Anybody have any tips on cleaning out the combustion chamber by hand not bead blasting etc.. wife won't do it..

oven cleaner, works great

Try Soda blasting. Then hose down the patio. . .

You can try this stuff, it works great:

http://www.orisonmarketing.com/cleaners/piston/carbon.html

Easy as easy off baby!! That is what a friend told me but whats he care. Thank you senior member,.. I will clean the combustion oven.. I wont let my wifey see me doing that she might get some idea I could actually clean the oven while I am at it,,

If you ever want to do it with the car together, Mopar combustion chamber cleaner is the best stuff iv'e ever used. Run it down the throttle body, turn the engine over but don't start it. Put some more in it and wait 15 minutes. Then start it and watch it smoke out your neighbors ! If it smokes very little, then you know it was clean to begin with.

"Oven cleaner"? Are you nuts? Toxic, nasty smelling, eats aluminum. The Cap'n

There was a consensus on the MCML several years ago about using distilled water down the carb. About half a bottle slowly, then pour the rest in, stalling the engine, at least if I remember right. Give it 10 minutes and then fire it up and run it. Long drive afterward was recommended to ensure that the oil was dry.

There was concern about hydrolock which those that did it never seemed to encounter. I'd think there might be issues with cracking things too, though that never came up at the time. Maybe it was recommended to do on the first start near immediately? Would have to pull my archives out.

Not sure I'd try it on the 914, even excluding the FI predicament.

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Soak it in a liquid and wirebrush it?

I used to hear that oven cleaner was good to use on Al wheels to remove the clear coat. Never heard about eating Al though.

Wore gloves, safety glasses, used water for cleanup. Hard to believe it was on there long enough to eat the Alum.

Anyone have an old English sports car or motorcycle and see instructions on pulling the head for "decarbonizing" periodically? There were no additives in the gas back then, and rings weren't what they are today, so the chambers built up lots of carbon deposits. Some smart guy realized you could use water and steam for "decarbonizing" instead of pulling the heads. You see it sometimes when a car's been driven with a leaking head gasket, the piston in that cylinder is super clean compared to the others. And there were people in the Forties and Fifties who ran light water injection, and the engines were spotless when you pulled a head. We used it in the seventies, too, for cars that were well tuned but still dieseled or pinged from running lean with carbon deposits. It was quick, easy and cheap, so we'd try it first, and if it didn't work then we'd pull the heads to clean up.

You get the engine hot, then slowly pour a pop bottle or quart oil can of water in, just a good solid stream while you keep the revs up. Not enough water for any possibility of vapor lock, but you'll be making STEAM baby, and you'll smoke out the whole neighborhood! You've been warned. DON'T dump a bunch in at once, and no reason to turn the car off. That superheated steam is what cleans the chambers, so when the smoke (vapor) dies down you're done. Yes, drive it a bit afterwards, but if the engine never stopped then as soon as it stopped smoking (steaming) there's no water in it any more. No, it never hurt anything, but of course that was before catalytic converters. I know that water vapor won't hurt them, but I don't know about what the carbon going out the back would do.

Bottom line is that it works sometimes. And if it doesn't you've wasted some time and a little water, and will be doing the mechanical repairs you would have had to do anyway. Once the engine's apart I just use solvent, a scraper and then a small light wire wheel to clean up.

I have a 63 j200 gladiator with a 350 chev in it and it has flattop pistons. It was built in 1980 and the only way I could run pump gas was to use water injection. It was a kit from holley. It worked like a windshield washer tank with a jet mounted over the middle of the carb on the stud for the aircleaner. It used a vaccum sensor to since low vavvum and would squirt water when you opened the carb up. When I took it apart it was spotless. The only thing is the oil needs to be about 200 degrees to burn the water off so I had to put a 200 degree thermostat in it. I used distilled water in it and kept a gallon jug in the bed to fill it up every second fillup.

That orison stuff might be a good cleaner for a parts washer and it might work on the tops of the pistons with the heads off but you won't get the ring grooves clean without taking the cylinders off.

Well I used the "easy off" about 3 - 20 minute lite treatments and bam!! clean as a whistle did not appear to eat the pistons at all .. even got a bit of overspray on my new oil coooler (also aluminum) and did not see that right away and it did not eat anything or leave anything like a spray pattern.. then again i used a wet sponge scrubby and clean and dried between treatment and then really cleaned and dried with a touch of brake cleaner the piston tops.. never sprayed directly into the cylinder walls and kept each piston i was cleaning at tdc.. Just thought i would put in the results for the next 914 chef..

for the disassembled motor, use the yellow can of easy off oven cleaner.
Only leave it on for 20 minutes then wipe it all down.
It takes several rinse repeat cycles to get it all, but it works.

Do it outside...it stinks.

If you end up with blackened areas, use straight borax (available in the laundry detergent isle) to neutralise the easy off Lye.
It will clean up the pistons again to aluminum.

RIch

I wonder if the borax will make a vw tranny or case new looking again? I'm pretty sure that is not possible but it would be nice if it would work. Even suby stuff gets corroded pretty bad.

After reading this thread a few days ago I've been thinking about the water injection cleaning- I get why it would work so well with a carbed motor, but what about one with FI? How would you even get a good delivery of water with FI?

My teener was set up for carbs when I bought it, so I don't know what an FI set up looks like on a teener. But depending on the set up, the best I can figure is that you would just have to use a spray bottle of water, behind the air filter, but even then I don't see the water making into the combustion chamber to have any good cleaning effect because you wouldn't get enough water running thru the engine at one time.

Plus I can only imagine what kind of havoc even distilled water could do to injectors and other sensors involved in with FI.

Any thoughts about how this might be possible w/ FI?

I'm just guessing... but I don't think it would work.

Works great on a Beetle or carbed engine with a top air intake and I 've done it many times. No great cloud of smoke pours out off the tailpipe so don't be dissapointed. I too have my doubts with pouring water into a sidedraft fuel injection manifold.

I've been toying with setting up a fine spray of water spaying into into the intake manifold with the throttle plate open. Windshield washer sprayer???.

Ken