boost leak symptoms?

[ca18det240hatch]

do these sound like symptoms of a boost leak to you guys?

1- mileage TERRIBLE, 200k to a full tank, just changed to adjustable FPR set at 37 psi, still no better mileage.

2- sluggish performance. The engine does not feel like it did before the rebuild, slower. Not SLOW by any means, just slower....

3- hesitating a bit below 3k rpm

4- have walbro 255, adjustable fpr, STOCK INJECTORS, stock ca18det maf, basically stock everything. The only thing that changed is that im running an sr t25 instead of ca t25. Still running side mount. timing is set to 14degrees, idles awesome with about +12 correction on safc.

5- coming to a stop at a light or whatever, it idles at 1300-1500 for about 2 seconds and then comes back down to 900 rpm. somebody told me thats a symptom of a boost leak.....

any ideas? getting desperate.

im sick of it being slow, dont know what else to check, ppl tell me its a boost leak.

[Ca_Silvia]

How much vaccum are you pulling at idle?

[driftin8ez]

A low vacuum reading will only be a sign of a leak after the throttle body. If you have leak in the suction pipe or intercooler piping your vacuum will read normal. Also a leak will in thery raise your idle.

[Liquid_Neon]

you know, I think I've been getting very similar results. My boost gauge read16-18in of vacuum at idle, and seems to peak out around 5psi boost this last week or two. Plus, i think it is making a noise very faintly (the turbo when boosting?) I think I'm having an exhaust leak too, where the turbo bolts to the mani... it always seems to give me grief there!

Off topic and not to thread jack... but would running my old CA wastegate actuator on my SR20 T25 be a problem?

[ca18det240hatch]

one more thing i notice, and it may be because of my boost controller, but im pretty sure not.

i am running a turbosmart dual stage manual boost controller.

i notice i get ALOT of spike

if i want to run nine, its gonna spike to 12

if i wanna run 10 psi, its gonna spike to nearly 15, sometimes itll spike to 15 and drop to 9 psi....what could that be? Bad wastegate actuator?