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We Can really see, what harm an Egr valve does 2 the engine , which has to eat alll this shit , and gets clogged up just tooo much. So, the cleaning of the engine takes time and energy, which means, that the Egr valve really does Not eliminate the pollution of the environment, it just delays it on later , so it is Worthless , and just a terrible Deception to the entire Humanity, just as the catalysators Are, Because the building of the catalytic converters Also take Tooo much of the environment destroyed. And, That environment damage 4 the production of the catalytic converters wasn't "calculated", so, they have miscalculation , which again makes a catalytic converteers just another deception tooo. Thank you 4 the video.
No for real crazy lady aside she’s right on this one. Vinegar in particular is amazing for carbon build up. I’m currently trying everything under the sun to get my Alfa Romeo started and one thing I did a few weeks ago was soak the cylinders in strong vinegar. My objective was more about the sludge from it sitting rather than the carbon but after a day of soaking I came back to almost all of the carbon completely gone.
Adding a zip tie around the bundle at the chuck end and another at the other about 2" from the end works well for focused agitation. Learned this growing up cleaning lathes and mills in family machinery business. Hope this helps. Great video.
Thanks Paul. I have a 2016 Mk7 GTI with 200,000 miles. The car is still running great and giving 35 mph highway. I change the oil according the service reminder, approximately evey 10,000 miles. I bought it new and only used premium fuel, oil and filter. I'm afraid it has the same carbon build up on the back of the valves. I've had the dealer do a carbon clean 3 time with crushed walnut shells. I'm starting to see the cold start misfire again so this will be the 4th cleaning. The first time it happened I got intermittent misfires. Everything checked out. It was the carbon. Thanks again to you and the humble mechanic. You-all helpled me to figure it out.
@@andyscott0 the dealer showed me the valves before and after each cleaning. It was bad. The cold start misfire went away each time it was cleaned. I can post the pictures if you would like to see them. I am definitely not paranoid.
@France definitely sound paranoid. I have cars with 300k miles that still don't need a cleanup lmao. I own and maintain 5 of them myself and even when they look bad they typically don't cause misfires. If it got carbon buildup bad enough at that mileage then I'd assume you're doing something wrong or the engine has a unique issue. If your vehicle doesn't call for premium, don't use it, thats causing your carbon buildup. All that changes is the fuels octane rating. When the octane rating is higher, it means it resists detonation which is good for sports cars, but for regular cars they can have increased trouble detonating it. I put premium in my Corolla while it misfired, because it was running too lean and caused a slight misfire, the premium made it less prone to misfires. Once I fixed the issue, using premium actually caused a rough idle. Use what is called for. If you want to treat your car to nice gas, use chevron, costco, or texaco. They all use a high amount of detergents in gasoline that will actually clean the engine. Using premium fuel doesn't mean your engine runs any better or cleaner unless it was designed for it
@@alextheonewarrior thanks for the feedback on the fuel. The user manual for my mk7 recommends premium. I only use top tier fuel formulated with detergent. My use case is not the same as yours. I drive 100 per day on the highway for work. Maybe your cars have not seen as many highway miles. The engine does not have any modifications and it still delivers 36 mpg which is an indication of efficient combustion. The reason it misfires is due to the lack of a homogeneous air fuel mixture. The presence of the carbon around the intake ports wreaks havoc with the air flow pattern.
@@alextheonewarrior You're absolutely correct on almost everything. On direct injection engines, you are not cleaning anything in your intake or your valves. This is one of the only things this video stated correctly. You are completely correct regarding octane.
Try cutting the blocks off the end of the zip ties, leaving them as long as possible, then put them through a piece of tubing maybe a few inches long, then put them in the drill. That would let you get them deep into the ports while keeping the drill away from the port, but they would not fly around so much because the tubing would keep them together.
if you actually NEED to see a dyno run to justify cleaning your intake valves because of this poor design ? then you really should buy a different car as it can only suffer in your hands.
@@mathewhoffer4541He never said he needed anything. It would just make an interesting video. You came at him for a scenario that you made up in your head.
I don't think its performance you should look for, the purpose is avoiding failure in the future, but of course fuel will flow better when there is no deposits.
I used oven cleaner, water, carb cleaner, a pick, a compressor airgun and lots of patience to clean the valves on my TDI. The oven cleaner worked FAR better than I had imagined, as a note of caution make sure you rotate the engine so that your valves are closed when spraying any liquid into that area otherwise you'll have a bad day when trying to start the engine.
Is TDI susceptible to this? I would have thought diesel was worse, but he didnt mention TDI as being a problem. What was your mileage and how bad was the buildup?
Been using the drill and zip ties for YEARS!! Then I vacuum the bits or carbon out followed up with carb cleaner and stuffing a paper towel in to soak up the carb cleaner and carbon residue before it dries out. It never looks perfect, but it's GOOD!!
@@im2yys4u81I’ve seen people use just a basic shop vac- but they also used specialty tool to cover the opening to increase suction. I’m currently trying to figure out how to make my shop vac work. I’m thinking duct tape and a silicone straw😅 Will update once I figure it out
On my 2018 VW Golf (Gen 3)TSI, change synthetic oil every 5K miles, use Top Tier gas, change filters regularly. This is the first time I have heard that these engines don't have big problems with carbon buildup. I had worried about this, but will continue to care for this engine. Thanks.
Make sure to use some type of gumout stp in your gas tank and Lucas whole system cleaner in crank case every oil change the Lucas stuff read the directions add in after oil change into syntetic oil one ounce per quart and bro u will have no worrys then u can even not do it some oil chages.
We use the walnut media blast. After we get the cylinder to TDC, it helps to use a pick tool and a seal removal tool (I've never used this tool to remove seals. It looks like a tiny hockey stick) as the first step to get the majority of the carbon off. Then blast it with the walnut media. It is a night and day difference.
It does work nice(pick) for plucking out the o-rings on a Mk4 rack for the small hard lines, I found out last night as I rarely use them for seals also 😂
I was gonna go with the walnut I just feel like baking soda is safer but I don't know yet which Im gonna go with. I think the baking soda will do just fine.
I haven't done any valve cleaning on my Mk7.5 GTI yet(Only 34k miles on my 2018 bought new) but I owned a Focus ST before this car. I put 30k+ miles a year on that car as I traveled about 100 miles a day for work back then. Every year I would take the manifold off, soak the port in 2+2 carb cleaner for about an hour and use various size gun brushes in my drill. Got about 90% of the stuff off every time. The different size and shape gun brushes worked great and I barely had to do any scraping.
I remember back in 60s - 70s all our cars at the time needed a de-coke every 40k or sooner.. You’d think 60+ years later that you wouldn’t need to go down that same route again with all the magical fuel additives we now have in our top fuels..🤷♂️
I think the zip tie thing would work better if you used the clip ends instead of the finger ends. The heavier ends and sharper edges would knock the carbon off quicker. Could then turn them around and do a "polish" with the finger end.
Weld or melt one end of the cable ties , will all hold together better . Make up a few mixed combinations of cable tie hacks , use drill in forward and reverse, don't use zip ties with small "metal" parts that "can" fly off or remove first .
I installed a water/ methanol injection system to reduce knock and lower egts and it removed all the carbon build up. I was happy to see that it cleans as well as increase power substantially
I had to replace my intake manifold because of the flaps being broken and also cleaned the valves because of cold start misfires. The liquimoly valve clean is what I used along with some nylon brushes attached to my drill. It worked really well, just took a while.
@@bustjanzupan1074You run into other issues by blocking off the EGR. Your running at a hotter temperature, because your combustion is hotter, this leads to premature failure of seals, puts added strain on your turbo, and can lead to heat soak issues.
I cleaned my 3.2 Audi using seafoam or Berryman and brass wire brushes- the pipe cleaner type I’d bend in a hook to get the backside of the valves, and a thicker spinny type to fit in the drill. Worked perfect. Cost overall about $250 for gaskets, brushes, cleaners, and lollipop wrench for the crank, saves pulling the front end but you wouldn’t have that issue with 2.0s. Took about 6 hours to get spotless.
I have done the same thing. Brass is softer metal than steel. I understand your logic, however, like Paul said: as long as you don’t do it like a crazy ape. I soaked all the liquid out with a rag and then walnut blasted with that special attachment that allows to stick the end of a vacuum hose. Works great!
I've done the same thing, powerfoam worked amazing. I let it sit for an hour first. I believe I used either brass or plastic brushes. I then installed a AOS and didn't get much if any more build up after 30k miles. This was on a Subaru and the valves were much more recessed.
I’ve actually looked into this myself. All the information I’ve found says that tuning is required to support MPI. So $800 ish for the kit plus a custom tune. Unless you’re planning to upgrade the turbo and go stage 3, seems it would make more sense to just pay for the cleaning. It’s likely only once in the lifetime of the car anyway. I’m just over 110,000 miles on my mk7 GTI and haven’t experienced any misfires, or drop in fuel economy that’s unrelated to a heavy right foot.
