[i30died]

Hello everyone,
I own a 2007 Hyundai i30 1.6 CRDI (85kw version), and yesterday I have experienced a dangerous death of my engine. So I was cruising on a motorway, overtaking, was at 3000rpm 3rd gear, and then suddenly I start to hear a whining noise, I begin to release the gas pedal to try and hear better what it is, but then I hear a "boom" and the whining increases significantly.

I left my foot of the gas completely and turn on my hazard lights, as the engine goes completely nuts and starts to accelerate on its own, up to 6000 rpm. The pedal was not stuck. I already smelled a turbo fault, but I didnt know what to do. I tried holding the clutch, breaking, and removed the keys from the (idk whats the place where keys are while you are driving called), but on my scary surprise, the engine didnt shut down. It continued to rampage at 6000rpm, now leaving huge amounts of grey smoke behind me, making everyone on the motorway panic as they thought the car was burning. I finally stopped in a grass field using my  brakes and clutch, but the car still didnt want to shut down. The engine was making terrible noises. As I finally stopped and reached for the door handle in a hurry to escape before something explodes, the engine shutted down. I went to a mechanic and he said that the engine is dead, while the cause for what happened is not known, except that it is very likely that everything was caused by a faulty turbo. I was scared.

Can someone tell me now, what could have caused this? The car has only gone 110000km (less than 70000 miles), and I have never taken it over 3500-4000 rpm. My driving style is harsh, but it was more going fast in turns and putting pressure on tires and chassis than on the engine and accelerating. Reving is not my thing.

Also, is it possible to sue hyundai for this, legally? The dashboard showed no warning lights, and the car tried to kill me by accelerating on its own and refusing to shut down.

Any comments, questions and suggestions are welcome.

[Bogdan1986]

Sounds line diesel engine runaway to me. You can find more info here

https://www.carthrottle.com/post/9liEWT/

or do a google search. I'm not 100% sure, though.
I am sorry it scared the piss out of you and that your car's engine needs changing. That's never a cheap repair.
As for legal action against Hyundai, I have no idea what you can do... It would depend on the country you live in and its laws. I think you should have a case against them if you respected the car's service intervals and the manufacturer's recommendations for how often parts should be checked/replaced, accounting for age, not only distance traveled.
Good luck!

Sent from my G8141 using Tapatalk

[tw2005]

Same, Turbo failure, engine runawy with engine oil fuelling diesel engine until it over revs and detonates.

Youtube it, you'll see some horrible failures.

If that turbo was noisy for some time? then that can be a clue it was going.

[Dazzler]

Welcome i30died,

The others have pretty much summed it up. Like them I feel a lot of empathy for your situation. That would have been terrifying and nobody wants the cost of a new turbo at that mileage, let alone a new motor.

Your best bet is to try and source a second hand complete motor with some warranty.

Turbo failure combined with diesel runaway appears to be a very rare occurrence with Hyundai turbo diesels so I would be surprised if you could sue them for poor design or some such thing.

I guess a turbo failure at highway speeds can trigger all sorts of things at times.

We will follow your situation with interest in the hope you can sort something without too much of a financial hit. Glad you survived unscathed physically. In some ways were were also lucky that pulling up on a grassy area you did not start a fire which you probably would have done in Australia. 

[i30died]

Hello people and thank you for answering.

I managed to calm down now and I found a solution. I will be replacing the engine with a used one which has also gone 100k km, for a solid price of 2000€ (which is not bad I guess).
I guess my mistake was ignoring the noise coming from the turbo for about a minute before it occured. I thought it was AC noise that I am hearing, and it wasn't loud at all, but it was too late when I realized its something else, and then it started getting really loud.

About the Legal process, I am not sure, I have just heard from the mechanic that this happens rarely, but when it does, some people take legal actions and usually win in court. I've googled a bit and found that the 1.6 CRDi engine has a DPF which should have prevented this from happening, so I at least want to know how it got past all layers of protection that the manufacturer used to prevent things such as this    No warning lights got me a bit surprised, but it's like I needed a huge red warning light, it was quite obvious that something wrong was going on. Just wished I had it before-

[Dazzler]

Thanks for the update. Is 2000 Euro fitted? 

[tw2005]

Hello people and thank you for answering.

I managed to calm down now and I found a solution. I will be replacing the engine with a used one which has also gone 100k km, for a solid price of 2000€ (which is not bad I guess).
I guess my mistake was ignoring the noise coming from the turbo for about a minute before it occured. I thought it was AC noise that I am hearing, and it wasn't loud at all, but it was too late when I realized its something else, and then it started getting really loud.

About the Legal process, I am not sure, I have just heard from the mechanic that this happens rarely, but when it does, some people take legal actions and usually win in court. I've googled a bit and found that the 1.6 CRDi engine has a DPF which should have prevented this from happening, so I at least want to know how it got past all layers of protection that the manufacturer used to prevent things such as this    No warning lights got me a bit surprised, but it's like I needed a huge red warning light, it was quite obvious that something wrong was going on. Just wished I had it before-

Don't know enough about it but if it was catastrophic failure hard to expect anyone to analyse and react knowing what was about to happen even the experienced.

I'm currently driving a high mileage unit which did a turbo but very lucky the guy that had it it kept going but I'm fairly confident if he went much further he would had run out of oil or had a runaway.

It lives on as I had a spare Turbo with nil damage.

is that 2000 Euro? Wow, that's a lot compared to here but they prove to be so reliable selling a used motor is difficult, possibly anywhere between $500 and $1500 AUD

Don't know about the safety systems to prevent it but if the engine fuels from a source outside what ids managed I.e. engine / sump then no computer can stop it fro runaway I believe. I could be wrong .

Sure the ECU can go to limp, cut fuel, cut injectors etc but if it's sucking in engine oil compressing and running as a diesel does then it continues until that is exhausted  and seizes or since there is no engine management in effect it's free to run to detonation speeds

BEST DIESEL RUNAWAY ENGINE 2017 COMPILATION - YouTube

[Dazzler]

Jeepers! That video is enough to put you off Diesels for life! 

[tw2005]

Jeepers! That video is enough to put you off Diesels for life! 

Nah, no way . Don't you keep a spare powertrain in the garage?



How to Stop a Run-away Diesel -ENGINE BLOWS ! - YouTube

[Dazzler]

Cheers, I'll watch that later... Nice spare by the way. I don't even have a full size spare TYRE!

[tw2005]

Cheers, I'll watch that later... Nice spare by the way. I don't even have a full size spare TYRE!

That's cos you got luxury model full of gadgets, have to save space and weight elsewhere

actually the spare is a ring in, that's the low K unit fitted but the "Spare" is just as clean, missing a turbo, now WTF did I do with that

[i30died]

Yeah, the engine + fit in is 2000e.
Anyways, wanted to say that I was satisfied with the car while I had it, it worked well and the engine working as it should. Now I am probably gonna sell this car after the engine replacement and buy a Honda civic, they just seem a little bit more reliable to me, and definitely more fun

[noels_hobby]

  didn't think it could happen with modern diesels ty for the heads up