Intake cleaning/ DI issues
 

I'm noticing people are talking about media blasting their intake valves with walnut shells... and while it may work... i have seem something I think works alot better.

Years ago I worked at a service station and they used valvoline products. One of which was a fuel system cleaner. There was a tank additive, TB cleaner (for cable TB's) and the jewel of the system was a cleaner that was hooked up to an intake/vacuum line via what was essentially an IV line. The car sat and ran for ~30 min while this cleaner was slowly dripped into the intake. A couple of times during the mech would go out and rev the crap out of it and this black and bluish white smoke would billow out of the exhaust, and the car would literally run better. I had seen first hand on an integra that was chopping like crazy, and it ran perfect after this procedure.

Now my thinking in this being better, it's not like seafoam where you suck it in, shut it off and let it sit. This is actually running over the valves, injectors, and plugs constantly. Then getting blown out my the increase in rpms and whatnot.

Here's my question... would this not be better to do than spraying your head with nuts? Both time wise, effectiveness, and cost? It was around $60 iirc. I'll be having it done to my car next week sometime.

DI is a different beast compared to PI cars.

I know, but the intake runners still go into the head and over the valves right?

I can think of numerous issues with that method but you can certainly give it a try. There is a reason BMW, VW, etc. cleans the valves the same way MSF suggests it, with a walnut blast. Do you think their multi-million dollar R&D departments just over looked this magic juice?

here are just a few reasons/examples of why this will not work off the top of my head.

1) how do you evenly distribute the magic juice to all runners, thus treating all 8 valves?
2) PI is not DI, so your integra example is moot and the positive results invalid.
3) B12 (very effective in breaking down carbon deposits) will barely scratch the surface of the deposits after sitting there overnight (after removing the intake, shutting the valves and filling the ports up). so this juice just flowing over the valves will likely not do a thing.

Yes the walnut blast is a PITA but the only real way to get the job done.

Well... learn something new everyday. I didn't know that the high enders did it that way. Im not sure where I thought it came from but that's good to know.

As far as even distribution, if all four cylinders are functioning properly wouldn't they all have equal vacuum?
Edit, sorry for my potato. The point of getting it cleaned is usually because something isn't functioning properly. So disregard.

no problem. the intake runners are not flow balanced so, no the same amount of juice would not get to every valve but that is really the least of the problem with that method.

that solvent just does not have enough time in contact with the deposits to break them down.

my 1st go around I was just PnPing my IM and after looking at the horrible state of the valves I thought, I'll get some scribes, B12 and soak it over night to see how it does. A total waste of time and effort. a few weeks later I hit it with the blaster and each cylinder took about 5 minutes to get sparkling clean.

Wow... so it gets pretty bad huh... i assume it's just by sheer velocity of the blaster that the whole valve is cleaned?

I've looked at the "how to" for this and the pics were gone. What does the media look like? I'm assuming the shells are ground up pretty well?

I've played with blasters before, well a cabinet, and I loved it.

media looks like sand/glass beads. but since its walnut, if any gets past the valve or otherwise into the cylinder, it burns up.

ask your friend google images for MS3 valve buildup pics.

All depends, you can get difference grade blasting media. I went to harbor freight (first time ever) and just picked up a media blaster and very fine walnut media., was about $60 total, and made a huge difference in cleaning the valves.

It just looks like thicker sand to be honest, can't even tell it's walnut shells.

FWIW I had the BG intake valve cleaning treatment done at a garage last year and it absolutely made a difference. Felt like I gained at least 10-15whp back. Not saying that it is as thorough as a walnut blasting, but IMO the latter is a ton of work for something that you'll have to do again in another 20k miles anyway. There's no solving this problem, only mitigating its effects.

Vdyno plots at a minimum would make this a lot more believable. Butt-dynos are inherently subject to bias, especially if you put hard work into the car.

I did some research about the BG stuff and couldn't find anyone that swore by it. A local place I called that did the treatment charges 180$ for it.

Peace of mind and sense of accomplishment to do it yourself. I want to blast my valve holes soon.

BG products are commonly used in VW/Audi direct injection applicaitons, and have shown to have positive results.

That said, unless you can show me before and after pics, its all snake oil.

Ive got the perfect tool for that...

Sorry i have nothing substantial to contribute other than I'm in the middle of tearing down my recently blown motor and will be doing this soon. Maybe ill do some testing with the BG products vs blasting and post pics

Meh, maybe after the next cleaning. There's just no way I'm taking my intake manifold off to do this in the foreseeable future, though, so this is good enough.

FWIW the treatment was $100.