So I recently bought a 2000 GU ZD30 manual. Absolutely love it.

However....I went to head out to Mt Disappointment last weekend, and I made it to about 20 mins on freeway when the engine lost power, and started blowing blue smoke. The amount of smoke was ridiculous - looked like a I had a bushfire attached to my towbar.

Anyway, a combination of limping it up some of the steeper hills, and getting a tow from a 2.4D Hilux had me home. Spoke to a friend who is a diesel mechanic, and he said it sounds exactly like a blown turbo. Started pulling off all of the turbo pipes, intercooler etc, and everything is soaked in oil. Oil around the exhaust at the back of the car too.

I drained the oil today, and was fearful of seeing small bits of piston 3 and 4, but everything is perfectly clean, no signs of any metal at all on the sump plug, so I have some renewed hope that it's just a turbo, and not the engine itself.

My question is, is there any point even trying to rebuild the turbos with new gasket and bearing kits, or are they just a dispose and replace job? What seals are most likely to go bang that will cause oil to go through teh intake?

I haven't managed to get the thing out yet (after pulling off all of the heater hoses, I realised that I should be able to get it off after taking off the actuator on the front, which will allow me to slide the heat shield forwards....hopefully..

One last thing... I also noticed that I now have oil on the drivers side of the engine, towards the front. There definitely weren't any oil leaks there before this, but I can't really see where it's coming from. Not sure if this is coincidence, if I've just managed to leak oil all over the engine as I was taking parts off (I don't think so), if it's symptomatic of a greater problem, or lastly, if the oil in the inlet has caused another seal or gasket to fail (head gasket overpressured and blew from oil in the cylinder??)