fuel injector cleaner

[Idontwantapickle]

IMHO, fuel injector cleaner is snake oil alcohol. Over the counter products do well at cleaning intake ports and valves. In my experience, the only way to clean an electronic fuel injector is an ultrasonic process like Asnu. http://www.asnu.com/

Agreed. Except they are mostly alcohol. Y’all hate alcohol in gas, right?

Hunter

[JJ]

Agreed. Except they are mostly alcohol. Y�all hate alcohol in gas, right?

Hunter

For Lucas Upper Cylinder Lubricant

[JoeW]

Fortunately with modern engines and fuel , carbon isn't much of a problem 

 Dusty

I have to disagree here Dusty. With port injected EGR and the crankcase venting upstream from the throttle bodies, the modern automobile engine has plenty of build up issues. Most dealers own and walnut shell blaster to clean buildup on the intake valves. BMW was the first company I saw use this method. The other thing I've seen is all the EGR pipes plug except one or 2, so all the exhaust gasses get dumped into those cylinders. Multiple random misfires!

[Delta425]

Port fuel injected engines DO NOT have carbon build up problems.  It is the GDI (Gasoline Direct Injected) engines that have carbon build up on the intake valves.

[JoeW]

Port fuel injected engines DO NOT have carbon build up problems.  It is the GDI (Gasoline Direct Injected) engines that have carbon build up on the intake valves.

I don't agree.

Sent from my VS988 using Tapatalk

[Delta425]

No offense, then you don't know the difference between the two.  Not calling you stupid, just ignorant of how the two differ.  I have two cars with port FI, one with 150K miles that the intake valves are perfectly clean (bore-scoped them).  Have a GDI engine with 30K and already has buildup.  I used the CRC GDI cleaner on this engine and valves cleaned up tremendously.  Will use a can at every oil change from now on. 

[Chuck in Indiana]

No offense, then you don't know the difference between the two.  Not calling you stupid, just ignorant of how the two differ.  I have two cars with port FI, one with 150K miles that the intake valves are perfectly clean (bore-scoped them).  Have a GDI engine with 30K and already has buildup.  I used the CRC GDI cleaner on this engine and valves cleaned up tremendously.  Will use a can at every oil change from now on.

I didn't really mean to start a fuel injector cleaner war.. 
but..
seriously, I wouldn't call Joe ignorant. He's been around these here parts for a long time.. 

[Delta425]

Dear JoeW:  I was only talking about the LAST THREE cars as an example.  I am not going to get into a "mine is bigger than yours" discussion with you to make myself feel important and special; I let that up to everyone on facebook and all the other social media, whatever-it-is.  I have nothing to prove; I was just pointing out a fact.   Anyways, I don't care who you are, what your "qualifications & experience" are; if you are wrong, you are wrong.  Heck, even Einstein was probably wrong a time or two.  Anyways, you say you have all this experience, but yet you do not know that GDI engines have a MUCH BIGGER problem with buildup on intake valves than PFI.....
OK, I'm done and out.  Have to go work 8V71 in a dump truck. 

[LowRyter]

There definitely is an issue with carbon build up on the intake manifold and valves for the direct injection engines.  The  Germans (VW/Audi) have some bad history.  The Japanese and American car companies, not so much.

You can google it.  That Scotty Kilmer vid I posted here explains it.  Of course, our bikes don't have GDI.

https://youtu.be/gg9ppeUMpK4

[RinkRat II]

 Atta Boy Chuck!  Meanwhile, Two years ago I needed to change the water pump, timing belt and do a general once over on my wife's 1991 Chrysler LeBaron V6 3.0 Mitsubishi motor, We've owned this car from new. 175,000 miles. I pulled it down to the block and while cleaning everything up I noticed minimal carbon deposits on the valves, piston tops etc. We have always put in a bottle of Techron or STP fuel injection cleaner about every 4th or 5th  tankful of gas and I believe it really helped. She still gets 30 plus miles to the gallon and doesn't burn a drop of oil. Only my $.02 YMMV.  I also do this ritual on all my vehicles.

       Paul B

[Perazzimx14]

Before using SeaFoam, Techron or other "treatments" look up their MSDS/SDS and you will see you are grossly over paying for Naphtha, kerosene, stoddard solvent/mineral spirits and alcohol. Some do have benzene but only in small amounts.

