What's up, fellas.

As I wrote in a previous thread, my engine was missing its oil separator for the full-load breather tube, which meant that oil was being sucked through my intake, through the throttle body and intake manifold, and into the cylinders. I've solved that particular problem...if you're interested, you can read about it HERE.

I've now got my intake manifold off and I'm doing some top-end maintenance. As expected, my intake ports (from the intake manifold to the valves) are quite dirty, from all of the oil that was previously being sucked through the system. It looks like the car's previous owner drove without the oil separator for quite some time.

I'd like to clean my intake ports while the intake manifold is off. But I don't want to dislodge crap that would then fall into the valve area below.

Any ideas on how to best clean these intake ports? The ports nearest the throttle body are the dirtiest...here's one of those.





Thanks in advance...I'm sure glad I have you guys to talk to, because my wife and two daughters are NO HELP with this kind of stuff!

 

I suppose if I said, "I'd leave it alone" it wouldn't be what you wanted to hear. Look at it this way, no chance of rinsing crap into the cylinders and maybe they're just sticky enough to grab little pieces of stuff that made it past the air filter, etc. There's certainly nothing there that will cause any problems.

 

Yeah, I'm a bit of a clean freak and would hate to leave it that way. But sometimes leaving things alone is a good option.

If someone has an idea, though, I'm all ears.

 

+1

The most important thing with cylinder heads is valves and valve seats have no blow-by.

The sight of that carbon around the valves, stems and in the ports may upset the 'clean freak' in you but nothing you can do with the cylinder heads in place is going to make any performance improvement.

Graham

 

Actually, the Valves themselves look Quite Clean. I have seen Much Worse. I agree with the above, even if the coating on the passage was removed, there would not be any improvement in performance.

 

I'm going to ditto the above comments. The intake ports actually look pretty good and any attempt to clean them could result in a particle getting lodged under a valve seat. It looks pretty good to me and if it were mine I would be very satisfied and leave it alone.

EZDriver 95 XJ6 2000 XK8

 

OK guys...thanks for the advice. I'll leave the intake passages alone.

With all of the upper engine components off, there's plenty of other cleaning I can do anyway.

 

Maybe this is one of the one in a million times that the dreaded seafoam might actually be useful?

If you really must, then a foot long pair of surgical forceps, torn up t-shirt, and throttle body cleaner could do the trick. Make sure to rotate the engine such that the intakes are closed at the cylinder you are working on and spray the cleaner on the rag, not the port.

Your car, your risk, etc.

 

I would grind it all out and give it a bit of a polish, main issue you will have, you need to take it off to do it, you dont really want all those grindings getting stuck in valve stems, unless you are willing to have a major strip down leave it alone

 

Oh lord, no. That would just like me, though, to start with replacing knock sensors and having a look around, and end up pulling both heads.

I'll leave it!

Here's one thing I did notice, however...after the fuel system was depressurized, there was still some fuel left in the rail, obviously. When I pulled the fuel injectors, some of this fuel from the rail flowed down into the intake ports. Where the valves were open, the fuel poured directly into the cylinder, and where the valves were closed I can see the fuel sitting in there, on top of the valves.

Is this any kind of problem?

 

Stick a paper towel in there and suck it up. No big deal.

 

If you want to feel a kick try this stuff on a regular basis. I seems to work for me.

http://www.wynnsusa.com/pdf/spec-sheet_9M1465.pdf

 

Hello.There is one thing you could do.Is have an injector cleaner performed on the motor.It not only clean the injectors but at the same time the cleaner work well on materiel glued to all the injection system.I have tried it on my xjs and had a good result.

 

No NO NO you dont want to polish it...thats very 1970's ..a slight roughness causes turbulence in the air which helps mix fuel and air .

 

The best way to minimize the build-up is to use fuel system cleaner in the fuel, it will keep this stuff to a minimum. I run cleaner through all my vehicles at every oil change , including the motorcycles and jet skis. I use Techron, but I have also tried BG44K and it is just as good. My Mercedes V8 has vacuum actuated intake runner flaps and the cleaner has kept them from sticking from oil buildup and breaking like some folks have had happen. Saved many hundreds of dollars in repairs.

 

Another vote for Chevron Techron. All of our vehicles get a 20-ounce bottle down the fuel filler hatch at every oil & filter change. Look for the BOGO sales at Advance Auto and Autozone from time to time and stock up....

 

Great info. Thanks