When I had my 2011 MK6 GTI, B12 and other strong cleaners weren’t available where I lived (Alberta, Canada). Canadian Tire just has your usual carb cleaners. Found that fresh oil soaked overnight (maybe only a few hours actually required) helped soften up the carbon, suspend it and also made it easier to clean everything. Used paper towel at first to soak up and remove everything and then compressed air to finish it off. Works very well and if any happens to get passed the valve stems or go down into the engine, I’m not worrying about it mixing with the existing engine oil and causing issues (as opposed to some strong cleaner seeping in).
Great video, I have performed the scrape and suck method and had great results. I also used gun brushes in fluid to finish and was able to get great results without having to use media blast. I recommend doing this every 30 to 50K.
@@less_vanity5820 Nope, the revving up does not clean that shit. But the Egr-valve-off , Does the Best result 4 the Engine, which than stays Clean 4 Many Decades !!! ! !!!
Living in Copenhagen, driving cars and motorcycles, some experience with this. Lots of daily slow driving. Then going on vacation to France. German autobahn, + 600 miles, 90-110 mph in average. Coming home,- 40-50% better milage, on the motorcycles - much higher top speed. Must come down to better flow. Getting the path through the engine cleaned up. My dad used a trick,- spraying sparkling water in the intake with the engine running,- kicks the nasty stuff off. But be carefull, we don't like huge chunks falling into the cylinder running :)
The cleaning process is very good but I would use a nylon drill cleaning brush, I spray the valves with penetrating spray before using the liqui moly cleaner. So those valves are impeccable.
I probably should do this on my '14 Cayman S with the 3.4 liter engine, but it runs perfect. I have a borescope at home, but getting it down that long winding intake looks like a huge hassle, not to mention you have to remove the rear interior just to get at the engine in the first place. Great video!
Seafoam makes a great product if you can get to your throttle body it spray into the throttle body while running. What i do is make a tiny hole in the cai hose right by the throttle body push the hose through while car is running spray you have to work the idle to keep it from stalling
@@roninthedestroyer8958 wil not work ...lots off video's to proof that seafoam and al the other products dont do much if sprayed into to the trotle body. Sometimes it even got worse!
I didn't have any noticeable cold start misfires on my MK6 GTI until about 170-180K miles. I ran Chevron 89 or 91 octane fuel exclusively and never added any fuel additives. When I pulled the intake it was a horror show of carbon build-up. Took me a few days of soaking, and cleaning using a variety of methods mentioned here until I was happy with the results. While the intake was off, I changed the fuel injectors and their seals and replaced the intake with the newest revision which VW recommended in a recall anyway. Once it was put back together, it literally ran like new...and still does at 215,000 miles. Just changed the timing chain, guides and tensioner for good measure a few weeks ago. Love the car, it's been amazing.
@@wavey_lit6046 Yes, first time the front cover had ever been off the engine. Half of the mileage on the car has been freeway in 6th gear. In my opinion, it's not the chains that are a concern, but the tensioner and chain-guides (which I also replaced). Last week my thermostat froze shut, and my temp gauge spiked for about 2 minutes, hopefully I didn't damage the head or head gasket. I'm in the process of replacing the water pump (and included thermostat) right now. I've had very few problems with this car, but it's age is catching up with it I think.
I just want to say, the overall video was real informative, and a lot of good advice was suggested here, however, I want to add a personal anecdote that conflicts with a statement made The Gen 3 2.0T engines do have carbon buildup issues, though not as major as the Gen 2s and the older 2.0T FSI Motors. My 8V S3 started having Cold Start Misfires around 70k Miles that got progressively worse, and when I finally cleaned the valves around 80k, there was a tremendous improvement. The Audi dealer local to me still recommends a Carbon Cleaning on the newer 2.0Ts at around 100k, so while the service interval has moved, their is still some Carbon Buildup that the revised PCV on the Gen 3 and newer motors that it can't resolve
Thank you - I was doubting myself after his comment in the video - Ours has 75k, just started getting cold start issues (with the cooler weather). Replacing coils and plugs didn't fix the problem. I think I'm going to have to dig in before the snow flies
Yeah he says some dumb stuff alright- like the fuel quality matters regarding carbon and sludge fouling of intake valves that are never in contact with fuel.
Did the hand scrape and zip tie method last year on my b8.5 s5, worked pretty well. Definitely worth doing if you have the charger off for whatever reason.
@@aqib2000 the procedure only takes about 30min to an hour. Getting the top end apart is a good half day adventure. If your not a regular wrencher plan on a weekend job.
@aqibi2000 The bulk of the cleaning gets done within 5-7min per port, maybe a little longer per depending on how much carbon and how clean you want it. I used a toothbrush with some cleaner to finish up. It can be done in a day if you hustle but more of a weekend project.
I DIY'ed the water pump at 150k km thanks to your tutorial and now I just did the carbon clean off at 190k km (120k miles). I had some intermittent check engine light and VCDS made me think it was a dead injector but when I opened it up it was quite like in this golf. Anyway thanks a lot for this!
I've gotten good results soaking the valves in Berryman's Chemtool and using a series of picks and nylon and brass brushes. Not quite as good as walnut blasting but cleaner than what you achieved with just picks and brake cleaner.
I have another "tool" try out for your consideration. Furnace or boiler brushes are used to clean out carbon soot from the internals of boilers and hot air furnaces. Sets of these tools are available from any plumbing or HVAC supplier and presumably Amazon. They come in a variety of shapes and sizes. Brush work plus brake clean solvent might be an effective way to address this problem.
I use Carbon-Off. It is sold as a decarbonizer for pots and pans in the restaurant industry, but it also works great for melting off baked-on carbon. It doesn't hurt metals, and is not particularly harsh. Instead of rinsing with water per the directions, wipe out everything with a rag.
Excellent explanation and I also enjoyed the comparison between the different cleaning methods. Well done! This youtube video is actually very helpful and covers just about all the bases.
Have done carbon cleanings on lots of gen3 2.0Ts and they definitely do have the same issue. Many of them I've seen at relatively low mileage with lots of buildup
Had to get this done on my previous car (2012 Rio5) as it was DI and my fuel economy was dropping and was having some minor stall/hesitation issues with the a CEL once in a while. A local shop did it for me. I'm not sure exactly, what they did, but they did use a special cleaner on it. No idea if they removed the intake or not, but it worked good enough that I never had issue again. When I replaced that car with a new one, I went with a Toyota with the D4S system. All the benefits of DI without any of the negatives as it has both port and direct injection.
I have an idea for the zip tie hack: instead of zip ties, get a long drinking straw cleaner brush. They’re like pipe cleaners but made a bit stronger than kid’s crafts items. Wonder how well that would work.
Harbor freight sells a brush set that includes a bunch of cone shaped brushes in plastic and metal, and can be attached to a drill. Those work like a charm. It's what I use along with media blast, and chemicals to get that factory fresh finish.
Beautiful video, very informative. There are two areas you need to be careful. Be careful that gasoline ( petrol) is getting spilt while you are removing the intake manifold, the second thing you need to be careful is not using a short mandrel or zip ties as you will be taking your drilling machine too close and can cause accidental digging of the metal. The best I learnt in my 40 years of experience is using a no 100 water emery sheet pasted with glue rolled over a round wooden stick 7 inches long, 8mm thick the sand paper will open due to the centrifugal force and will clean everything. But prior to this I was told to use toilet cleaning hydrochloric acid to soak and soften the hardened carbon deposits that you can remove with a cotton ball and a similar pick you used. I had a guru or teacher as you may understand who taught me the same way you pulled the valves up so nothing gets into the cylinder. I have worked on the older gen carburettor vehicles but not on injection vehicles I don't know if timing would get changed , in carb vehicles I had to use a timing light to get it fixed. I really enjoyed your video. Great stuff.
I've used a soft toothbrush, a vacuum, and e85 with great results. Its more about soak time. If you leave the e85 in the intake port overnight it does great.
@@Deutscheautoparts Even though I know shops can't park cars overnight like that to do soaks 24/7 you guys should make a video. It gets the intake ports so clean they are silvery aluminum again.
@@kanadaijuharszirup 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline from the pump. It melts fuel varnish away in old gas tanks in seconds is how we got the idea. Its a fantastic cleaner.
@@Deutscheautoparts ive only cleaned up ports in 3 engines & used tergo strip paint stripper.. soak port for 15-20 mins the hose out.. wd40 after air blast dry.. has been quick & simple & no visible corrosion.. did one head twice & its ports & valves had no signs of black residue at all.. one head was off the engine & did chambers too seperate to ports & plugging the oil galleries.. didn't notice any water finding its way past the valves..
Perfect honest video - after reading so many dodgy and destructive and ineffective methods on the web, I am now totally confident that the scraper and zip tie method will fix this issue at 80-90% of the effectiveness of walnut/vapour blasting - cheaper too and thus one can maybe do it again in 10-20k miles to compensate for the slight difference in efficiency. One suggestion I worry about sharp steel scrapers/points scratching a valve stem or poppet head stres raiser causing a broken valve. I suggest using a piece of copper pipe instead, maybe 3/8 or 1/2 dia with a semi circle shovel sharp edge cut out at the end to scrape the valve. The curved shape will enable the easy scraping of the back of the valve stem and the softer copper will make no marks or imprint on the valve. Thanks again great honest presentation too.
