There will always be "the factory did it right" people and they will never except that anyone else can do it differant and have it work well.

That said I did document my build on this forum so anyone who wants to look into building a 616 turbo can see what I have done. I have also posted hill climb data pre turbo and post turbo. As well as compared it to a stock 300 turbo. So the numbers speak for themselves.

As far as long life, think this is more function of how it is driven. Drive it like a mad man and life will be shorter. Let the egts get to high, melt pistons. Watch egts and let the engine live. Before adding a turbo I saw egts go way up 1400 or so for short amounts of time, that is really pushing it. Kind of surprised no meltdowns happened. With turbo, 1000 is about as high as it goes.

I did not want a 617 because of the added wieght. Handling just suffers too much, as I like to have some fun in the mountains with it, and a 300d is more of a highway cruiser, so the better balance of a 240 gives much better handling. I have both so have a real comparision.

I am not saying this is for everyone but it does have it's place and can work very well.

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1977 240D turbo