It's been a while since I've posted and I have searched and even found somewhat of an answer to what i was going to try and do but my situation is a bit different.

My turbo popped a freeze plug one winter while sitting at a friends house. Its a 16g (water was left in the car from the turbo to oil cooler due to a noob mistake thinking that by removing the lower radiator hose all the water would drain out).

I replaced the head gasket, then the oil cooler, which was the real problem for sure.

Now it leaks coolant into the oil still and the only thing i haven't replaced is the turbo.

I have read a thread on here where people run their turbos without hooking up the water lines for one reason or another, they just leave the water lines disconnected on the turbo and run a turbo timer or just let it idle for a few mins before shutting the car off.

My first question is does this sound like something that can be rebuilt or internal metal cracked leaking the 2 fluids together that way and so the turbo is trash? Can I use another turbo like a junk 14b and swap parts from my turbo to it and make a good one? (I've never taken a turbo apart or even rebuilt one)

Second is, If I plug the coolant lines to the engine and plug the coolant lines on the turbo to catch any leaking oil, would that be about the same as running it with no coolant lines connected? It's possible that some coolant also was leaking into the exhaust system which would totally make it pointless to do any of this, but I don't know for sure yet and figured i'd see what you guys think.

I'm still a probationary member so i couldn't post this question anywhere else or i would have. I know u guys are pretty straight forward and brutally honest with replies sometimes but I'm hoping you will take it easy one me here.

Thanks again for any and all replies. Sorry for such a long thread too.

Ben