I just bought a cheap media blaster and the plate with a vacuum adapter and hole for blasting. Far less work than picking or brushing off the carbon and it produces the best results. If you clean the valves every ten or fifteen thousand miles then it’s less work each time and your engine’s power and efficiency is always tip top. The very best solution is an engine with both port and direct injection. Toyota doesn’t have a single engine with only direct injection, they always combine it with port injection to keep the valves clean. The decision to use only GDI is made by bean counters who don’t care what happens to the engine after the warranty expires.
@@The1Real1Cheese Because the "Egr" valve immediatelly pollutes your engine back on the old way. That is why it is essential to cut it off, 2 Not do any further damage 2 your engine.
My 103K mi 2010 VW CC had its valves cleaned with nut shells. I was not prepared for the increase in power. But what was really amazing was that at 70 mph highway driving I in a 3 hour standard driving loop that I do. I was able to get 11mpg to 12 mpg increase. Which when my car was new I was getting about 4mpg worse. So, I am actually getting better mpg now than when my car was new.
Thank you for this video Paul. I've been wanting to crack open my Q5's intake to service some parts and clean the valves. I wonder how well dry ice blasting would work. Keep up the great work.
I just use the a can from CGC before every other oil change and it does the trick for me. I don't have to disassemble my intake and it's cheap. I know there's gonna be carbon in there, but I can definitely notice the difference if I let it go for longer than ten thousand miles. The cold-start misfires are non existent and the power is there. I even scan with vagcom to see if any of the cylinders misfire especially in the winter. It's done a great job at keeping the build-up at bay.
I know it's probably not the project you talked about that's a secret, but it would kind of be dope if y'all made a *_Mazda 3 TCR_* since it uses the *_Volkswagen Mk7 GTI EA888 engine._* Considering mazda decided not to actually do it and y'all are Volkswagen/Audi people, I figured it would be a nice experiment for y'all. I don't know, I just figured it would be a dope thing to put on your channel
Hello back in the days of Mercedes Benz and this was from one of their support techs. Most 420 models had a lot of buildup on the intake valves cars ran like crap esp cold due to people using cheap gas. What we were told to use was oven cleaner the original no frills with lemony smell. We had to pull intake and valve covers remove intake rockers. We would spray all the valves filling each intake port let it soak for some time, then the fun part came in. We used a high pressure washer that had hot water and blasted them cleaned like brand new. The only draw back was the splash back shielding helped and so did the garbage bag suit with face shield. Yup regular oven cleaner, we did not have the stuff you have today. Maybe you may want to give it a try with the wire ties, never thought of that. Great video.
Cut the zip ties longer and place a 3/4 -- 1.5 inch long piece of 3/8 -- 1/2 inch diameter clear tubing (depending on your car) over the zip ties and use the tubing to control the zip ties while they spin in the drill
Good video as this is an issue with most high mileage vehicles. I like the idea of using the baking soda over ground walnut pieces. Baking soda can even be used to strip paint surprisingly.
This issue of the pollution of the engine comes just from the Egr valve, and is Not caused because of the hight mileage. I have seen engines Clean after 300 miles, but with the Egr-off . So, after the clenaing of the engine, make sure, that this issue does Not repeat again, by shutting off the egr valve.
I didn't realize boroscopes were so cheap, but our 2018 pathfinder with VQ35DD has direct injection - I manually cleaned the carbon deposits off, and use seafoam about once a year before an oil change for preventive maintenance.
The spoon shaped o-ring tools are good for scraping the wider areas. I found the hook pick to be great for the back of the valve stems and a 90 and an angled pick good for getting around the valve seat. Removing the bulk with picks followed by media blast is the most efficient and quickest way. Bore brushes may seem like a good way to go, but they gum up almost instantly.
It is so sad that modern cars are so much ridiculous maintenence. I only bought a new car because of busting my azz with 2 jobs all day and night 6 days a week . its like the stufff we thought was crap from the 60 s , seems so superior now, and this channel is so facinating anyway !
When i cleaned mine my media blaster wasnt working so i had to improvise and use gasoline. Then i used a combo of picks/hooks and a bundle of long zipties. Worked pretty good
Here are my concerns with this, and I have a couple. First is I wouldn't even consider doing any of this without pressurizing the cylinder to prevent debris/fluid from entering it. Next, scratching the surfaces with a metal pic is creating metal shavings, so now you have carbon and metal in the mix being carried by a liquid possibly into the cylinder during the cleaning. Next, adding any abrasive on top of all that and you're really asking for cylinder and ring wear. There is no way you are removing the deposits/abrasive/shavings from against the valve seats at minimum, at worst its coated everything and upon startup where does it end up...between your cylinder walls and rings or your valve seats. While spraying media, you think it's not getting past the valve seal or valve seat. There is a reason that air filters are 99.9% efficient at 2 micron at minimum. If you want to remove carbon or oil sludge remove the head and do it right, oh and pb blaster works well.
That's my thoughts roughly. With the valves closed the walnut, or whatever used, couldn't possibly clean everything. It defies common sense. Liquid intake cleaners don't inspire confidence either against hard carbon, which you don't want bouncing around in the cylinder anyway. A simple cold start injector upstream of the valves would fix everything.
Copper stranded wire, soft enough to not harm anything but stiff enough to work quickly. Been using it for decades. Standard 120v house wire cheap as sin as it last for many jobs. Remove carbon on top of pistons by getting it nice and hot and mist water into the intake, the crap that comes out of the tail pipes is crazy. In the 80's it was common tune up use.
CRC intake valve and turbo cleaner works excellent on my 1.6 DIG turbo Nissan. The PEA (polyether Amine) does work very well without having to soak or scrape the valves. And I did confirm it’s effectiveness by viewing the valves before/after.
@@Jimster481 I just followed the directions on the back. Warm up the engine, then I removed the MAP which is just before the throttle body and sprayed it directly into there in small sprays while maintaining RPM 2000-2500. I usually do this every other oil change
The absolute best solution to this problem is buying a car that has either just Port injection or dual injection ('cuse, guess what, Port injection is usually better at very low and very high RPM)
Just did this job today at work, im finding media blast with walnut first, then i soak with liqui moly throttle body cleaner to melt the rest works best. I did it the other way around and the wal nuts just create a goopy mess with the melted carbon. Would take me 2hrs without the water pump job this way, on a mk6 without the studs probably 1.6hrs
Would have thought string trimmer line would be a bit easier to manage in a drill than cable ties. Multiple diameters, cores, twists, and so forth are available. Mix and match and cut varying lengths.
The square 0.155" trimmer line works great. Soak the valves with BG carb cleaner & let set for an hour. There are also rotary long stem wire brush balls that work well with a drill motor. You can also go to the hardware store & buy copper pipe cleaners, cut off the handles & use your drill motor.
Any reason why the gen 3 Ea888 motors don’t see as many carbon build up issues? To my understanding the euro gen 4 motors went to dual port but every gen 3 motor sold here is still only DI. Any Vw dual port engines here in the U.S?
2017 GTI owner here, Paul's claim that EA888 gen3 don't have this issue is bunk. At 50k miles my car had the intake valves looking just like the 1.8 in the video at 80k. I've had the car since new, 7-8000 miles oil changes with the right oil (LM or Motul), only 93 gas, all the maintenance done on time; on the downside it does have stg2 tune (w/ supporting mods) and gets about a dozen track days per year, so maybe a stock car that only gets driven around town will have much less carbon, but again "gen3 EA888 don't have this problem" is BS. I did my own media blasting cleaning and it came out perfect. I got the Harbor Freight media blaster, the nozzle from FCP Euro and bought wallnut shells media from Amazon. Also replaced the water pump that started to leak, very easy to do with the intake off.
In Hungary we clean it with grinded walnut shells! It is like a powder. No joke. They blow it through the engine. It's gonna be like brand new. Cleans up everything. There are well known car magazines who made interviews with specialized garages.
Yup 👍🏽 I use the supertech throttle body cleaner from Walmart it’s got more of the active ingredient acetone in it and cheaper too I always pick up a extra few cans and it’s very effective against both soft and baked on hard carbon
Use carb cleaner and a brass brush on the plates -- nice and clean without much effort. I used CRC intake cleaner to soak and pick the valves, followed by carb cleaner.
This is so easy fix. I do this by driving hard revving engine to redline. And it couldn’t be better. There is no need to use any additional treatment. Driving hard long is the way to go.
@@Deutscheautoparts what do you know. shows you have no idea about engine. i have a 603000 km engine and it is in great shape. no carbon deposits on valves and piston crowns. you just dont know about engine, seriously, instead spouting expensive ways of doing this which is crap anyway.
My method for cleaning my L8T 6.6 liter is converting it to port injection and a Stage 2 cam swap. So from 401 hp to over 500 hp and no more worry about carbon build up.
