# Scary X-Trail Experience



## ian.ross (Mar 22, 2009)

Hi guys / girls,
I’d like your advice after a particularly scary experience with my 2.2DCi X-Trail (2005 95k miles). A bit of background first, the car has been making a bit of a wheezing noise for a few months which I intended to get looked at soon!! I also noticed that there was a spluttering of oil on the engine, which had previously been very clean and that the exhaust fumes were a little blacker than I remembered.
Anyway, we were driving back home (towing a caravan) yesterday and the car started to make some bad screeching noise so I pulled in at the next motorway exit, had a look and did not see anything untoward, revved the engine and the noise disappeared. Foolishly, it now transpires, I decided to continue the journey and I’d only travelled two miles when the exhaust seemed to be excessively smoking. I just made it to an exit, when it started getting really bad and I had to abandon the car, as all power had gone, the smoke was getting worse and the engine started to rev excessively. I turned the ignition off and got out but the engine was still revving at, at least 5k revs, it could have been more, but it was like an of load rev, if that makes sense.
At a safe distance I called the fire brigade as the smoke from the exhaust was covering the motorway and it looked to me as if the car would set fire! After 2 or 3 minutes there was a loud “pop” and the revs stopped and coolant started appearing on the road. When the fire brigade arrived the car was no longer smoking and on inspection of the engine compartment, the only damage visible is that the top of the radiator had exploded.
So, I’d like to ask your guidance. Looking at the forum I would guess that the intercooler could be the cause of the initial oil problem, could the turbo be the cause of the revs problem and is it likely that there will be engine damage with what has happened? I’m going to have send it to a Nissan dealership which will be big bucks I’m sure, but what if I (local garage) just changed the radiator, intercooler and turbo, would you think that that would fix things? 
There’s an engine with Turbo and intercooler on eBay at the minute and although not cheap at £1.75k it sounds a viable option to me, but would there be any issue with the car’s ECU?

Any advice is very much appreciated.

Regards

Ian


----------



## The Mad Hat Man (Oct 3, 2006)

Sounds like you have had Turbo runaway, where it has been running on the engines own oil - until it ran out of oil.
I wud think there is major engine damage, so be prepared for the worst .


----------



## ian.ross (Mar 22, 2009)

Cheers for that, I think 
In your view could the engine be repaired or is it likley kapput, im just after an idea before i take it 2 nissan.
Cheers

Ian


----------



## The Mad Hat Man (Oct 3, 2006)

As a minimum its a complete engine strip down and rebuild - I certainly trust an engine that has revved its guts out till it went pop. I tip for anyone else that suffers this - stall the engine by foot on the brakes and drop the clutch in a high gear.


----------

