what have you done to your car today ?

[smutts]

Thanks for this - right now the only concern I've got is rounding off or snapping the allen bolts, but given they're allen bolts, I'm not expecting anything too strenuous. I've got a ball-ended 6mm from my bike toolbox, and I've also got normal ones that can go on my 3/8" ratchet with three different length extensions, so I should get enough leverage. Gives me a chance to use the gasket I've had in my parts box for the past couple of years too.

I don't need the car for a few days, so will probably put it in a bin bag with Mr Muscle sprayed liberally in there and just give it a few rinses then fill it with oven cleaner again until it looks clean. Maybe a long-handled bottle brush or something too.

With any luck, it'll improve emissions at any stretch, but it'll be nice just to have an engine that's breathing the way it should be. If this doesn't fix it I'm not really sure what next, but at least it'll be clean.

DON'T USE MR MUSCLE! or any other caustic alkaline cleaner! NaOH aka sodium hydroxide is great at dissolving tar & soot.
BUT
It is also great at dissolving Aluminium.
I used a blowlamp to start & hot air paint stripper gun on my manifold, very effective & dramatic.

The ports? Trickier, I didn't have time & a bad back didn't inspire me to be leant over the engine for hours cleaning them out.
If the relevant cam lobe is pointed up, and you are dextrous with a load of oversized dental tools to pull the shite off the port walls & valve stem, and have a small enough vacuum cleaner to pull the pile of loosend flakes out it probably can be done.

A more fun way was used in the 1920's on the Le Mans Bently's to decoke the engines,
(tricky job as the head and block were cast as one, no head gasket to fail, but no access to scrape away the pre-detonating soot.)
they stuck a metal tube with a gentle flow of pure oxygen into the spark plug hole, and lit it somehow, this would allow the soot to be burnt away.
you need bottled oxygen, (gas axe, oxy-acetalyne gear, saturation rebreather dive gear, mad rocket scientist etc.)
Be careful as pure oxygen is absolutely evil stuff if it builds up in a confined space. You will spontaneously burst into flames if you get it wrong.
On second thoughts, a BAD IDEA.

 

[smutts]

I took this photo last year when I took the EGR valve off to clean. There seemed to be more build up around the neck where it connects to the EGR, but you get the idea. I'm guessing the ports are probably totally clogged.

Looks like I know what I'll be doing this weekend. When I tried to do this before, I didn't take the air intake pipe off, so had a whole world of problems getting access to the allen bolts.

Did you notice any change in performance when you cleaned it? Were you down on power beforehand?


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That's clean, that is!

 

[Rich.T]

EGR cleaner is good for this.
Thats what its made for. The crap that builds up in an egr is the same stuff that builds up in the manifold. Infact, its the EHRs fault!
May cost a few £ though as you'll probably need a gew cans to get the job done.

 

[Rich.T]

Noticed one of my tyres looking a little low on air at the weekend. Checked it and was only at 21psi.
Went to a garage on the way home.
Took the wheel off and there's a nail in it near a side wall.
The mechanic is going to ring me when he gets the tyre off to see if it can be fixed.

Luckily its only a 9 month old Michelin Pilot Sport 4
Was having a good day up untill that point!

 

[iammooks]

Screwfix do a 5l bottle of degreaser for around a tenner, so was thinking about using some of that. The reviews seem pretty good and if it doesn't work, I still need something for paint prep. I might just get as much out as I can and then block off the ports and the inlet and leave it overnight.

Sorry to hear about the tyre - those are the best tyres I've used and I know they're not cheap. At least you got nine months out of them though.


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[MoToJoJo]

I took this photo last year when I took the EGR valve off to clean. There seemed to be more build up around the neck where it connects to the EGR, but you get the idea. I'm guessing the ports are probably totally clogged.

