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Hey everyone. Will someone help me. i need help with my turbo setup. I need to know where on my heads where i can drill and tap them for oil lines. Please help

Ive got turbo heads...One head is the valves are burnt from detonation though But i believe underneath the coolant manifold right underneath the coolant bypass under the TB you can tap for oil

what is the tb. and it the coolant bypass under the intake.

TB= Throttle Body, Coolant bypass yes under the intake manifold, You can do this by taking off the manifold, i cant direct you on how to tap it, all i know is that i have N/A heads on a turbo block and this is where the previous owner tapped for oil.

1.) Oil feed - there's an oil feed location at the rear of the block before the bell housing (top and centered if you are standing over it). It is fitted with a threaded hex/allen key plug. You can buy one that's already drilled and tapped or do it yourself. Pretty easy but even easier to buy it pre-made

2.) Oil drain - I drilled the back of the passenger side valve cover towards the bottom to keep the line at a slight downward slope.

3.) Coolant/water - I tee'd into the heater core lines coming off the fire wall. There's one flowing in and one flowing out. These are a much better match terms of line size than the TB.

The only thing I don't like about my set up is the oil drain. It DOES work but it's not perfect. To take care of the occasional leak, I bought an additional valve cover and will have an aluminum drain pipe welded in instead of the way I have it now (1/2" hose barb drilled and fixed in place with steel weld epoxy).

Other than that, all is good.

All the spots are outlined there to drill for oil and coolant on the N/A heads (just not drilled), but you'd have to see another turbo set up to see exactly where they are. Going to my garage is too much work for me right now.

tmarcel wrote:1.) Oil feed - there's an oil feed location at the rear of the block before the bell housing (top and centered if you are standing over it). It is fitted with a threaded hex/allen key plug. You can buy one that's already drilled and tapped or do it yourself. Pretty easy but even easier to buy it pre-made

2.) Oil drain - I drilled the back of the passenger side valve cover towards the bottom to keep the line at a slight downward slope.

3.) Coolant/water - I tee'd into the heater core lines coming off the fire wall. There's one flowing in and one flowing out. These are a much better match terms of line size than the TB.

The only thing I don't like about my set up is the oil drain. It DOES work but it's not perfect. To take care of the occasional leak, I bought an additional valve cover and will have an aluminum drain pipe welded in instead of the way I have it now (1/2" hose barb drilled and fixed in place with steel weld epoxy).

Other than that, all is good.

Good info, An even easier way is to get something that fits into the oil drain plug fitting.

94SS_Canada wrote:
Good info, An even easier way is to get something that fits into the oil drain plug fitting.

If you mean the "drain plug" at the bottom of the oil pan that would be impossible. Oil from the turbo flows by gravity. It must enter to the top of the oil pan or from the valve cover, which also leads back to the top of the oil pan.

^ Correct. Your oil drain needs to go back in before the oil level in you pan, other wise the foamy churned up oil will back up and your turbo will not drain properly. Journal bearing turbos really don't like this.



You drain should be as straight as possible, and hopefully go straight down for a bit before anywhere.

hmm thats news to me, heres my oil return from the turbo the guy put on 4000km on this setup with no problems

I've seen the banjo bolt - drain plug return line on a couple of newer b-bearing turbo kits but I believe those turbos do not need as much oil as the non-b-bearing models.
? on that being the reason they were able to get away with this...

I actually did the v-cover drain with a -8 hose going into the v-cover.
I'm gonna weld the drain fitting onto the v-cover when I get a chance as it is just threaded / j/b welded / siliconed on - basically a big mess.

4000km is like 2400miles - not enough time to show how well or bad something works, I can't really see how the above is working well as a drain when the fitting sits below the oil pan - which will just drain oil out of the pan.
It actually looks like its hanging low enough the get yanked off if the car bottoms out - it will really drain then.
Do you have some sort of skid plate for your car ?
If you do not you may want to change the drain or get one on the car.

94 SS,

Not sure what's up but think about this, it's a DRAIN, not a pump. Oil is drained downwards from the turbo to the pan via GRAVITY. Maybe your motor is low on oil pressure, crooked pan level to the side, or you have an external pump on it LOL (J/K)!

94 SS,

Not sure what's up but think about this, it's a DRAIN, not a pump. Oil is drained downwards from the turbo to the pan via GRAVITY. Maybe your motor is low on oil pressure, crooked pan level to the side, or you have a pump on it LOL!

hey guys thanx for all the advice now that i know where the oil feel line in my block is i can get this rolling. and teeing into the heater hoses i would of never thought of. And the gravity return oil line is perfect i got a good idea on what i am going to do. i will let you guys know how it turns out. Thanks mostly to tmarcel lot of helpful advice.

Here's a reply to a PM that I responded to earlier. After all the typing, I figured that it might help if I posted it too.


Reply -

NP man. I've done this on two different motors/two different Subarus. What I did was have -4 braided lines made. One end is terminated with a 90* fitting which goes to the block, the other end is for the turbo and uses a -4 banjo fitting. You need to use the factory Subaru banjo bolt with crush washers. The factory banjo bolt has an oil restrictor already drilled into it. If you don't have it the turbo will blow oil past the bearings in the turbo (this already happened to me).

For the oil drain, get a 5/8" hose (possibly 1/2") designed for oil (hot oil!), i.e. not heater hose or it will rupture and/or leak through. I recommend slipping a fire sleeve over it to decrease the chance of burning through as it will pass right by the up-pipe (make sure it doesn't rest against it!). You will also need to bend your power steering hoses out of the way. If they burn, through you will have a nice fire under your hood

For the valve cover, you can use a brass hose barb. One end is threaded, the other end is notched. Drill the bottom side of the cover just large enough for the threaded end to screw in. JB weld will seal it up and provide a strong base. Make sure that the fitting is fairly straight and level.

Your other option is to get an aluminum hose end and have it welded in place instead of the hose barb. This would be the best way to do it!!

I have one other note to make. I ended up making a oil drain bracket. This bracket is super simple. It attaches to one of the up-pipe studs and slopes down to basically keep the drain hose from both touching the up-pipe and also keeping it at a downward progression to keep the oil from backing up. Just bend the end in a "U" shape to cup around the hose.

You can buy the hose parts (even assembled to your specs) from ATP Turbo. There's an order form and you build it how you want it. The drain hose is sold by the foot I believe - at least two feet and a sleeve to protect it.