All kias, Hyundais and most automakers use them now 😑 blows ass. Also, they burn oil. About a quart wil burn off in between oil changes. You'll know you're low from the increased strength of the exhaust fumes. Oil light doesn't come on until AFTER a quart burns off
You obviously don’t have one or know shit about them. Burning oil is false, they require cleaning, but all cars do today as egr systems are the larger issue
Just spray hydrogenperoxide with water when engine running. I remember back in early 90s there was a company in Sweden called MISAB (Motor Italia Svenska AB) that sold a kit with watercontainer, nozzle, plate for nozzle, and an electrical pump with cable harness. The mixture was peroxide and water and they told that compression increased and soot removal. Nozzle was set in adapterplate on intake manifold. This was for like Dellorto, Weber carburator. I remember that other sparkplugs was needed. I also remember a friend that put this kit on a 1984 Volvo Turbo 2.1L that had mechanical fuel injection. The seller from MISAB shown the results and we all was amazed at the time.
How about an engine that doesn't eat its own poop? The root of this problem is not direct injection, but the incredibly stupid emissions exhaust gas recirculation system. Without EGR the intake valves would never be exposed to exhaust soot.
Nice video. Water injection will prevent the carbon returning. We used to de carbon combustion chambers by spaying water down the intake on a warm engine. Worked ok.
Agreed, but MPI adds double the injectors and more complexity. You'd imagine 1 larger injector upstream in the manifold and after the throttle body could help mitigate
My uncle, who was an army mechanic in the early 70’s, would take a glass of water and slowly pour in down the carb, with the car rev’ed up, to clean out the carbon.
You can do it with solvent, zip ties, and brushes. However, on heavily caked valves this will take AWHILE! If you have the means, invest in a media blaster or phone a friend. Did a gen 3 EA888A by hand and it took a few hours to make them like new. Soak, pick, scrub, rinse. Over and over and over for each cylinder.
People go through a lot to keep their European cars happy. I just stripped a glow plug in my 2002 golf TDI. I hope I bought the right thread repair kit wish me luck.
1.The zip ties have to be snipped at different angles and slighty different lengths. 2. Warm the engine up, remove the intake, using 3 cans of brake cleaner 1 per 2 cylinders for a 6cyl or 2 for a 4 banger, spray let sit a few mins, then get to work with zipties and spray after the brake cleaner dries. 3. When all done, get a beer and change the oil and filter if needed.
I was thinking that opening the port injection ports might help 1.) gives access to a boroscpoe without taking the intake off 2.) gives access to the valves without removing the intake. 3.) Allows you to clean the ports over a longer term.
Tip: Epoxy or hot glue the square ends of the zip ties together so they won't fall apart as easily. Personally, I love the walnut blast, but those ties can help. Great vid thanks for sharing.
Great video, but I am surely interested in the use of another chemicals.. 1st :oven cleaners contain chemicals such as potassium hydroxide and sodium hydroxide. These chemicals eat up carbonized parts, but it desolves also aluminum! As the heads are mostly made of aluminum this isnt the correct choice. 2nd : Metasoak, this is safe for aluminum, but I cant buy that stuff in The Netherlands and would like to know how good this works!
thanks for warning me, I wanted to use oven cleaner for this. I used oven cleaner on the intake on my diesel bmw that has a plastic intake. It didn't eat up the plastic tho...
1. Rotate the engine until the intake valve is closed. 2. Spray a f-ton of WD-40 on the back of the valve. 3. Let the crap marinate overnight (2 nights if it's stubborn). 4. Blow crap out with compressed air. 5. Marvel at how all the crap flies right off , leaving everything perfectly shiny! Probably works for exhaust too.
I don’t have a media blaster… surely a dremel with flexshaft and very soft wire brush would be the next best thing? Obviously being careful of the valve seats and not being too heavy handed!
I do the old Italian tune up. Today after replacing the stock intake manifold on my 2010 Jetta 2.5L with IE's power kit at 163k miles, seeing how clean my valves were, I'll continue to just stick with that lol
Our Honda CRV 1.5 T CRV GDI went into the dealership because I wanted them to check if there was any build up at it was nearly on 70k miles, there was no build up of any significance I asked them for screen shots to prove it and they were spot on just a light dusting of Carbon. The Honda tech guy said Honda built in a valve rotation to mitigate excessive carbon fouling, seems to be working on the Honda Earth dreams units
Easy Off oven cleaner dissolves carbon a lot, too! There is a warning on aluminum. I'd used wire brush or stiff nylon brush after 10min, let soak continue, repeat brushing advances carbon layer reduction. Then suction out & water rise, air pressure blast or air dry. If any thin layer still exists then dry brush,. The softened carbon will turn to dust.
I had a misfire on my C230 and dumped in two containers of injector cleaner on an 1/8 tank. Changed the entire ignition and fuel injectors and the intake ports were spotless.
HI DAP Guys, as I sad on the other clips of Your carbon checkups , take a 1750km trip on speedy highways engine gets rid of carbon valves! My city driving for 180000km make carbon build up day after day! Keep doin, Johnny
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We Can really see, what harm an Egr valve does 2 the engine , which has to eat alll this shit , and gets clogged up just tooo much. So, the cleaning of the engine takes time and energy, which means, that the Egr valve really does Not eliminate the pollution of the environment, it just delays it on later , so it is Worthless , and just a terrible Deception to the entire Humanity, just as the catalysators Are, Because the building of the catalytic converters Also take Tooo much of the environment destroyed. And, That environment damage 4 the production of the catalytic converters wasn't "calculated", so, they have miscalculation , which again makes a catalytic converteers just another deception tooo. Thank you 4 the video.
can you stop whispering in the mic? Just get to the point. you are not funny.
Doesn't break cleaner ruin rubber grommets/ guide seals?
Great video. Btw what does it mean when I have a burnt exhaust valve
How much it cost?? I am planning to get new car. Maybe better to stay away from GDI eangen.
"It's an ingenious solution to a problem that shouldn't exist in the first place." - James May
Yaaaay to modern engineering. Computer didn't calculate a person dealing with it later....
I literally saw this problem 30 yrs ago on a VW GTI.......and here we are......
Best DIY option is vinegar & baking soda. Least that’s what the lady from the farmers market selling essential oils told me.
🤣
Jesus 😂😂
😂😅
Do not forget mint for a fresh exhaust ! 🤔🤔🤔
No for real crazy lady aside she’s right on this one. Vinegar in particular is amazing for carbon build up. I’m currently trying everything under the sun to get my Alfa Romeo started and one thing I did a few weeks ago was soak the cylinders in strong vinegar. My objective was more about the sludge from it sitting rather than the carbon but after a day of soaking I came back to almost all of the carbon completely gone.
Adding a zip tie around the bundle at the chuck end and another at the other about 2" from the end works well for focused agitation. Learned this growing up cleaning lathes and mills in family machinery business. Hope this helps. Great video.
Thanks for the tip!!!!!
I've used shrink tubing to make long handle zip tie "artist's" brushes for cleaning/scraping gunk and crud out of crevices.
*you took the words right out of my mouth*
@@psdaengr911 *i like your style!*
😄 Walnut blasting wouldn't be a thing if this actually worked. This will only remove new blow-by deposits that haven't burned onto the valves yet.
Thanks Paul. I have a 2016 Mk7 GTI with 200,000 miles. The car is still running great and giving 35 mph highway. I change the oil according the service reminder, approximately evey 10,000 miles. I bought it new and only used premium fuel, oil and filter.
I'm afraid it has the same carbon build up on the back of the valves. I've had the dealer do a carbon clean 3 time with crushed walnut shells. I'm starting to see the cold start misfire again so this will be the 4th cleaning. The first time it happened I got intermittent misfires. Everything checked out. It was the carbon. Thanks again to you and the humble mechanic. You-all helpled me to figure it out.
I think your paranoid. My 05 gti has 150k mileage and never been cleaned
@@andyscott0 the dealer showed me the valves before and after each cleaning. It was bad. The cold start misfire went away each time it was cleaned. I can post the pictures if you would like to see them. I am definitely not paranoid.
@France definitely sound paranoid. I have cars with 300k miles that still don't need a cleanup lmao. I own and maintain 5 of them myself and even when they look bad they typically don't cause misfires. If it got carbon buildup bad enough at that mileage then I'd assume you're doing something wrong or the engine has a unique issue.
If your vehicle doesn't call for premium, don't use it, thats causing your carbon buildup. All that changes is the fuels octane rating. When the octane rating is higher, it means it resists detonation which is good for sports cars, but for regular cars they can have increased trouble detonating it. I put premium in my Corolla while it misfired, because it was running too lean and caused a slight misfire, the premium made it less prone to misfires. Once I fixed the issue, using premium actually caused a rough idle. Use what is called for.
If you want to treat your car to nice gas, use chevron, costco, or texaco. They all use a high amount of detergents in gasoline that will actually clean the engine. Using premium fuel doesn't mean your engine runs any better or cleaner unless it was designed for it
@@alextheonewarrior thanks for the feedback on the fuel. The user manual for my mk7 recommends premium. I only use top tier fuel formulated with detergent. My use case is not the same as yours. I drive 100 per day on the highway for work. Maybe your cars have not seen as many highway miles. The engine does not have any modifications and it still delivers 36 mpg which is an indication of efficient combustion. The reason it misfires is due to the lack of a homogeneous air fuel mixture. The presence of the carbon around the intake ports wreaks havoc with the air flow pattern.
@@alextheonewarrior You're absolutely correct on almost everything. On direct injection engines, you are not cleaning anything in your intake or your valves. This is one of the only things this video stated correctly. You are completely correct regarding octane.