I used to use SeaFoam and at $6.50 for a 16oz can it turned out to be really expensive naphtha AKA white gas AKA camp fuel. Crown camp fuel in the walmart camping section is about $5.75 a gallon and a quart of K1 kerosene is less than $1. So you can roll 160 ounces of your own "Seafoam" for about $7 or you can pay about the same for a can 16 ounce of Seafoam.

If you look at the SDS for MMO it really ain't no mystery.

[screamday]

If you look at the SDS for MMO it really ain't no mystery.

So.....are you saying Marvel's Magic Mistery oil is superior? 

[Hugh Straub]

I cleaned the injectors on my 2006 Breva 750 by removing them from the bike and connecting a series of decreasing diameter plastic hoses from the injector to an aerosol can of injector cleaner.  The hoses were connected to each other by shrink tubing.  The last connection was to the red tube which comes with the can.  I wired the injector to a battery but did not complete the circuit until I pressurized the hoses with cleaner. Then I simply tapped a wire to a battery terminal opening the injector and the cleaner was sprayed through and out of the injector. Easy then to see the spray pattern and confirm the nozzle is clear. I read one must be careful only to make very quick taps of the wire to the battery to avoid injector damage

[Chuck in Indiana]

^^^^^ seems like a reasonable method to me. <scratching head> Still don't see anything wrong with it, but I'm clueless..

[Perazzimx14]

So.....are you saying Marvel's Magic Mistery oil is superior? 

Superior to what?

As per the SDS its:

60 - 100% Naphtha
10 - 30% Mineral spirits
less than 1.2% Benezene

[FGO]

Hi Chuck,
I'm back!  Do leave it with some seafoam in the tank to stabilize the gas, after running it a few miles.  This has worked well for me when I had my fleet and could not ride everything all the time and some were down for work.
Cheers bud,

[rodekyll]

Injectors are tested by firing them for a period of time -- 30sec, a minute . . .  and the volume they squirt in that time is measured against a standard.  Even your vdsts and guzzidiag tests fire for several seconds.  So I would not worry about long activations for cleaning.  What will kill them is firing them dry.  Always have pressurized fuel behind them. For that reason I always leave the injectors connected to the fuel rail when testing, even if I have to make a longer hose.

That said, there is a visual test to determine if you need to mess with them.  Pull the injector and put it in some thing to contain the fuel.  Leave everything connected.  Now fire the injector with a jumper or use the guzzidiag test.  If you see a uniformly-atomized cone of fuel spray, and if there is no drip before or after you trigger it, it's good.   If it sprays off to one side, has "bald spots" in the cone, or drips, even any at all, you've got a crud buildup or bad pump/relief pressure.

Why bother testing?  The solvent doesn't care where the varnishes and deposits are.  It just goes to work knocking it all loose -- from the inside of the tank, the hoses, etc.  All that potential crud is then sloshing loose and getting redeposited somewhere else -- probably in the injectors you're trying to clean, since the nozzles are the choke point.

So I never use the stuff without an indication that I need it, and then I try to get it only where I need it.  Hope this helps.

[not-fishing]

The only injector cleaner that I know works and trust is pulling the injectors and sending them to a shop.  You get a before test and after test to confirm the amount of buildup and the amount of cleaning that was necessary.

On my daughters 2000 MR2 she was surprised with the results.

I've done it on both my Griso (AF1) and Lemans ( a race shop in Southern California that I can't remember)

The Griso was easy to pull the injectors the 03 Lemans was a nightmare as I had to dremel out on of the flat head allen stainless screws because they froze into place.

Mark

[Chuck in Indiana]

Hi Chuck,
I'm back!  Do leave it with some seafoam in the tank to stabilize the gas, after running it a few miles.  This has worked well for me when I had my fleet and could not ride everything all the time and some were down for work.
Cheers bud,

Hiya Father.. whatup?

[oldbike54]

 W/O getting into one FI system VS another , here is what I've personally witnessed . In 1970 with leaded fuel and carbs running rich enough to keep an old air cooled engine happy , carbon buildup was an issue . Sometimes a shot of water into the system would break up the carbon , most times the problem required removing the head(s) to clean up the carbon . The last several years every head I have personally removed only had a nice even thin layer of carbon , which is beneficial as a heat insulator . That was my point . Heck , even my old Brits and Beemers ran cleaner on modern fuels than on the supposedly superior stuff from 1970 , and the days of fuel filter replacement every 19,000 miles are long gone . Carry on 

 Dusty

[Chuck in Indiana]

I'm sharing this 'cause...uh... haven't the foggiest.