Originally Posted by 
mtthsk
				 
			Hi Scott,
thanks for your reply. I just ordered the top intercooler hose. You're right, it's relatively cheap and very easy to replace, so might be worth trying. Maybe the smoke testing doesn't put enough pressure in the system to show a tear. 
Last weekend I drove ~600 km to another city and back. I noticed that the restricted performance does not necessarily relate solely to the second turbo kicking in at 2500 rpms. It's more load-related than solely that. When driving on the autobahn and overtaking at ~130 km/h the fault regularly showed up, when staying below 120 km/h and not on an uphill section the fault would not occur.
Before the drive back home I inspected the throttle body butterfly valve again, as it was sticking a bit. I noticed again that there was a little bit of space on the left hand-side and no space on the right-hand side of the valve, meaning it has shifted a bit and would therefore stick when fully closed. I managed to gently push the valve back to its original position, so the valve does not stick anymore. I kind of had high hopes in this fix, as I have seen this problem quite a few times on Youtube, but unfortunately it had no effect.
Thanks again for your help @ all.
The one thing I could not check, is the secondary turbo actuator rod. Can someone guide me where to gain access to that part, trying to free it with a coat hangar or similar? Most posts only tell how to do it on the 2.7L, but not on the 3.0L MY14.
Cheers,
Matt