remove carbon deposits

[towjoe]

Just curious..............................
Has anyone used anything to remove carbon deposits ??    Tops of pistons, valves, and combustion cambers.
This is without removing the head.
Regards
towjoe ::)

[94touring]

Sea foam.  I've used it in my fuel and also used it on blocks with the head off to clean up very old engines that have sat around. 

[MiniDave]

The best thing I've found to do that over the long years is water! As in, when the engine blows a head gasket the water intrusion will leave that cylinder clean as can be.......so if you would find a way to inject small quantities of water as you drive, especially driving the engine hard, like up a hill or at 70 mph on the highway it will clean it right out.

As for chemicals that you add to the fuel supply, I've never found anything that really worked - and don't use Seafoam, all that stuff does is kill mosquitos for a few miles in every direction. I'm speaking of using it the fuel system as an additive.....

[DS1980]

I think Dave and Dan should fight. Winner gets to put Seafoam in the others gas tank.

[94touring]

I'll just keep using it. If nothing else I can kill some mosquitoes.

[94touring]

I'll add for the most effective cleansing additive, a 50/50 mix of distilled water and methanol will do the trick.  Highly unlikely any mini guys are doing that  45.gif

[DS1980]

It has amazing reviews. Some use a spray bottle to minimize hydro lock. Makes sense with any liquid.

[DS1980]

Try it Joe. If you blow a head gasket it sounds like you'll get em clean anyway.

[MiniDave]

A lot of MINI guys run meth/water.....  ;D

[BruceK]

I thought for sure someone was going to mention doing an "Italian Tuneup" as the solution.   :)

[John Gervais]

I've used distilled water before, works great and thanks for reminding me that I need to do it again.

I filled a soft/flexible bottle and ran a tube from the bottle to the carb elbow, wedged through the air-filter tube-nut hole and gave it short bursts when running on the highway.

[Armycook]

I must admit i've squirted little amounts of sea foam inside the cylinders while spark plug was out. my engine was running very rich and after correcting it the dieseling won't go away and i got impatient. i let it sit a whole day then used a wet dry vac with a small home made fuel line attachment and sucked all the crap out. Not sure if that's too harsh but it worked hehe :)

[Richard1]

In the old days I used water, drippling it into the carb. but you have to be very careful. Now I just use a bottle of Techron in the tank, and that keeps the fuel system clean too.

[Armycook]

I heard you have to pour Techron on a nearly empty tank then fill with fuel to get the full effectiveness of the solution. Is this true?

[Richard1]

I heard you have to pour Techron on a nearly empty tank then fill with fuel to get the full effectiveness of the solution. Is this true?

It depends. In the US, Chevron sells two versions of the product, one more diluted to use every 1000 miles, and a stronger solution to use every 3000 miles. Of course they also have a weaker blend in their gasoline. I usually end up buying it for mi kid's cars when I visit and see how bad they run. When it is really bad, I use a bottle per half tank and they one in the next full tank.

I don't remember if they have a minimum amount listed. I buy drums of the actual concentrate from them and dilute it for my own product, according to their technician's recommendations for a super strength (probably a little stronger than their 3000 mile version) because our gasoline, at 85 RON and with 50 ml of gum allowed en each liter. I recommend one bottle of my formulation for 30 to 70 liters.  My 30 liter minimum is based on the maximum their technician recommended for my formulation.

[John Gervais]

I tried to decarbonize by water today, without much success.  I couldn't find my previous bottle setup, so I found a parking lot and turned the idle up to 3K and gave the engine short-shots of distilled water from a tapered-spout tip plastic bottle directly into the carb elbow.

When the engine rpms dropped a bit, I'd stop for 10-15 seconds and let the engine recover, then repeat again and again.  I never saw any carbon chunks or even any water droplets/steam exit the tailpipe, even after I'd 'fed' around 8 ounces of water through the carb.

After a while, I pulled a spark plug to see if the water had cleaned 'something' - I'd expected the plug to have been cleaned, but it looked the same afterwards as before.  The pistons also looked just as crusty/crappy as ever.

I then trundled over to the store and bought a bottle of BellAdd ServiceRens 1B+ (https://www.belladd.dk/da/produkter/bell-add/servicerens/servicerens-1b-1-12-detail.html) which hopefully won't do too much harm - they didn't have the ServiceRens 1B (https://www.belladd.dk/da/produkter/bell-add/servicerens/servicerens-1b-detail.html).  It's developed for something called 'direct injection' engines - I don't really know what they are, but since many local auto dealerships (Toyota, Volkswagen, Porsche etc. ) carry this company's products, I figured that it can't be all bad.  I added a tad less than ½ of the bottle to the 3/4ths filled fuel tank. 

On my test drive, one thing I did notice is that the engine runs quieter, lacks a bit of power and the center tunnel is wicked hot when driving on the highway at 60-70 mph.  The coolant temperature also climbed from the normal 84C to around 90C.  I hope it's at least cleaning my valves.  Upon returning to the garage, I pulled the plugs and looked down at the piston tops - they're just as crusty as before and the spark plugs look slightly darker than normal.

I wonder what this stuff does to the fuel's octane rating.

[MiniDave]

It takes a lot longer than that for water to do the trick, also it helps to have the engine under load and the hotter the better (but not overheating - just thoroughly warmed up)

Direct injection engines are exactly what it sounds like, instead of injecting fuel into the port before the valve, it's injected directly into the cylinder - much like a diesel engine. Very common today as they're more fuel efficient and make more power out of small displacements. I think Mitsubishi was the first modern car maker to adopt it.... although Mercedes used it in the 50's in the 300SL cars.

[John Gervais]

So, do you reckon that filling the windshield washer bottle with distilled water, blasting down the highway and giving short intermittent 'shots' might do the trick?

How have you done it, or, would you do it?

[MiniDave]

I think it needs to be more of a steady fine mist sort of thing. I found it the hard way, when an engine I tore down that had a blown headgasket into one cylinder and that cylinder was spotlessly clean!

[John Gervais]

I think I'll try to rig something up - blowing a head gasket just to clean the combustion chamber and remove carbon deposits seems a bit extreme.

[94touring]

So my h20 kit on my rx7 sprays a very fine mist, but with a pump providing a lot of pressure.  I'm also spraying progressively a total of 800cc's of fluid, 400 water and 400 methanol at full boost.  That all being said, if you can find a nozzle that does 100-200cc's and mount it so when you're out ripping on the car, you may be able to clean your engine out.  At some point when I clear out the shop of projects and slap on a turbo to the mini I'm going to add water/meth as well. The cleaning side affect is just one small perk to the system.

[Richard1]

You won't see particles coming out of the exhaust, since the muffler is normally y perforated tube that ends in the body, and another tube that exits. They are not connected. Anything heavier than air will drop out.

[John Gervais]

Cool - thanks!

[tsumini]

I used to pour windshield washer fluid into the intake of my old '77 Dodge van (318 V8 IIRC).

[MiniDave]

I think the best thing to do to remove carbon deposits - outside of running good gasoline - is to get the car out for a good long highway run at as much speed as the law allows. Not just a quick blast across town, I mean a 3-4 hour run. THAT will clean it up just fine.....