Big believer of Seafoam...did my 03 MCS tonight....smoked like a train. Probably smoked more than any of the other cars I have used Seafoam. Always seems to run better after a nice internal cleaning!.

 

i forgot to mention as a helpful tip. Keep an eye on the Catalytic Converter. You dont want that thing glowing red or you can damage or plug the Cat, then you are looking at a $800-$1k repair cost, Unless you want to run cat-less then burn it out.

 

can anyone give me detailed instructions on how to do this? i'm running a 2003 cooper. i'm really interested.

 

Just ran half a bottle through! This stuff is AMAZING! So glad i heard about it on here! Heck, I'm just glad I got rid of that nasty tourettes Stella gave off every now and then! Especially with the A/C on and stopped. That! Was annoying. Now it's allll gone! Thanks guys! :D

 

If the PCV hose is to big which line do you recommend??

 

well just checked out my car and the only possible vacuum lines to reach are the PCV and the Clean Air Tube that leads back to the throttle. In most cars they're more assessable lines. The PCV line will be alright. I recommend getting a clear line (such as fish tank air tube) Fit it into the PCV line and pour the SeaFoam into a clear plastic bottle so you can see exactly what you are doing. Remember that slower is better when using SeaFoam.

 

Since folks like the good professor are willing to point out but not correct misinformation, let me chime in with my $.02. I've always found that the amount of smoke correlates to the length of time you let the seafoam soak, and the amount you sucked in. The longer you loet it soak in, the less smoke you'll see. Honestly, most of the smoke you see is the seafoam burning. The carbon deposits are "clearer" than you'd think.

Seafoam is quite safe. It's used commonly in winterizing boat engines (That what I use) and you need to literally choke the boat motor on the stuff before you store it for the winter. So you really can't hydro-lock your motor from it or anything. I like to suck it up in waves, with heavy doses every 15 seconds or so. And then really suck a ton before i let it soak. I like to let it soak for a good 2hours or so, and then start it up, let it idle, drive it around, and really roam through the RPM range. This is all for just a vaccuum application. Which should not require any oil change or anything.

If you do pour anything besides oil in your crank case, I woudl highly reccomend you change your oil soon after. I do use a small amount of seafoam in my gas tank annually. But that's more because I store winter/summer cars and have old gas.

 

Uh oh. :( Service engine soon light came on after doing this. What's wrong?! :(

 

Probably a dirty 02?

Mine went away pretty quickly (I think one long highway drive).

 

I have a can for my mini, Im just waiting for the next oil change. I bought a can for all my cars. I did my VW Passat 1.8T yesterday. I got a moderate amount of smoke, I couldnt really tell since it was a slighty breezey day. Feeding the seafoam was no problem. It started to smoke as soon as I started administering the seafoam. I did have a problem after I let it sit for 15 minutes and started it up. It had a very rough idle and my CEL was blinking I let it run for about 10 minutes to see if it would smooth out. I would rev the engine to about 2500rpms occasionally. I shut the car off and looked under the hood, my cat was glowing bright red Two more times I let it run for about 5 minutes still nothing. I checked the spark plugs and 2 of the were kinda wet. So I cleaned them off and everything was OK, car ran smooth and the blinking CEL went away!!

 

No way to know without checking the code. I'd bet fouled plugs or dirty 02 sensor.

 

By the time you do an oil change, your oil contains 2-5% gasoline, just from normal running. It gets in from the combustion chamber and around the valves.

If you use Seafoam in any way, do an oil change afterward.

 

Where do you people get this from? ANY gasoline that blows past the rings evaporates in the hot block. Hence the need for pcv systems.

 

Fouled plugs? That doesn't sound very good.. So how do I check? :/

 

Go to any auto parts store like pep boys or oreilly's and ask them to read it. Or pick up your own OBD2 code reader. You can pop your plugs off easily and just look at them. They may look a bit brown-ish which is fine as long as it's not built up. Black and wet are what you don't want. I'd just get the code read first, that's the easiest and most logical starting point. Does it drive fine still?

 

Oh yeah, no problem at all. I actually just drove down from Pa to Va beach with it. A good four hundred miles. It just bugged me that the light was on.. Hoping it wasn't a silent killer or something. :/

 

So Maybe someone who knows could explain something to me.

Being a direct injection engine (R56) does that mean that there is no fuel ever hitting the back of the valves? if not I guess an Oil Catch Can would be a necessity to stop oily residue building up in the intake tract, as there is no fuel to "wash" it out.

 

The fuel never really washes anything out in a conventional injection engine. Most times the vacuum line is on the intake arm after the filter, the injector is on the intake manifold right at the head.

 

ok if you get a Service Engine Soon Light come on while doing SeaFoam don't worry about it. Most cars are equipped with vacuum sensors that trip if the sensors see's a sizable vacuum leak. Just continue to drive the car regularly and let the OBD II trip monitor reset itself for that monitor, it will eventually go away. Also Tommy is right, you can not hydro lock a car with something that is combustible.

 

Actually you can. Hydrolock is what happens when any liquid stops the combustion cycle enough to stall the engine. Which you do with seafoam. There isn't enough to do rod damage, but you do hydrolock the engine.

 

okay... i've got a problem. :[ as many of you know, i used the seafoam. i asked about this before but my light still hasn't gone away. (keep in mind i've driven over 900 miles since using the seafoam.) when it was about 500 miles from using the product i went to Autozone to see what they had to say. he hooked it up to his computer thinger and it said low fuel(i had a forth of a tank left at the time) and that there was cylinder misfire(whatever that is?!) he went on to say that i would know if i had a cylinder misfire(even thought i don't know what it is) but the car has not been acting any different since using the seafoam. when i mentioned running seafoam through (just the PVC area) the car he said to just disconnect the battery, all will be fine then. i've disconnected the battery. and the light, is still on.. what do i do? do i have a cylinder misfiring?! that doesn't sound good.. help please..

 

a cylinder misfire is when a cylinder fails to ignite the fuel air mixture during its cycle. This you can hear and feel on a four cylinder car such as a rougher idle and it will be running really rich. meaning you would likely smell a heavy scent of gasoline from the tail pipe. Running your car rich can damage the cat by overheating it and possibly plugging it up or melting it.

Do you know the exact code that AutoZone gave you? if not can you get the code again.
A cylinder misfire code is P030X (The X is a # which states which cylinder is misfiring)

 

i'll see what i can do. i won't be able to today, going into work soon. tomorrow the coop goes into the garage. just gettin' a check up, wheel bearing repair too. i also just told them to take a look to see what they're response is for the light on. so they'll let me know whats up i suppose. (the only thing thats weird is, i don't really feel as though the car is driving differently. it seems fine to me.. no smell of gasoline either.) so i don't know what to do..

 

Have them reset the code for you after they read it. If it drives with full power, you're not misfiring. You may have had a wet plug that misfired once after you seafoamed and the code is still there. After they reset it, if it comes back, I'd pull your plugs and check the condition and gap. Also, how old is your distributor? My 04 with 111k miles had a ton of corrosion on the back right connection, can't recall which cylinder it goes to. It's really easy to just pop off the plug wires and check the terminals.

 

Alright. I'll make sure to take the advice when i get off work and take a look. It's a 2003 MINI Cooper with just under 60,000 miles.