Why seafoam and methanol won't clean caked on carbon build up
#1
Why seafoam and methanol won't clean caked on carbon build up
WOW. I had no idea my car had the power it does! Losing power slowly over time has caused me to not realize how much I had actually lost! When I started realizing that WOT pulls through gears wouldn't yield 1-2 or 2-3 chirps like I used to, and that my torque steer was gone, I figured it had something to do with tires... well, tonight, all that power is back. Haven't been pushed back into my seat like this since (who knows how long). Maybe never, since I've added more go fast parts since my initial tune.
What am I talking about? I realized that methanol was doing absolutely nothing to break up any carbon build up. In fact, soaking it in carb cleaner for 30 minutes yielded not much progress. It really relied on scraping and brushing with metal brushes/picks. Also, I knew I would be finding some build up when pulling the manifold today, but not like this:
One valve in Cyl 1 was the worst. I only had toothbrush style horiztonal bristles for my brass/steel brushes, and my nylon ones were the pipe cleaner like bristles. I wish I had those in metal, as cleaning the intake valve was the hardest, and the nylon brushes did not do much good. I ended up using a thin long flathead to lightly scrape the backsides of the intake valves and did my best. Resoaked them in carb cleaner again and did a final dry and spray.
Before:
After some scraping/soaking:
Finished. but could have done better with better tools. But I followed the 80/20 rule.. basically getting the last bits would only yield a small insignificant benefit compared to everything else thats been removed.
Example of some of the chunks coming off I was able to pick out, huge chunks would come flying out with intermittent air compressor blowing.
What am I talking about? I realized that methanol was doing absolutely nothing to break up any carbon build up. In fact, soaking it in carb cleaner for 30 minutes yielded not much progress. It really relied on scraping and brushing with metal brushes/picks. Also, I knew I would be finding some build up when pulling the manifold today, but not like this:
One valve in Cyl 1 was the worst. I only had toothbrush style horiztonal bristles for my brass/steel brushes, and my nylon ones were the pipe cleaner like bristles. I wish I had those in metal, as cleaning the intake valve was the hardest, and the nylon brushes did not do much good. I ended up using a thin long flathead to lightly scrape the backsides of the intake valves and did my best. Resoaked them in carb cleaner again and did a final dry and spray.
Before:
After some scraping/soaking:
Finished. but could have done better with better tools. But I followed the 80/20 rule.. basically getting the last bits would only yield a small insignificant benefit compared to everything else thats been removed.
Example of some of the chunks coming off I was able to pick out, huge chunks would come flying out with intermittent air compressor blowing.
#2
wow that looked terrible but looks like you did an amazing job cleaning it up. how many miles were on your car when you performed this and what were your driving habits like?
Lastly is there a write-up you followed to remove the intake manifold? is it easy to remove or will it take a long time (2+ hrs to remove).
Thanks for the photos.
Lastly is there a write-up you followed to remove the intake manifold? is it easy to remove or will it take a long time (2+ hrs to remove).
Thanks for the photos.
#5
https://www.northamericanmotoring.co...ml#post3141289
Last edited by fishbert; 04-25-2012 at 01:56 PM.
#7
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Besides my Cyl 1 which was AWFUL, they don't look too much better than my Cyl 2-3 before I cleaned them. Also, this is a good comparison to show how much better a media blasting cleaning can be much more effective than manual scraping. Its evident I still have lots of carbon left on the valves, though compared to before, its magnitudes better.
No catch can, no PCV block, 70k miles. '08 S. Methanol for the last 10k miles.
Driving habits- No short drives, ever. Always let the car warm up to temp before getting into boost. During every drive, after it warms up to temp (I account for oil as well as water temp), I roll out the Revs at least once during the drive (WOT). So, imo, its the best scenario for clearing any deposits, but, again, this applies only so much to a DI car.
The problem with this myth that w/m will clean your valves is... w/m only sprays (for a short amount of time) when you are heavily on the throttle (depending on your injector duty cycle/boost setting for pump activation), which, isn't when you have the most oil blow by. The rest of the time, driving normally/cruising, and during warm up, there is no w/m to clean the valves.
The oil blow by occurs heavily when the car is cold, and the EGR is active (emissions control bs). Add it to oil thats not up to temp, doesn't flow well.
OCC and PCV block off are going in.
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#8
#9
#10
I roll out the Revs at least once during the drive (WOT). So, imo, its the best scenario for clearing any deposits, but, again, this applies only so much to a DI car.
The problem with this myth that w/m will clean your valves is... w/m only sprays (for a short amount of time) when you are heavily on the throttle (depending on your injector duty cycle/boost setting for pump activation), which, isn't when you have the most oil blow by.
The oil blow by occurs heavily when the car is cold, and the EGR is active (emissions control bs). Add it to oil thats not up to temp, doesn't flow well.
