Valve/Fuel Injector Cleaning

[Brett Dikeman]

At 2:14 PM -0500 11/13/01, Frederick Kuhne wrote:

>What is everyone's opinion on fuel injector cleaners?  Is the stuff you
>dump in your tank any good?  Any brand recommended over another?  Is it
>worth it to get the cleaning that auto repair shops sell and charge you
>$100 for?

The servicing(I forget the machine name...Motojet?) controls the
injection of a strong deposit remover while the engine is running.
It is good for removing intense carbon buildup.  A demonstration was
given for the local NE region PCA club using, of all things, a very
old 4000 that belonged to a club member, and everyone was impressed
with the results which were apparent simply by driving the car
afterwards.

There's also Mopar Combustion Chamber cleaner.  It removed huge
chunks of carbon from the combustion chamber on my 200q20v.  I soaked
each cylinder with the stuff for hours, then cranked it with the
spark plugs out and a rag folded over on top of each plug hole(20v's,
its hard to do the process, because the fluid can't splash out of
those deep spark plug holes; 10v's are far easier to treat)

The fluid that splashed up along the sides of the plug holes and hit
the rag was FULL of little clumps of carbon buildup.  I was blown
away.

Search around on the 'net for a good hour or two and read up on how
to use the stuff before you go and buy some and dump it in.  Among
other things, you'll generate enormous amounts of white smoke, and
the cleaner(when injected with the engine running, as is suggested
for an initial treatment), makes the engine run VERY rich and could
cause your catalytic converters to go AWOL(probably one of the
reasons the can says to do it with the engine warm to the touch, NOT
hot.)

   Changing the oil is a must after treatment, a good deal of fluid
seeps down into the crank when you fill each cylinder with the fluid.

Oh...one final note.  If you can rotate the crank so that you can get
each piston to TDC let it soak, move the engine to the next piston's
TDC, spray the stuff in, let it soak etc, you'll hit the top of the
combustion chamber, and not just the piston head.  I just used a long
screwdriver to figure out which piston was closest to TDC, treated
that one, then turned the engine over with the starter, tested again,
etc.

Lastly, you'll probably trash the spark plugs in the engine.  Have a
new set handy.

Some folks let the stuff sit overnight; I found that a few hours was
more than enough to free up quite a bit of garbage.  YMMV.

B

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