It was only part of the problem. What happens to most Saab’s that smoke like this is the turbo is shot, but the root cause is that the engine was neglected ether the wrong type of oil was used or never changed. If you own one of these 2.0 or 2.3 HOT (high output turbo) motors and it starts smoking get your tool belt on and check under the valve cover for a sledged motor. Saab sledge easy because of the high heat caused by the turbo and the convertor setting right next to the oil pan and then someone puts in the wrong oil. So, here is the results, motor sledges lack of oil to turbo, turbo fails, turbo bearing leaks oil (lots of it) into the head, head gasket blows now coolant and oil really smoke! Everything’s still fixable so far. But, if it spins the lower mains (you now have a ticking motor) because of lack of oil it’s time to go shopping for a new engine $2500 - $2800. Or sell the car for $500 to someone like me who loves Saabs. I now have 2 of them both had the same problem.
did repairing the turbo actually solve the white smoke issue?
It was only part of the problem. What happens to most Saab’s that smoke like this is the turbo is shot, but the root cause is that the engine was neglected ether the wrong type of oil was used or never changed.
If you own one of these 2.0 or 2.3 HOT (high output turbo) motors and it starts smoking get your tool belt on and check under the valve cover for a sledged motor.
Saab sledge easy because of the high heat caused by the turbo and the convertor setting right next to the oil pan and then someone puts in the wrong oil.
So, here is the results, motor sledges lack of oil to turbo, turbo fails, turbo bearing leaks oil (lots of it) into the head, head gasket blows now coolant and oil really smoke!
Everything’s still fixable so far.
But, if it spins the lower mains (you now have a ticking motor) because of lack of oil it’s time to go shopping for a new engine $2500 - $2800. Or sell the car for $500 to someone like me who loves Saabs. I now have 2 of them both had the same problem.
What was the end result of your endeavours? I would assume that changing the turbo would still not fix the poor compression on one of the cylinders...
Sold the car, but it was the turbo causing all the issues. not a hard fix once we learned about Saab's.