The problem with this myth that w/m will clean your valves is... w/m only sprays (for a short amount of time) when you are heavily on the throttle (depending on your injector duty cycle/boost setting for pump activation), which, isn't when you have the most oil blow by.
The oil blow by occurs heavily when the car is cold, and the EGR is active (emissions control bs). Add it to oil thats not up to temp, doesn't flow well.
And blow-by gasses are pushed into your crank case every time a piston's combustion chamber is ignited; i.e., you get more blow-by with higher revs, it's not so much related to temperature.
An OCC is required if you block the PCV hose, but blocking the PCV hose is not required for having an OCC.
#12
I want to do this with my new JCW, but fear of the warranty has me thinking otherwise. But then this thread pretty much shows it is a pay me now, pay me later situation.
#13
#14
While the Prince engine doesn't have EGR specifically, it does have cam phasing control over the intake valves (N14 VANOS) or intake+exhaust valves (N18 VANOS) that allows for valve overlap and exhaust reversion into the intake tract.
You will see that the worst of the deposits are right at the bottom of the intake runners, where they are hottest (but not hot enough to make carbon from oil). If it was oil causing this, it would be depositing at the colder areas (throttle body, intake manifold, etc.) not hotter areas (where the oil would flow more easily). Let's say there is 5-10% EGR "reversion" flow - guess what, that's the first 1-2" of the intake runner where most of the deposits are.
Since the EGR functionality also happens when any Water/Meth injection would be inactive (low, cruising load), the deposits happen and can't be controlled. In a normal motor, fuel would be cleaning this area all the time (as has been said many times).
That's my theory as to why its so bad on this engine. Other factors (blow-by, etc.) will pay a roll, but we may be barking up the wrong tree for much of this problem.
-Charlie
PS. This means that there could conceivably be an ECU re-flash that reduces the carbon build-up - but it would come at the expense of reduced gas mileage and increased emissions.
#16
#17
You could go the Toyota/Lexus route and do dual injection (direct+port)...
-Charlie
#18
The only meth injection I know of is from watching episodes of "Breaking Bad" and I highly suspect that type of meth is different.
#19
You someone explain to me what water / meth injection is, how it works, where I can buy one for the mini, how much it costs to install and run? I would be very interested but I honestly don't have a clue about it.
The only meth injection I know of is from watching episodes of "Breaking Bad" and I highly suspect that type of meth is different.
The only meth injection I know of is from watching episodes of "Breaking Bad" and I highly suspect that type of meth is different.
-Charlie
#20
Check out http://howertonengineering.net/
Their Aquamist systems are the water/meth systems of choice.
Their Aquamist systems are the water/meth systems of choice.
#21
EGR is the thing most people are forgetting in this whole mess...
While the Prince engine doesn't have EGR specifically, it does have cam phasing control over the intake valves (N14 VANOS) or intake+exhaust valves (N18 VANOS) that allows for valve overlap and exhaust reversion into the intake tract.
You will see that the worst of the deposits are right at the bottom of the intake runners, where they are hottest (but not hot enough to make carbon from oil). If it was oil causing this, it would be depositing at the colder areas (throttle body, intake manifold, etc.) not hotter areas (where the oil would flow more easily).
That's my theory as to why its so bad on this engine. Other factors (blow-by, etc.) will pay a roll, but we may be barking up the wrong tree for much of this problem.
-Charlie
PS. This means that there could conceivably be an ECU re-flash that reduces the carbon build-up - but it would come at the expense of reduced gas mileage and increased emissions.
While the Prince engine doesn't have EGR specifically, it does have cam phasing control over the intake valves (N14 VANOS) or intake+exhaust valves (N18 VANOS) that allows for valve overlap and exhaust reversion into the intake tract.
You will see that the worst of the deposits are right at the bottom of the intake runners, where they are hottest (but not hot enough to make carbon from oil). If it was oil causing this, it would be depositing at the colder areas (throttle body, intake manifold, etc.) not hotter areas (where the oil would flow more easily).
That's my theory as to why its so bad on this engine. Other factors (blow-by, etc.) will pay a roll, but we may be barking up the wrong tree for much of this problem.
-Charlie
PS. This means that there could conceivably be an ECU re-flash that reduces the carbon build-up - but it would come at the expense of reduced gas mileage and increased emissions.
I've cataloged my carbon buildup issues in these forums elsewhere, and last month I had my MCS in for the walnut blasting service after getting multiple CELs due to misfires. Part of that walnut service was to update software in the car (wasn't expecting that). The technician said he thought it was to make the ECU less sensitive to misfires (sounded fishy to me at the time)... but perhaps MINI is hitting VANOS with instead? All I know is I'd love an opportunity to pick the brain of an actual BMW engineer who knows what's really going on.