Ahhh crap, I haven't even looked at mine yet... not sure I want to now

 

[iammooks]

Ahhh crap, I haven't even looked at mine yet... not sure I want to now

To be honest there seem to be so many variables when it comes to how clogged the intake might be, so you could be lucky. When I got the car in 2008, I was doing about 35k miles a year, but from around 2014 I've barely been doing a few thousand, and a lot of those miles were short journeys. I knew nothing about my car and what to do to keep it running healthily until it started failing its MoT on emissions a few years ago, and since then I've just been doing bits here and there - cleaned the EGR early last year and cleaned the turbo a few months ago. In the past few weeks I've heard that the oil pickup pipe can become clogged, so will replace that when I do an oil change next, depending on what work is like.

If your engine isn't performing too badly, you'll probably be fine for a while - my car just won't rev like it used to, and I've done all these handling mods that it would be wrong not to get the engine running like it should be. If you've serviced or had it serviced regularly, I reckon you won't have nearly the kinds of problems I am - I just never really looked after it because I wasn't driving it much and didn't spend money on servicing. Up until about three years ago, it was sweet as - now it seems like everything I fix just makes some other problem waaaaaaaay more obvious...!

 

[Rich.T]

Theyre not great cars really are they.
For almost 30 year ive only ever owned 12+ year old cars.
From a Fiat Panda (i was a naughty boy in my teens and its all i could get insurance on), through nissans, Audis, metros and BMWs. In fact ,you name it, i may of had one.
And NEVER have i ever owned such a demanding brand of car.
Still got 1 or possibly 2 tyres to do.
Moody cambelt history.
Floppy cup holder.
Nsf raindrop doorstep chalenge.
Osr intermittent door solenoid.

If it wasn't for how much it now owes me id probably of got rid and be driving an scooby now.
Well, that and the big smiles it gives me every time i turn the key lol

 

[iammooks]

Theyre not great cars really are they.
For almost 30 year ive only ever owned 12+ year old cars.
From a Fiat Panda (i was a naughty boy in my teens and its all i could get insurance on), through nissans, Audis, metros and BMWs. In fact ,you name it, i may of had one.
And NEVER have i ever owned such a demanding brand of car.
Still got 1 or possibly 2 tyres to do.
Moody cambelt history.
Floppy cup holder.
Nsf raindrop doorstep chalenge.
Osr intermittent door solenoid.

If it wasn't for how much it now owes me id probably of got rid and be driving an scooby now.
Well, that and the big smiles it gives me every time i turn the key lol

In spite of all the trouble it causes me and money it costs me, I still love it. I feel like I owe it to be honest, given it's often covered in tree sap and I still haven't resprayed the lacquer on the rear bumper. Or the front one.

If I can keep it alive until I move to France with the missus though, that'll be enough, and I'll still have a tear in my eye when it goes.

And then I can buy a left hand drive Lada Niva. I've wanted one for years. I can't see myself being able to afford that Nissan GTR or BMW 2002 so it'll have to do...

And then I'll probably end up buying a mk1 over there because I miss mine.

I don't know what it is - they just get under your skin.


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[Manic172]

Had a little tidy up and put it to bed

Wheel and tyre collection is getting
bigger

Tidied up the front wings and some small repairs and primers them

 

[iammooks]

Wheel and tyre collection is getting
bigger View attachment 26507

This guy's a bloody millionaire.


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[Nam-uk]

I took this photo last year when I took the EGR valve off to clean. There seemed to be more build up around the neck where it connects to the EGR, but you get the idea. I'm guessing the ports are probably totally clogged.

Looks like I know what I'll be doing this weekend. When I tried to do this before, I didn't take the air intake pipe off, so had a whole world of problems getting access to the allen bolts.

Did you notice any change in performance when you cleaned it? Were you down on power beforehand?


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mine was never that bad when i removed mine at 50k just the usual carbon ect, that's short journey's bet the cars turbo never even spun up, also cheap oil don't help as you need low ash oil , use 5-30 myself , the seat service history i had never said the oil grade as you can use 5-40 also, i did change the fuel filter though as that was due worth doing if you not done it

 

[Nam-uk]

Theyre not great cars really are they.
For almost 30 year ive only ever owned 12+ year old cars.
From a Fiat Panda (i was a naughty boy in my teens and its all i could get insurance on), through nissans, Audis, metros and BMWs. In fact ,you name it, i may of had one.
And NEVER have i ever owned such a demanding brand of car.
Still got 1 or possibly 2 tyres to do.
Moody cambelt history.
Floppy cup holder.
Nsf raindrop doorstep chalenge.
Osr intermittent door solenoid.

