Could low oil pressure and/or leaking oil be the cause..?

Forewarning - my vehicle knowledge is low. Car is a 2007 GTI, stock as can be.

A couple moths ago I took my 07 VW GTI in to Victory Lane to get an oil change. About 3 weeks later my car informed me my oil pressure was low so I pulled into a Meijer parking lot to check my oil and it was bone dry. I went inside, got some oil, yada yada yada. From there I closely monitored the oil until I could really get under there to check it out.

About 2 weeks later the turbo went out in my car. I sent the car off to a personal mechanic to have it replaced and to replace the oil filter housing (we assumed the oil filter housing had been over tightened, as has happened in the past, which was causing the leak).

Once the car was done, he informed me that the leak was caused by the oil filter gasket being put in upside down at Victory Lane.

I called Victory Lane to voice my concern on the issue and had to send a ticket on their website. Today, someone from Victory Lane called me back. According to him and other higher up managers, which he assured me had 40 years of experience in the industry, they've never heard of an oil filter gasket having to be put in a certain way.

When we got off the phone I instantly called a VW dealership service department to ask about directional gaskets - he confirmed the tab on the gasket MUST be positioned in the "up" position. 3 minutes of googling after my call with him also confirmed this. I also asked him if he had any idea if this could be a cause to the turbo going bad, and he said "it's a logical explanation." Hmm.


The real question here is whether or not the upside down oil gasket and brief period of low oil pressure could be a cause for my turbo going bad. I just can't get that thought out of my head now.

Thoughts?

If this car is your daily driver, I would be checking the oil once a week. What does it take, a tissue and a minute? This whole scenario seems weird.
The turbo is oil lubricated with oil lines going to and from it so... Who diagnosed the turbo failure? Is it seized from oil starvation?
What I'm trying to wrap my head around is how your engine didn't seize before the turbo failed or why you had do be at "dry-stick" before your (low oil pressure) light came on?
The gasket that goes into the canister fits into a groove that doesn't allow one to insert it up-side down. The part where the tab is wouldn't tuck-in. Even a monkey would stare at that knowing something is wrong. (See photo). That being said, this is not the first horror story I've heard about these quick change oil places. Usually, the mistake they make is forgetting to put any oil in at all. Sorry for your mis-fortune.

Thanks for the reply.

The turbo failure diagnosis was done by me, based on what the car was doing and the code the car was throwing, and later confirmed when I got the car to my mechanic. The turbo fail happened a couple weeks after I found out my car was leaking oil. While I agree I should check my oil more often between changes, I monitored it very closely after I found out it was leaking until I could get it checked out.

The craziest thing about it all is how confident the guy I spoke with told me that him and everyone else never heard of a gasket needing to be put in a certain way. How many other VWs has this happened to by them??

I've told a couple people about this situation and everyone is pushing me toward trying to get more than a free oil change (what they offered me) out of this. Knowing the turbo is oil cooled just kinda makes me want to.

:iono:

This is absolutely the explanation for the turbo failure. Turbos are very sensitive to oil starvation and could be destroyed in seconds without lubrification. The engine itself can run several minutes without oil before seizing.

Now I am not sure it will be that easy to get them to pay for the damages, especially since it didn't fail on the spot. Another thing is that if they are so knowledgeable about oil filter gaskets, they certainly didn't put a VW approved oil.

vwengineer said:

This is absolutely the explanation for the turbo failure. Turbos are very sensitive to oil starvation and could be destroyed in seconds without lubrification. The engine itself can run several minutes without oil before seizing.

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Even though the turbo failed about 2 weeks after I drove briefly with little to no oil?

Usually when you perform an oil change you also fill the housing (with filter) with a bit of oil. It could have also been that, and your engine suffered oil starvation. Make sure when the place did the oil change that they filled the housing with the new filter with some oil, oil starvation could damage more than just the turbo. Also, the gasket sould not only be put in tab up, but tightly secured into the housing before being put back into the vehicle. Hope everything goes well!

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WolfsburgRabbit said:

Usually when you perform an oil change you also fill the housing (with filter) with a bit of oil. It could have also been that, and your engine suffered oil starvation. Make sure when the place did the oil change that they filled the housing with the new filter with some oil, oil starvation could damage more than just the turbo. Also, the gasket sould not only be put in tab up, but tightly secured into the housing before being put back into the vehicle. Hope everything goes well!

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Actually the VW dealership manual (on Elsa) does not state to do it. So not a requirement

Op are you the original owner of this GTI? How many miles does it have? Turbos do fail so it may just be a coincidence that it did a few weeks after the oil change.

vwengineer said:

Actually the VW dealership manual (on Elsa) does not state to do it. So not a requirement

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Not a requirement but it make sense to do it on cars that you can, the less time the engine has without oil pressure at startup the better.

I totally agree with you and do it also but it will not cause any problems if you don't do it

vwengineer said:

Actually the VW dealership manual (on Elsa) does not state to do it. So not a requirement

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Boom.



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