Last edited by fishbert; 04-26-2012 at 12:52 PM.
#22
I don't think anyone is saying oil causes the carbon buildup (if anyone is, they're probably just incorrectly latching on to Oil Catch Can). The prevailing theory has been the re-circulation of carbon (soot, really) suspended in blow-by gasses (which are basically the same thing as exhaust gasses, the difference being which path they take to exit the combustion chamber). The VANOS overlap you bring up is interesting, but one would think we would see more people in here saying that blocking their PCV hose didn't stop the carbon buildup, were VANOS overlap a significant contributor to the issue.
I've cataloged my carbon buildup issues in these forums elsewhere, and last month I had my MCS in for the walnut blasting service after getting multiple CELs due to misfires. Part of that walnut service was to update software in the car (wasn't expecting that). The technician said he thought it was to make the ECU less sensitive to misfires (sounded fishy to me at the time)... but perhaps MINI is hitting VANOS with instead? All I know is I'd love an opportunity to pick the brain of an actual BMW engineer who knows what's really going on.
I've cataloged my carbon buildup issues in these forums elsewhere, and last month I had my MCS in for the walnut blasting service after getting multiple CELs due to misfires. Part of that walnut service was to update software in the car (wasn't expecting that). The technician said he thought it was to make the ECU less sensitive to misfires (sounded fishy to me at the time)... but perhaps MINI is hitting VANOS with instead? All I know is I'd love an opportunity to pick the brain of an actual BMW engineer who knows what's really going on.
As an aside, the N18 engine still has the same style (dual) PCV - the rear PCV (to the manifold) is now internal to the head instead of external to keep the manifold and throttle body from icing up - and now you can't block it like people have been doing with the Boost Tap and other parts on the N14 engine.
I would also be very interested in the true internal BMW understanding of this problem, as it is also happening on the direct injected BMW engines.
The last thing - I haven't seen convincing evidence yet that catch cans really do fix the problem... I'd like to read some success stories if you know of any specific threads. (i.e. needed cleanings every 15k before oil catch can, 40k since last cleaning with catch can and things are all good) I'm just not sure if people have put enough miles on their cars since catch cans to really know. I very well could have missed something though.
-Charlie
#23
My understanding on the oil catch can thing was that people are expecting oil vapors in the PCV flow, not carbon/etc. from combustion. (well, that's what *I* expect) Fast moving parts inside the engine get some oil vapors whipped up in there and then blow-by carries it out of the engine.
As an aside, the N18 engine still has the same style (dual) PCV - the rear PCV (to the manifold) is now internal to the head instead of external to keep the manifold and throttle body from icing up - and now you can't block it like people have been doing with the Boost Tap and other parts on the N14 engine.
Ooooo, I went looking for an old newspaper clipping I've posted previously in these forums about carbon buildup and DI engines, and found this (relatively) new article I hadn't seen before. Quite interesting for a number of reasons!
- DI engines in US models (Ford, GM) seem to have been designed more intelligently (wasn't expecting that)
- This "more intelligently" stuff apparently deals a lot with valve timing ... appears to lend some credence to the VANOS overlap tweaking theory, though the article doesn't mention PCV systems when taking about "dirty" intake design (and PCV systems are dirty)
- Apparently manufacturers with these "dirty" intake designs are beginning to reign it in, and the problem is projected to be sorted across the board in a few years time.
The last thing - I haven't seen convincing evidence yet that catch cans really do fix the problem... I'd like to read some success stories if you know of any specific threads. (i.e. needed cleanings every 15k before oil catch can, 40k since last cleaning with catch can and things are all good) I'm just not sure if people have put enough miles on their cars since catch cans to really know. I very well could have missed something though.
#24
The whole joie de vivre of a PCV system is to recirculate blow-by from previous combustion cycles back to the combustion chamber. There may be oil vapors in the crankcase that get sent that way as well, but that's not why the system is there, and those aren't going to lend themselves to carbon buildup as easily. Think 1800s chimney sweep... there's a lot of easy carbon buildup to be had from airborne byproducts of incomplete combustion.
Yes, I know. If you go back to the original conversations about that, the similarly re-designed intake manifold for the N14, and the controversy of whether or not the PCV hose had been incorporated into the valve cover, you'll find I was somewhat in the thick of it all.
Ooooo, I went looking for an old newspaper clipping I've posted previously in these forums about carbon buildup and DI engines, and found this (relatively) new article I hadn't seen before. Quite interesting for a number of reasons!
I had thought DI engines were being found out as a lost cause these last few years, but reading this article has damn near made me giddy as a school girl.
I had thought DI engines were being found out as a lost cause these last few years, but reading this article has damn near made me giddy as a school girl.
-Charlie
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