Try cutting the blocks off the end of the zip ties, leaving them as long as possible, then put them through a piece of tubing maybe a few inches long, then put them in the drill. That would let you get them deep into the ports while keeping the drill away from the port, but they would not fly around so much because the tubing would keep them together.
I did exactly what you said on my mk6 r.. works great
Wish I saw this yesterday, kept struggling to keep the ties in the drill!
Dont forget some electrical tape on the end before chucking it into the chuck!
It would be really cool to see before and after dyno numbers on really gunked up valves.
if you actually NEED to see a dyno run to justify cleaning your intake valves because of this poor design ? then you really should buy a different car as it can only suffer in your hands.
@@mathewhoffer4541He never said he needed anything. It would just make an interesting video. You came at him for a scenario that you made up in your head.
@@mathewhoffer4541😮 I've never seen someone get burnt so hard as you pal
I don't think its performance you should look for, the purpose is avoiding failure in the future, but of course fuel will flow better when there is no deposits.
@@allancncdirect injection is sprayed in the combustion chamber at a high psi....... fuel flow? You meant air flow?
I used oven cleaner, water, carb cleaner, a pick, a compressor airgun and lots of patience to clean the valves on my TDI. The oven cleaner worked FAR better than I had imagined, as a note of caution make sure you rotate the engine so that your valves are closed when spraying any liquid into that area otherwise you'll have a bad day when trying to start the engine.
Oven cleaner is a good at cleaning up stuff,, used it on some nasty crudely eng blocks
Don't use oven cleaner on an aluminium head. It'll eat the head away and produce hydrogen as a byproduct, which is flammable.
Yes, and after the cleaning , make sure that you do the Egr valve-off , so, that you never again have alll that dirty shit in your engine !!! ! !!!
Careful with oven cleaner, Mine is incompatible with aluminium.
Is TDI susceptible to this? I would have thought diesel was worse, but he didnt mention TDI as being a problem. What was your mileage and how bad was the buildup?
Been using the drill and zip ties for YEARS!! Then I vacuum the bits or carbon out followed up with carb cleaner and stuffing a paper towel in to soak up the carb cleaner and carbon residue before it dries out. It never looks perfect, but it's GOOD!!
What type of vacuum did you use to suck out the debris?
@@im2yys4u81 A shop vac.
@@im2yys4u81 Harbor freight has a small tools attachment set that I used with my wet/dry vac. Worked great.
@@im2yys4u81I’ve seen people use just a basic shop vac- but they also used specialty tool to cover the opening to increase suction. I’m currently trying to figure out how to make my shop vac work. I’m thinking duct tape and a silicone straw😅 Will update once I figure it out
On my 2018 VW Golf (Gen 3)TSI, change synthetic oil every 5K miles, use Top Tier gas, change filters regularly. This is the first time I have heard that these engines don't have big problems with carbon buildup. I had worried about this, but will continue to care for this engine. Thanks.
Double injection what makes them less problematic
Have you done anything to clean the carbon on your engine in the past year ?
Make sure to use some type of gumout stp in your gas tank and Lucas whole system cleaner in crank case every oil change the Lucas stuff read the directions add in after oil change into syntetic oil one ounce per quart and bro u will have no worrys then u can even not do it some oil chages.
We use the walnut media blast. After we get the cylinder to TDC, it helps to use a pick tool and a seal removal tool (I've never used this tool to remove seals. It looks like a tiny hockey stick) as the first step to get the majority of the carbon off. Then blast it with the walnut media. It is a night and day difference.
It does work nice(pick) for plucking out the o-rings on a Mk4 rack for the small hard lines, I found out last night as I rarely use them for seals also 😂
I was gonna go with the walnut I just feel like baking soda is safer but I don't know yet which Im gonna go with. I think the baking soda will do just fine.
I haven't done any valve cleaning on my Mk7.5 GTI yet(Only 34k miles on my 2018 bought new) but I owned a Focus ST before this car. I put 30k+ miles a year on that car as I traveled about 100 miles a day for work back then. Every year I would take the manifold off, soak the port in 2+2 carb cleaner for about an hour and use various size gun brushes in my drill. Got about 90% of the stuff off every time. The different size and shape gun brushes worked great and I barely had to do any scraping.
Zip tie hack worked perfectly on my VW 2.0t, did 3-4 sets of cleaner, soak, zip ties, brake clean wash and vacuum. Almost perfectly clean now.
I remember back in 60s - 70s all our cars at the time needed a de-coke every 40k or sooner..
You’d think 60+ years later that you wouldn’t need to go down that same route again with all the magical fuel additives we now have in our top fuels..🤷♂️
I think the zip tie thing would work better if you used the clip ends instead of the finger ends. The heavier ends and sharper edges would knock the carbon off quicker. Could then turn them around and do a "polish" with the finger end.
bottle brush.
@Ralph Washburn 🤣🤣
Weld or melt one end of the cable ties , will all hold together better . Make up a few mixed combinations of cable tie hacks , use drill in forward and reverse, don't use zip ties with small "metal" parts that "can" fly off or remove first .
I installed a water/ methanol injection system to reduce knock and lower egts and it removed all the carbon build up. I was happy to see that it cleans as well as increase power substantially
I had to replace my intake manifold because of the flaps being broken and also cleaned the valves because of cold start misfires. The liquimoly valve clean is what I used along with some nylon brushes attached to my drill. It worked really well, just took a while.
And Don't 4get 2 shut your Egr valve off, so, that it does not repeat again.
@@bustjanzupan1074You run into other issues by blocking off the EGR. Your running at a hotter temperature, because your combustion is hotter, this leads to premature failure of seals, puts added strain on your turbo, and can lead to heat soak issues.
@@klubstompersdo you even know what a egr is???
I cleaned my 3.2 Audi using seafoam or Berryman and brass wire brushes- the pipe cleaner type I’d bend in a hook to get the backside of the valves, and a thicker spinny type to fit in the drill. Worked perfect. Cost overall about $250 for gaskets, brushes, cleaners, and lollipop wrench for the crank, saves pulling the front end but you wouldn’t have that issue with 2.0s. Took about 6 hours to get spotless.
WTF , if a little peice of brass gets in your oil pump or elsewhere GAME - OVER for engine you need mental health ?
I have done the same thing. Brass is softer metal than steel. I understand your logic, however, like Paul said: as long as you don’t do it like a crazy ape. I soaked all the liquid out with a rag and then walnut blasted with that special attachment that allows to stick the end of a vacuum hose. Works great!
@@ericsanchez3959 the head isn't steel
I've done the same thing, powerfoam worked amazing. I let it sit for an hour first. I believe I used either brass or plastic brushes. I then installed a AOS and didn't get much if any more build up after 30k miles. This was on a Subaru and the valves were much more recessed.
Great video!
In Europe, models from 2013-2017 have dual port from factory, avoiding this problem and better fueling for stage 3 tuning...
Was about to comment this! MPI is an option for pre facelift cars that is not that expensive.
@@XxSmokeeyxX so it can be retrofitted to DI (non-EU) cars? Cool!
@@petermolnar8667 of course. It's very popular on prefacelift cars. Unfortunately VW removed it and started using GPF instead for emissions.
I’ve actually looked into this myself. All the information I’ve found says that tuning is required to support MPI. So $800 ish for the kit plus a custom tune. Unless you’re planning to upgrade the turbo and go stage 3, seems it would make more sense to just pay for the cleaning. It’s likely only once in the lifetime of the car anyway. I’m just over 110,000 miles on my mk7 GTI and haven’t experienced any misfires, or drop in fuel economy that’s unrelated to a heavy right foot.
When I had my 2011 MK6 GTI, B12 and other strong cleaners weren’t available where I lived (Alberta, Canada). Canadian Tire just has your usual carb cleaners. Found that fresh oil soaked overnight (maybe only a few hours actually required) helped soften up the carbon, suspend it and also made it easier to clean everything. Used paper towel at first to soak up and remove everything and then compressed air to finish it off. Works very well and if any happens to get passed the valve stems or go down into the engine, I’m not worrying about it mixing with the existing engine oil and causing issues (as opposed to some strong cleaner seeping in).
Great video, I have performed the scrape and suck method and had great results. I also used gun brushes in fluid to finish and was able to get great results without having to use media blast. I recommend doing this every 30 to 50K.
What tool do you use to suck up the fluid?
@@i-khailvision7307I reckon you can just blast it out with compressed air
I recommend buying a car, that doesn't require this stupid procedure every 30 to 50 k, lol.
Just rev it
@@less_vanity5820 Nope, the revving up does not clean that shit. But the Egr-valve-off , Does the Best result 4 the Engine, which than stays Clean 4 Many Decades !!! ! !!!
Living in Copenhagen, driving cars and motorcycles, some experience with this. Lots of daily slow driving.
Then going on vacation to France. German autobahn, + 600 miles, 90-110 mph in average.
Coming home,- 40-50% better milage, on the motorcycles - much higher top speed.
Must come down to better flow. Getting the path through the engine cleaned up.
