Cracked Intercooler hose Question

[texaxile]

Car is a Subaru Impreza WRX 2004

118k miles..

Car went into local MD for a Gearbox / Diff oil change as my regular Indy can't fit me in per schedule.

Health report came back with, among other stuff, "Intercooler hose cracked, needs immediate replacement" cost £268 plus VAT. I questioned it with the Service manager and he told me that the "Tech" said if it splits, then it will cause the turbo to overboost and destroy the engine.

I questioned the Service guy and said that I thought the wastegate dealt with excess boost, but he argued that the Technician said the Turbo will lunch itself and then the bits will be sucked into the engine and cause damage and failure.

The hose is simply a Samco job with 2 jubilee clips for much less, as I'm more than capable of removing a top mount and swapping it out, and tbh the original was apparently fine but 20 years old, so yeah.

My question is that is the Tech correct?. I thought that a split or cracked or leaking Intercooler hose would lead to a drop in boost pressure and performance, and the excess Turbo boost pressure is bled into the exhaust via the wastegate at a preset or preloaded pressure anyway, so no danger of overboost until you start buggering around with venting wastegate / actuator bleed hoses etc.(which are all in good order and have not been touched).

For clarity, we're talking about the intercooler hose running from the Turbo Compressor housing to the Inlet manifold. (I would post a pic but you can only see the upper part which is fine and good as new)

Thanks in advance and a virtual single malt to you all.


Edit in ***

To add, the car is at home and off the road until I can replace the hose.

I've ordered an RCM hose kit for £153 delivered. Even if they;re not needed,I'll give the car a birthday

Edited by texaxile on Saturday 2nd December 22:47

[GreenV8S]

texaxile said:

the Technician said the Turbo will lunch itself and then the bits will be sucked into the engine

There's no way for a boost leak to damage the turbo. This is an outright lie trying to panic the uninformed public into paying an exhorbitant price for a non-urgent repair.

[texaxile]

GreenV8S said:

There's no way for a boost leak to damage the turbo. This is an outright lie trying to panic the uninformed public into paying an exhorbitant price for a non-urgent repair.

Yep. I thought as much, I thought your good self and helpful BM "stevieturbo" would offer a more informed opinion on this. My very limited knowledge of forced induction doesn't really allow me to stand there arguing too much, and of course my little knowledge could be dangerous, hence the question.

Although the hoses are 20 odd years old almost and can do with a refresh which was on the cards anyway, for all the money it costs to keep my daily driver reliable and serviced, I just got annoyed at the "urgency" of the repair that was given and their arguing that I didn't know what I was on about..

These Dealers seem to prey upon the uninformed and easily scared public.Oddly Brakes didn't come into the equation, which is lucky as the car had new discs and pads @100k. I was half expecting a scare story for that as well.

[gazza285]

Depending on where the mass air flow meter is you could be running rich, which does lead to other issues if it’s not sorted.

[stevieturbo]

GreenV8S said:

There's no way for a boost leak to damage the turbo. This is an outright lie trying to panic the uninformed public into paying an exhorbitant price for a non-urgent repair.

I wouldn't say never, but not often likely.

A small split or crack could see the turbo working harder to try and maintain boost despite this additional leak leading to overspeeding of the turbo.
But I'd say instances of that are rare. Generally there will be other obvious symptoms if it's that bad that should alert a driver to a problem

The OE pipe on a lot of them is a hard plastic type of pipe and rough hands can break them if they had the intercooler removed. Generally they don't break on their own

So would be interesting to see what this actual split or damage is, and whether it seems natural, or caused by someone.

But silicone replacement is a good option

As for it destroying the engine, that's getting a bit far fetched. but then, it's a Subaru.....sometimes they just do that themselves lol