance to make things right and I'm sure he will.

And the pre-lubing instructions are not a load of BS, it is needed and if not done can indeed cause serious problems and/or failure.

Best of luck. I'm sure Jacob will take good care of the situation.

BLK01S4

How would you pre-lube a turbo?? You bolt it in fill the car with oil let it idle on the lift ..?? Or am I missing somethin here?

Stätus Josh

IIRC it's fuse #28

[badmoon]

<ul><li><a href="https://forums.audiworld.com/s4/msgs/1884586.phtml">link</a></li></ul>

BLK01S4

What instructions is what I am getting at?

Stätus Josh

he usually sends instuctions I thought?

[badmoon]

and no mention of priming them either...