^ There's no good way to accurately predict or tell when it's about to go, but it will happen sooner or later so you might as well just replace it, especially if you're planning on modding.
Quote:
Originally Posted by XutvJet
My M235 has 25k miles and is 2.5 years old. The charge pipe hasn't broken. I did take a 3.5" hose clamp and put it just under the charge pipe clip. Between the hose clamp is an approximate 1/2" wide by 1/8" thick rubber seal to keep the clamp from creating direct pressure points on the rigid portion of the charge pipe.
I've been running this for about 6 months now. It's an experiment. I'm hopeful the clamp would help reinforce the charge pipe rigid plastic lip as I believe the lateral movements of the motor teamed with high underhood heat is what ends up breaking the pipe's plastic lip. The clamp may help take the load off.
I don't believe boost is the real problem, but rather the constant movement and lots of heat cycling. Lots of people say a high load, high boost situation is when the pipe breaks thus the belief it's the boost that breaks it. I think what happens is the pipe cracks and stays on for a while and then a heavy boost situation hits and the pipe breaks fully and pops off.
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Is your car tuned? There are plenty of cars at your mileage and year mark on stock tune and piping so flashing a tune for your experiment would be better served, if not already, I'd think. I do like the thought process behind it, though.
That said, I'm also inclined to believe that the culprit is movement and heat cycle related. I don't know about a crack developing and staying like that until it finally lets go, but I can certainly see the material being weakened over time before bursting one day due to the stress. I recall my CP let go right upon upshifting when there's inherent movement and less boost.