My dad used a trick,- spraying sparkling water in the intake with the engine running,- kicks the nasty stuff off. But be carefull, we don't like huge chunks falling into the cylinder running :)
The cleaning process is very good but I would use a nylon drill cleaning brush, I spray the valves with penetrating spray before using the liqui moly cleaner.
So those valves are impeccable.
I probably should do this on my '14 Cayman S with the 3.4 liter engine, but it runs perfect. I have a borescope at home, but getting it down that long winding intake looks like a huge hassle, not to mention you have to remove the rear interior just to get at the engine in the first place.
Great video!
Seafoam makes a great product if you can get to your throttle body it spray into the throttle body while running. What i do is make a tiny hole in the cai hose right by the throttle body push the hose through while car is running spray you have to work the idle to keep it from stalling
@@roninthedestroyer8958 wil not work ...lots off video's to proof that seafoam and al the other products dont do much if sprayed into to the trotle body.
Sometimes it even got worse!
I didn't have any noticeable cold start misfires on my MK6 GTI until about 170-180K miles. I ran Chevron 89 or 91 octane fuel exclusively and never added any fuel additives. When I pulled the intake it was a horror show of carbon build-up. Took me a few days of soaking, and cleaning using a variety of methods mentioned here until I was happy with the results. While the intake was off, I changed the fuel injectors and their seals and replaced the intake with the newest revision which VW recommended in a recall anyway. Once it was put back together, it literally ran like new...and still does at 215,000 miles. Just changed the timing chain, guides and tensioner for good measure a few weeks ago. Love the car, it's been amazing.
Do you plan on keeping it?
Yes, my son is driving it now and in the process of buying it from me. @@Da_Jrac
Was that the first time the car had its chains done at 215k miles?
@@wavey_lit6046 Yes, first time the front cover had ever been off the engine. Half of the mileage on the car has been freeway in 6th gear. In my opinion, it's not the chains that are a concern, but the tensioner and chain-guides (which I also replaced). Last week my thermostat froze shut, and my temp gauge spiked for about 2 minutes, hopefully I didn't damage the head or head gasket. I'm in the process of replacing the water pump (and included thermostat) right now. I've had very few problems with this car, but it's age is catching up with it I think.
I just want to say, the overall video was real informative, and a lot of good advice was suggested here, however, I want to add a personal anecdote that conflicts with a statement made
The Gen 3 2.0T engines do have carbon buildup issues, though not as major as the Gen 2s and the older 2.0T FSI Motors. My 8V S3 started having Cold Start Misfires around 70k Miles that got progressively worse, and when I finally cleaned the valves around 80k, there was a tremendous improvement.
The Audi dealer local to me still recommends a Carbon Cleaning on the newer 2.0Ts at around 100k, so while the service interval has moved, their is still some Carbon Buildup that the revised PCV on the Gen 3 and newer motors that it can't resolve
Yep, I hear a lot about carbon buildup on mqb's with the 2.0t. My gti is around 142k and needs one bad, just haven't had the time to get to it
Thank you - I was doubting myself after his comment in the video - Ours has 75k, just started getting cold start issues (with the cooler weather). Replacing coils and plugs didn't fix the problem. I think I'm going to have to dig in before the snow flies
Mine shot a injector 4 malfunction code at 118k my intake is caked 2017 gti
Just shut that dumb Egr-valve off, and you will Not have this dirty exhaust shit in your engine anymore as before .
Paul is the only person that could say the dumbest/funniest things and somehow have my full attention when explaining something serious 😂😂
It's the glasses
@@Traeh93 Maybe I should wear 2 glasses......I'll be unstoppable!
@@Deutscheautoparts this guy!💀😭😂
@@Deutscheautoparts one but double glazed 😆
Yeah he says some dumb stuff alright- like the fuel quality matters regarding carbon and sludge fouling of intake valves that are never in contact with fuel.
AS an Aeronautical Engineer I would advise getting the valves as clean as possible as future build up will be slower on a cleaner valve.
Did the hand scrape and zip tie method last year on my b8.5 s5, worked pretty well. Definitely worth doing if you have the charger off for whatever reason.
How long did it take you I’m looking to do my s5 b8 v8
@@aqib2000 the procedure only takes about 30min to an hour. Getting the top end apart is a good half day adventure. If your not a regular wrencher plan on a weekend job.
@aqibi2000 The bulk of the cleaning gets done within 5-7min per port, maybe a little longer per depending on how much carbon and how clean you want it. I used a toothbrush with some cleaner to finish up. It can be done in a day if you hustle but more of a weekend project.
@@Mekanik.b Thanks for the info. Does a car need to be in neutral when rotating the crankshaft?
I DIY'ed the water pump at 150k km thanks to your tutorial and now I just did the carbon clean off at 190k km (120k miles). I had some intermittent check engine light and VCDS made me think it was a dead injector but when I opened it up it was quite like in this golf. Anyway thanks a lot for this!
I've gotten good results soaking the valves in Berryman's Chemtool and using a series of picks and nylon and brass brushes. Not quite as good as walnut blasting but cleaner than what you achieved with just picks and brake cleaner.
I have another "tool" try out for your consideration. Furnace or boiler brushes are used to clean out carbon soot from the internals of boilers and hot air furnaces. Sets of these tools are available from any plumbing or HVAC supplier and presumably Amazon. They come in a variety of shapes and sizes. Brush work plus brake clean solvent might be an effective way to address this problem.
Also you can do a zip ties AROUND the zip ties in 3 places to allow the final end to flare out, while the rest stay as a single unit.
I use Carbon-Off. It is sold as a decarbonizer for pots and pans in the restaurant industry, but it also works great for melting off baked-on carbon. It doesn't hurt metals, and is not particularly harsh.
Instead of rinsing with water per the directions, wipe out everything with a rag.
Excellent explanation and I also enjoyed the comparison between the different cleaning methods. Well done! This youtube video is actually very helpful and covers just about all the bases.
I’ve been putting it off for my MK6, perfect timing! You convinced me to go with media blasting, seems the best way to not f- it up.
Have done carbon cleanings on lots of gen3 2.0Ts and they definitely do have the same issue. Many of them I've seen at relatively low mileage with lots of buildup
Cheap gas and infrequent oil changes?
@@SouthsideTaxi Nope, just the Egr-valve shitty idiotism which is polluting every engine.
Had to get this done on my previous car (2012 Rio5) as it was DI and my fuel economy was dropping and was having some minor stall/hesitation issues with the a CEL once in a while. A local shop did it for me. I'm not sure exactly, what they did, but they did use a special cleaner on it. No idea if they removed the intake or not, but it worked good enough that I never had issue again. When I replaced that car with a new one, I went with a Toyota with the D4S system. All the benefits of DI without any of the negatives as it has both port and direct injection.
I have an idea for the zip tie hack: instead of zip ties, get a long drinking straw cleaner brush. They’re like pipe cleaners but made a bit stronger than kid’s crafts items. Wonder how well that would work.
Yeah I’m honestly confused they didn’t even talk about using a brush. Seems like the obvious answer to me!
Harbor freight sells a brush set that includes a bunch of cone shaped brushes in plastic and metal, and can be attached to a drill. Those work like a charm. It's what I use along with media blast, and chemicals to get that factory fresh finish.
Beautiful video, very informative. There are two areas you need to be careful. Be careful that gasoline ( petrol) is getting spilt while you are removing the intake manifold, the second thing you need to be careful is not using a short mandrel or zip ties as you will be taking your drilling machine too close and can cause accidental digging of the metal. The best I learnt in my 40 years of experience is using a no 100 water emery sheet pasted with glue rolled over a round wooden stick 7 inches long, 8mm thick the sand paper will open due to the centrifugal force and will clean everything. But prior to this I was told to use toilet cleaning hydrochloric acid to soak and soften the hardened carbon deposits that you can remove with a cotton ball and a similar pick you used. I had a guru or teacher as you may understand who taught me the same way you pulled the valves up so nothing gets into the cylinder. I have worked on the older gen carburettor vehicles but not on injection vehicles I don't know if timing would get changed , in carb vehicles I had to use a timing light to get it fixed. I really enjoyed your video. Great stuff.
I've used a soft toothbrush, a vacuum, and e85 with great results. Its more about soak time. If you leave the e85 in the intake port overnight it does great.
Great tip!
@@Deutscheautoparts Even though I know shops can't park cars overnight like that to do soaks 24/7 you guys should make a video. It gets the intake ports so clean they are silvery aluminum again.
@@kanadaijuharszirup 85% ethanol and 15% gasoline from the pump. It melts fuel varnish away in old gas tanks in seconds is how we got the idea. Its a fantastic cleaner.
@@Deutscheautoparts ive only cleaned up ports in 3 engines & used tergo strip paint stripper.. soak port for 15-20 mins the hose out.. wd40 after air blast dry.. has been quick & simple & no visible corrosion.. did one head twice & its ports & valves had no signs of black residue at all.. one head was off the engine & did chambers too seperate to ports & plugging the oil galleries.. didn't notice any water finding its way past the valves..
Perfect honest video - after reading so many dodgy and destructive and ineffective methods on the web, I am now totally confident that the scraper and zip tie method will fix this issue at 80-90% of the effectiveness of walnut/vapour blasting - cheaper too and thus one can maybe do it again in 10-20k miles to compensate for the slight difference in efficiency.