If it wasn't for how much it now owes me id probably of got rid and be driving an scooby now.
Well, that and the big smiles it gives me every time i turn the key lol

had a 5gturbo and that was reliable as looked after by me but get bad stick for being unreliable but it comes down to owners 44k sold that grr wish i had that thing now worth a bomb lol, then had 2 clio16vs last one was very low miles and the issues later on were getting expensive i.e rust and springs ect and just the odd annoying faults, yet my leon now at same age feels more new and solid other than the turbo spitting its dummy out and needing replacing the rest i fixed over time that's what i like about them as most of time its not a massive lump to repair like old clio with less miles and that was mint engine as well, i could not even change oil filter on that thing without a bloody ramp, there is allot of cars out there that you cant do home repairs but that's done for a reason, your current faults are not all that wallet heavy just time is more costly

 

[Rich.T]

Got workshop envy....

 

[Thai-wronghorse]

Got workshop envy....
View attachment 26510

So have I, it doesn't look like a sandstorm has ripped through it like mine does.

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[bruceR]

Lucky you guys, I’ve not even got a garage so all my work is on the drive


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[iammooks]

Lucky you guys, I’ve not even got a garage so all my work is on the drive


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Drive? I have to do all my work on the street.

Not in that way, you filthy beggars.


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[iammooks]

mine was never that bad when i removed mine at 50k just the usual carbon ect, that's short journey's bet the cars turbo never even spun up, also cheap oil don't help as you need low ash oil , use 5-30 myself , the seat service history i had never said the oil grade as you can use 5-40 also, i did change the fuel filter though as that was due worth doing if you not done it

When it comes down to it, any sort of blockage - especially one like that - is going to reduce airflow, and looking at that I'd say I'm not even getting 2/3 of the flow I should. That's going to have a big impact on power.

In recent years I've been looking after the car better than any garage would on normal servicing, but I'm just paying for the fact that between 2010 and 2017 I only had the oil changed probably once or twice.

Now I use Mobil 1, change the oil and fuel filters, use a Millers additive, never run the car less than ten minutes and take it up the A23 and up and over Devil's Dyke a few times to give the engine a chance to open up.

It'll be interesting to see what the EGR valve looks like now though - it's been about a year and a half since I cleaned it and I'll be taking it off to clean the intake anyway, so we'll see whether it's as clean as it was when I last took it out.

Fingers crossed that with me knowing more about the car and just generally treating it better, I'll never need to clean those parts again.

So much of the car seems to have been done with a finite lifespan in mind - like most ordinary people would get rid of the car long before the manifold got clogged, same with half the bushings. The car was ten years old when the locks went and same for the door seals.

If I hadn't neglected it, there's actually very little that would be wrong with the car other than normal wear and tear.

Still need to put the clutch in mind. I'd do it if I weren't so nervous about needing to support the engine and having a jack to lower the transmission.


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[Alexis27]

Theyre not great cars really are they.
For almost 30 year ive only ever owned 12+ year old cars.
From a Fiat Panda (i was a naughty boy in my teens and its all i could get insurance on), through nissans, Audis, metros and BMWs. In fact ,you name it, i may of had one.
And NEVER have i ever owned such a demanding brand of car.
Still got 1 or possibly 2 tyres to do.
Moody cambelt history.
Floppy cup holder.
Nsf raindrop doorstep chalenge.
Osr intermittent door solenoid.

If it wasn't for how much it now owes me id probably of got rid and be driving an scooby now.
Well, that and the big smiles it gives me every time i turn the key lol

I've had a lot worse!
Nissan Sunny - headgasket cooked the engine at 120k.
Citroen Xsara - engine destroyed itself at 120k.
Vauxhall Corsa - water pump failed and cooked engine at 90k.
MGZR - too many failures at its MOT.

 

[MoToJoJo]

Drive? I have to do all my work on the street.

Hey, we're not judging, gotta afford that rear ARB somehow