Cleaning carbon with water

[camaro_speedemon]

My friend told me that if you sprayed water into the intake, not a lot and not dump it into the intake, that it would help boil off the carbon on the valves. I was bored yesterday and I was like, I'll give it a try because I'm getting a hesitation in light throttle. I didn't notice a change, and didn't help the hesitation either. I was wondering if anyone knew how effective this actually is.

[defrag]

ummm water in the engine????


thats a big nono

[V6MaroFL]

I haven't heard of this, but I will have to agree with defrag in saying its probably not a good idea.

If you are hesitating, seafoam that bad boy :cool:

[Tyler]

unless you want to hydro lock your car.... go for it. lol

[camaro_speedemon]

<blockquote>quote:</font><hr>Originally posted by defrag:
ummm water in the engine????


thats a big nono<hr></blockquote>

Hmmm, then whats water injection? I'm talking about using a squirt bottle spraying, not dumping a gallon of water into the intake.

I already did it yesterday, and my engine is running fine. I should be a little more specific, spraying water in the intake when the engine is running while having someone holding the revs at about 2k or so.

[ May 04, 2003: Message edited by: camaro_speedemon ]</p>

[y87inside]

There were big discussions about this on my old message board.... thirdgen.org

They said something to the effect that if you mist water into the TB after the engine has reached operating temp that the water would acutally boil off or partially boil off carbon deposits. There were many testimonies to the fact that this did actually work. I tried it on my TBI 305 and it did seem to help with the throttle response. Hope this helps a bit.

[John_D.]

That is an old trick, I haven't heard anyone bring it up in a long time. It's a lot like steam cleaning the insides of the combustion chamber...

Another old method, specifically for cleaning valves, on carb cars, was to pour a can of cleaner made for this, down the throat of the carb while holding it to about 2000-2500 rpms. Just fast enough to choke it down but not kill it. At least with this stuff, if you killed it, it would start back up pretty easily. If you killed it with water, it was harder to start up again.

Sea foam is probably similar to the old style valve cleaner, but designed to be sucked up in a vacuum line instead of poured in the carb.

On the newer cars, light throttle hesitation is more likely to be a sensor going off. TPS or MAF would be likely culprits. (or an egr valve hanging open a little)

[ianwells100]

i was talking to a friend, who fixes airplane engines, he says the water idea is applicable for airplane engines (small ones), he also said an old trick was to add a bit of talcom powder to the intake, and then some water and this would basically fill in any imperfections in the cylinders therefore helping compression ratios...

i don't know if these would work in our cars, so what i just wrote was probably useless, unless you fix airplane engines [img]smile.gif[/img]

[Bliggida]

Maybe if you removed the intake or throttle body, and pressure washed it with over 2000 PSI of water. Then hit it with compressed air. That might clean it out.

Shooting water into your engine with a spray bottle? What'd you think? you're firing up a Top Fuel Dragster?

[Blue94V6]

I was trying to find a place to buy sea foam today and I met up with an SCCA racer at a Parts Plus that told me about the water trick. He said run to about a pint through a 4 cylinder engine. I don't know how much you would use for a 6 though.

[chkptcharlie]

why play with water.... seems like a waste of time to me, when a can of seafoam is made for the job. the water might work, but just be cautions to how you use it.