One suggestion
I worry about sharp steel scrapers/points scratching a valve stem or poppet head stres raiser causing a broken valve.
I suggest using a piece of copper pipe instead, maybe 3/8 or 1/2 dia with a semi circle shovel sharp edge cut out at the end to scrape the valve.
The curved shape will enable the easy scraping of the back of the valve stem and the softer copper will make no marks or imprint on the valve.
Thanks again great honest presentation too.
Exactly, scrapping and scratching is not wise. Soda ash is far the best quick and easy.
Blasted the valves with walnut shells on my wife’s 2.0L turbo Santa Fe, restored its power. Wife said her car was fun to drive again.
Did you do it yourself or get it done at a shop?
@@theposerhoser did it myself.
Can you share links of what you purchased? Im losing hope @@jerrykurl69
I just bought a cheap media blaster and the plate with a vacuum adapter and hole for blasting. Far less work than picking or brushing off the carbon and it produces the best results. If you clean the valves every ten or fifteen thousand miles then it’s less work each time and your engine’s power and efficiency is always tip top.
The very best solution is an engine with both port and direct injection. Toyota doesn’t have a single engine with only direct injection, they always combine it with port injection to keep the valves clean. The decision to use only GDI is made by bean counters who don’t care what happens to the engine after the warranty expires.
What media blaster do you recommend for a cheap price? I need to do this job soon and I feel the same way about it being less time
Thanks, Paul! Your timing is flawless - I’m about to do this cleaning this week on my Mk7 and you addressed a ton of things I was curious about
And Don't 4get 2 cut cut off the Egr polluter of the engine tooo.
@@bustjanzupan1074?? Before cleaning? What is that?
@@The1Real1Cheese Because the "Egr" valve immediatelly pollutes your engine back on the old way. That is why it is essential to cut it off, 2 Not do any further damage 2 your engine.
My 103K mi 2010 VW CC had its valves cleaned with nut shells. I was not prepared for the increase in power. But what was really amazing was that at 70 mph highway driving I in a 3 hour standard driving loop that I do. I was able to get 11mpg to 12 mpg increase. Which when my car was new I was getting about 4mpg worse. So, I am actually getting better mpg now than when my car was new.
Thank you for this video Paul. I've been wanting to crack open my Q5's intake to service some parts and clean the valves. I wonder how well dry ice blasting would work. Keep up the great work.
Never thought about that sounds like a good idea, I would make sure valves closed do one at a time, Vacum up mess
And do not 4get 2 get your Egr valve on off, 2 not get such dirt back into a clean engine ever again !!! ! !!!
I just use the a can from CGC before every other oil change and it does the trick for me. I don't have to disassemble my intake and it's cheap. I know there's gonna be carbon in there, but I can definitely notice the difference if I let it go for longer than ten thousand miles. The cold-start misfires are non existent and the power is there. I even scan with vagcom to see if any of the cylinders misfire especially in the winter. It's done a great job at keeping the build-up at bay.
I know it's probably not the project you talked about that's a secret, but it would kind of be dope if y'all made a *_Mazda 3 TCR_* since it uses the *_Volkswagen Mk7 GTI EA888 engine._*
Considering mazda decided not to actually do it and y'all are Volkswagen/Audi people, I figured it would be a nice experiment for y'all. I don't know, I just figured it would be a dope thing to put on your channel
Hello back in the days of Mercedes Benz and this was from one of their support techs. Most 420 models had a lot of buildup on the intake valves cars ran like crap esp cold due to people using cheap gas. What we were told to use was oven cleaner the original no frills with lemony smell. We had to pull intake and valve covers remove intake rockers. We would spray all the valves filling each intake port let it soak for some time, then the fun part came in. We used a high pressure washer that had hot water and blasted them cleaned like brand new. The only draw back was the splash back shielding helped and so did the garbage bag suit with face shield. Yup regular oven cleaner, we did not have the stuff you have today. Maybe you may want to give it a try with the wire ties, never thought of that. Great video.
the active ingredient there is lye. It can burn you if you aren't careful
Cut the zip ties longer and place a 3/4 -- 1.5 inch long piece of 3/8 -- 1/2 inch diameter clear tubing (depending on your car) over the zip ties and use the tubing to control the zip ties while they spin in the drill
Good video as this is an issue with most high mileage vehicles. I like the idea of using the baking soda over ground walnut pieces. Baking soda can even be used to strip paint surprisingly.
This issue of the pollution of the engine comes just from the Egr valve, and is Not caused because of the hight mileage. I have seen engines Clean after 300 miles, but with the Egr-off . So, after the clenaing of the engine, make sure, that this issue does Not repeat again, by shutting off the egr valve.
For me, the best video on that carbon build up .
200000000 thumbs up.
love your way to explain......
I didn't realize boroscopes were so cheap, but our 2018 pathfinder with VQ35DD has direct injection - I manually cleaned the carbon deposits off, and use seafoam about once a year before an oil change for preventive maintenance.
Get the one with side camera also
The spoon shaped o-ring tools are good for scraping the wider areas. I found the hook pick to be great for the back of the valve stems and a 90 and an angled pick good for getting around the valve seat. Removing the bulk with picks followed by media blast is the most efficient and quickest way. Bore brushes may seem like a good way to go, but they gum up almost instantly.
It is so sad that modern cars are so much ridiculous maintenence. I only bought a new car because of busting my azz with 2 jobs all day and night 6 days a week . its like the stufff we thought was crap from the 60 s , seems so superior now, and this channel is so facinating anyway !
Paul, your timing is impeccable. I plan on doing this to my B8.5 this weekend. Phenomenal video as always!
When i cleaned mine my media blaster wasnt working so i had to improvise and use gasoline. Then i used a combo of picks/hooks and a bundle of long zipties. Worked pretty good
That media blast is freaking dope!!!! Also for the zip tie method actually happy with those results!
Here are my concerns with this, and I have a couple. First is I wouldn't even consider doing any of this without pressurizing the cylinder to prevent debris/fluid from entering it. Next, scratching the surfaces with a metal pic is creating metal shavings, so now you have carbon and metal in the mix being carried by a liquid possibly into the cylinder during the cleaning. Next, adding any abrasive on top of all that and you're really asking for cylinder and ring wear. There is no way you are removing the deposits/abrasive/shavings from against the valve seats at minimum, at worst its coated everything and upon startup where does it end up...between your cylinder walls and rings or your valve seats. While spraying media, you think it's not getting past the valve seal or valve seat. There is a reason that air filters are 99.9% efficient at 2 micron at minimum. If you want to remove carbon or oil sludge remove the head and do it right, oh and pb blaster works well.
That's my thoughts roughly. With the valves closed the walnut, or whatever used, couldn't possibly clean everything. It defies common sense. Liquid intake cleaners don't inspire confidence either against hard carbon, which you don't want bouncing around in the cylinder anyway. A simple cold start injector upstream of the valves would fix everything.
@@fendermonIt works. I walnut blasted my mazdaspeed6 and it cleaned 100k work of junk off it. No issues and it runs much better
@@sevenmileshome Thank you, very glad to hear it.
Copper stranded wire, soft enough to not harm anything but stiff enough to work quickly. Been using it for decades. Standard 120v house wire cheap as sin as it last for many jobs.
Remove carbon on top of pistons by getting it nice and hot and mist water into the intake, the crap that comes out of the tail pipes is crazy. In the 80's it was common tune up use.
CRC intake valve and turbo cleaner works excellent on my 1.6 DIG turbo Nissan. The PEA (polyether Amine) does work very well without having to soak or scrape the valves. And I did confirm it’s effectiveness by viewing the valves before/after.
I use the same and you are right. it works pretty good.
Did you spray it in the intake or directly on the valves?
@@Jimster481 I just followed the directions on the back. Warm up the engine, then I removed the MAP which is just before the throttle body and sprayed it directly into there in small sprays while maintaining RPM 2000-2500. I usually do this every other oil change
@@Jimster481Directly on inlet throttle valve.
@@SuperChewy808 well I also did this with my QX80 and I can tell you when I opened the engine at 145k there was tons of carbon.
The absolute best solution to this problem is buying a car that has either just Port injection or dual injection ('cuse, guess what, Port injection is usually better at very low and very high RPM)
The zip tie bit was an actual TSB from Volkswagen/ Audi back in the day..🤔
Just did this job today at work, im finding media blast with walnut first, then i soak with liqui moly throttle body cleaner to melt the rest works best. I did it the other way around and the wal nuts just create a goopy mess with the melted carbon.
Would take me 2hrs without the water pump job this way, on a mk6 without the studs probably 1.6hrs
Would have thought string trimmer line would be a bit easier to manage in a drill than cable ties. Multiple diameters, cores, twists, and so forth are available. Mix and match and cut varying lengths.
The square 0.155" trimmer line works great. Soak the valves with BG carb cleaner & let set for an hour.
There are also rotary long stem wire brush balls that work well with a drill motor.
You can also go to the hardware store & buy copper pipe cleaners, cut off the handles & use your drill motor.
@@BobSmith-mc7uq I wouldn't use anything steel in a brush, which the pipe cleaners are
Chevy V6 LGX with GDI - appreciated this video, even if it's not for my car's engine... thank you!
