Xjyuk

My car is a VW Golf 5 1.9 TDI (77 kw), year 2005.

Problem: Turbo hose broke

Yesterday while driving on the highway with a speed of around 130-140 km/h I noticed a sound from the engine which was clearly indicating that something was detached or broke and I immediately pulled over to see what is happening.

Note that I’m a noob in mechanics and I called for an advice from some friends which are more experienced and the first thing they wanted me to test is will the car drive. I started it and it was driving but the thing that I immediately realized was that it does not have the same power as before and there was this loud noise coming somewhere from the engine.

I turned it off and I called my friends to get a mechanic and to come see the car right on spot, I did not want to drive it. After the mechanic took a look he established that the hose that is connected to the turbo was broke and the noise was coming from the turbine in the turbo.
He decided that it is okay to drive the car from there to home (which is around 55 km) and on the way home as expected the car would not have the normal power. I asked him how fast should I drive and he said that there is no problem with how fast we are going and because it was on the highway I was going with a speed of around 100 km/h (120 if it was downhill) it would not go faster.

Oil draining out

During the journey towards home the car was outputting visible gray/black smoke a lot which up until that point was definitely not the case.

After a few hours I decided to check the oil (obviously it had time to settle) and it was below the minimum.

The oil indicator did not go on that it is below the minimum and even today it is still not indicating that it is below the minimum. Before driving it towards home the mechanic checked the level and it was okay (the car was not working for 1 hour before he did that, it probably had time to settle).

Note that I didn’t had any issues with my car consuming oil. The last oil change that I did was 1500 - 1700 km before this happened and I was constantly monitoring it and it stayed at the original level all the time.

Oil level after oil change

Current oil level

Questions

1. Should I add oil so that it has enough and drive it to the workshop of the mechanic? It is around 15 km from my location.


2. I guess it is not safe to drive anymore with the current level of the oil, right?


3. Is it better to just add oil or completely replace it under the current circumstances?

Don’t drive it, until you have topped up the oil. Then you can get repair it or take it to a mechanic to fit a new pipe.

Once those repairs are complete check what is causing the high oil consupmtion - it may just be due to the broken air pipe...

Not sure how much damage you have done - it may already be terminal - if not, then you have reduced the life of the engine...

I don't know enough about turbos to speculate on why this might make the engine burn oil (which yours did). The decision to drive it back home was likely fine. At worst, you've taken a bit off the engine's life, from running it with low oil. It would've been better if you could have kept the engine oil above the minimum (adding oil during the drive), and you definitely need to keep it above that starting now, but I wouldn't expect the fix to be too hard overall.

Take the car to a mechanic (after filling your oil, and maybe checking the oil along the drive to make sure it stays high enough), and have them fix the problem with your turbo. Afterword, keep an eye on your oil level. Hopefully you won't be burning oil anymore, and the oil level will stay good. If not, you'll have to separately diagnose the oil leak problem.