Any reason why the gen 3 Ea888 motors don’t see as many carbon build up issues? To my understanding the euro gen 4 motors went to dual port but every gen 3 motor sold here is still only DI. Any Vw dual port engines here in the U.S?
As an EA888 owner, I’m curious how they prevent this build-up too!
yeah i was curious, ive got a 2019 GTI and I thought all of these engines had these issues, but apparently gen 3 EA888 dont have that problem?
They do have buildup, Charles checked his I recall and it wasn't great
2017 GTI owner here, Paul's claim that EA888 gen3 don't have this issue is bunk. At 50k miles my car had the intake valves looking just like the 1.8 in the video at 80k. I've had the car since new, 7-8000 miles oil changes with the right oil (LM or Motul), only 93 gas, all the maintenance done on time; on the downside it does have stg2 tune (w/ supporting mods) and gets about a dozen track days per year, so maybe a stock car that only gets driven around town will have much less carbon, but again "gen3 EA888 don't have this problem" is BS.
I did my own media blasting cleaning and it came out perfect. I got the Harbor Freight media blaster, the nozzle from FCP Euro and bought wallnut shells media from Amazon. Also replaced the water pump that started to leak, very easy to do with the intake off.
Probably improved pcv system
In Hungary we clean it with grinded walnut shells! It is like a powder. No joke. They blow it through the engine. It's gonna be like brand new. Cleans up everything. There are well known car magazines who made interviews with specialized garages.
You should be using Carburettor Cleaner as it is 1000 times better than brake cleaner at dissolving carbon. Brake cleaner is a degreaser.
Yup 👍🏽 I use the supertech throttle body cleaner from Walmart it’s got more of the active ingredient acetone in it and cheaper too I always pick up a extra few cans and it’s very effective against both soft and baked on hard carbon
Use carb cleaner and a brass brush on the plates -- nice and clean without much effort. I used CRC intake cleaner to soak and pick the valves, followed by carb cleaner.
Quick question, I'm buying a 85k miles 2019 golf 1.4. Should I be worried? Thanks a lot
same question here, 77.5k miles 2019 jetta 1.4. can't seem to find anything covering this topic for our engines.
Toyota dual injection is the obvious engineering solution, Pure DI is always going to give problems.
This is so easy fix. I do this by driving hard revving engine to redline. And it couldn’t be better. There is no need to use any additional treatment. Driving hard long is the way to go.
Wrong, you have accomplished nothing
@@Deutscheautoparts what do you know. shows you have no idea about engine. i have a 603000 km engine and it is in great shape. no carbon deposits on valves and piston crowns. you just dont know about engine, seriously, instead spouting expensive ways of doing this which is crap anyway.
Volkswagen is charging $1300 for that service
Cap. Mine was done at vw for $900
Still fair. Taking my engine apart and cleaning the engine is an ass kicker. I’m wishing I had just paid to do it.
@@njlucas3357Still expensive considering you can do it yourself for absolutely nothing.
5000
My method for cleaning my L8T 6.6 liter is converting it to port injection and a Stage 2 cam swap. So from 401 hp to over 500 hp and no more worry about carbon build up.
too bad we in the US don't get dual injection
Zip tie aren't bad idea! Soak it and zip tie it. + some pick scrapping. Thanks!
Step one: dont buy a direct injection car
All kias, Hyundais and most automakers use them now 😑 blows ass. Also, they burn oil. About a quart wil burn off in between oil changes. You'll know you're low from the increased strength of the exhaust fumes. Oil light doesn't come on until AFTER a quart burns off
Diesel owners: 😬
You obviously don’t have one or know shit about them. Burning oil is false, they require cleaning, but all cars do today as egr systems are the larger issue
Just spray hydrogenperoxide with water when engine running. I remember back in early 90s there was a company in Sweden called MISAB (Motor Italia Svenska AB) that sold a kit with watercontainer, nozzle, plate for nozzle, and an electrical pump with cable harness. The mixture was peroxide and water and they told that compression increased and soot removal. Nozzle was set in adapterplate on intake manifold. This was for like Dellorto, Weber carburator. I remember that other sparkplugs was needed. I also remember a friend that put this kit on a 1984 Volvo Turbo 2.1L that had mechanical fuel injection. The seller from MISAB shown the results and we all was amazed at the time.
How about an engine that doesn't eat its own poop? The root of this problem is not direct injection, but the incredibly stupid emissions exhaust gas recirculation system. Without EGR the intake valves would never be exposed to exhaust soot.
Is there an aftermarket EGR bypass somewhere?
@@jordanburrack6404 blocker plates exist, but they are highly regulated as emissions bypass equipment
Nice video. Water injection will prevent the carbon returning. We used to de carbon combustion chambers by spaying water down the intake on a warm engine. Worked ok.
DI is such a bad design. You'll never convince me otherwise.
How is it a bad design?
The best is dual injection for sure
Agreed, but MPI adds double the injectors and more complexity. You'd imagine 1 larger injector upstream in the manifold and after the throttle body could help mitigate
@@diydrivenGA Indeed!
I'm a fan of the Stratified XtraFuel system for this reason, and am considering adding it to my GTI
Wat the hell u talking
My uncle, who was an army mechanic in the early 70’s, would take a glass of water and slowly pour in down the carb, with the car rev’ed up, to clean out the carbon.
0:13 Direct injectors aren't amazing...
You can do it with solvent, zip ties, and brushes. However, on heavily caked valves this will take AWHILE! If you have the means, invest in a media blaster or phone a friend.
Did a gen 3 EA888A by hand and it took a few hours to make them like new. Soak, pick, scrub, rinse. Over and over and over for each cylinder.
People go through a lot to keep their European cars happy. I just stripped a glow plug in my 2002 golf TDI. I hope I bought the right thread repair kit wish me luck.
1.The zip ties have to be snipped at different angles and slighty different lengths.
2. Warm the engine up, remove the intake, using 3 cans of brake cleaner 1 per 2 cylinders for a 6cyl or 2 for a 4 banger, spray let sit a few mins, then get to work with zipties and spray after the brake cleaner dries.
3. When all done, get a beer and change the oil and filter if needed.
I was thinking that opening the port injection ports might help 1.) gives access to a boroscpoe without taking the intake off 2.) gives access to the valves without removing the intake. 3.) Allows you to clean the ports over a longer term.
Some valves have special coatings on them. Be sure to check first so you don't damage your valves.
No, the nitrate is tooo hard 2 get it off. Sometimes it may change the colour after rubbing it, but it can Not get off.
Tip: Epoxy or hot glue the square ends of the zip ties together so they won't fall apart as easily. Personally, I love the walnut blast, but those ties can help. Great vid thanks for sharing.
Great video, but I am surely interested in the use of another chemicals.. 1st :oven cleaners contain chemicals such as potassium hydroxide and sodium hydroxide. These chemicals eat up carbonized parts, but it desolves also aluminum! As the heads are mostly made of aluminum this isnt the correct choice. 2nd : Metasoak, this is safe for aluminum, but I cant buy that stuff in The Netherlands and would like to know how good this works!
thanks for warning me, I wanted to use oven cleaner for this. I used oven cleaner on the intake on my diesel bmw that has a plastic intake. It didn't eat up the plastic tho...
1. Rotate the engine until the intake valve is closed.
2. Spray a f-ton of WD-40 on the back of the valve.
3. Let the crap marinate overnight (2 nights if it's stubborn).
4. Blow crap out with compressed air.
5. Marvel at how all the crap flies right off , leaving everything perfectly shiny!
Probably works for exhaust too.
I don’t have a media blaster… surely a dremel with flexshaft and very soft wire brush would be the next best thing? Obviously being careful of the valve seats and not being too heavy handed!
I do the old Italian tune up. Today after replacing the stock intake manifold on my 2010 Jetta 2.5L with IE's power kit at 163k miles, seeing how clean my valves were, I'll continue to just stick with that lol
Our Honda CRV 1.5 T CRV GDI went into the dealership because I wanted them to check if there was any build up at it was nearly on 70k miles, there was no build up of any significance I asked them for screen shots to prove it and they were spot on just a light dusting of Carbon. The Honda tech guy said Honda built in a valve rotation to mitigate excessive carbon fouling, seems to be working on the Honda Earth dreams units
Simple, drive a car with port injection. Solved!
K24 still got plenty of zip, without the hassle :)
Easy Off oven cleaner dissolves carbon a lot, too! There is a warning on aluminum. I'd used wire brush or stiff nylon brush after 10min, let soak continue, repeat brushing advances carbon layer reduction. Then suction out & water rise, air pressure blast or air dry. If any thin layer still exists then dry brush,. The softened carbon will turn to dust.
I had a misfire on my C230 and dumped in two containers of injector cleaner on an 1/8 tank. Changed the entire ignition and fuel injectors and the intake ports were spotless.
HI DAP Guys,
as I sad on the other clips of Your carbon checkups , take a 1750km trip on speedy highways engine gets rid of carbon valves!
My city driving for 180000km make carbon build up day after day!
Keep doin,
Johnny
Would you say the 2025 GTI engine would still have these problems or is it updated?