Washing Your Engine Bay

[Rav]

Hey my engine bay gettin pretty dirty but iam scard to wash it, Do you rekkin the water can damge some plugs or liek in to some lil senssor.

What is your comments on this topic?

And whats the best way to wash my engine?

[burnsie]

put a plastic bag around ur starter motor and pod (if u have one)... i havent had any problems with doing it juz use common sense when doing it and u should be right

[bluey33]

I personally go over the whole engine bay by hand with a rag, using degreaser and WD40 then getting the air compressor onto it. It takes a while but it comes up a hell of a lot better. Then I have the piece of mind of not worrying about water getting onto starter motor or any electrical wiring for that matter.

Normally takes me 1-2 hours. Which includes taking pod off, crossover pipe and I even get under the car and give it a good clean.

[krzysiu]

I personally go over the whole engine bay by hand with a rag, using degreaser and WD40 then getting the air compressor onto it. It takes a while but it comes up a hell of a lot better. Then I have the piece of mind of not worrying about water getting onto starter motor or any electrical wiring for that matter.

Normally takes me 1-2 hours. Which includes taking pod off, crossover pipe and I even get under the car and give it a good clean.

agree with this method. NEVER spray water in your engine bay using a hose or high pressure system

[Rav]

I thought of useing degreaser and a air compressor

[bluey33]

Also never spray degreaser on and start car up without using compressor or rag on it, i know someone who has set their engine bay up in flames doing this (lucky he had fire extinguisher on him). Just take your time and the results will come.

[foznice]

I've done this quite a few times now. THe first time I just used degreaser and a rag and got most of the dirt off. But there was so much there. So, I took the coilpack cover off, packed it with absorbent towl stuff, then put it back on and blocked off everything important. Then I sprayed degreaser everywhere, and let if sit for while so that it really started cleaning up... Then I sprayed it off with a hose. I wasn't too keen on using a water compressor though just because of the electrics.

Since then i've pretty much done all that, except I didn't have to do it 2 or 3 times (degrease, rinse, degrease, rinse) because there isn't THAT much dirt.

Aftwards if you want a really nice shine (and smell...) then spray 'inox' on stuff (especially rubber things) and it gives it all a real nice glow. It only really lasts a couple of weeks though, so I wouldn't really bother unless you were going to a show and shine or something....

[Hardman69]

A few weeks ago, I sprayed a whole can of degreaser over everything enginey & dirty-lookin, and 5mins later sprayed it off at the car wash with "High pressure wash" - and then dawdled home to dry it out with the air compressor, then spray a mist of turps over/around the CoilPacks with the parts washer air-gun.

It wasn't enough - turns out there was still water sitting beneath the coil packs, where the compressed air couldn't blast it out. Sure enough, the legendary RB25DET weak-spark misfire came back . . . . so out with the coil packs, dried it properly, in with the WD-40 & RP-7, put it back together again. Mis-Fire gone.

so - moral of this story: Water tends to find the lowest part of your cam-valley . . . around the spark plugs !

[femno]

Yer i just hit it with some non-corrosive (careful some are corrosive, makes your alloy bits white!) degreaser, wash with hose, blow out under the coil packs, all good.

[adznight]

I hit the steering rack and bottom of the engine with high pressure, thats it though. I wouldn't risk the rest of the bay. You'll need to do it by hand hence my engine bad is DIRTY!

[Mavric]

You can get away with doing it with high pressure...

I would normally attack the engine bay with high pressure but again avoiding belts depending on the temp of the day...

If its a warmer day water is ok and will make no difference as it will just dry...(im talking summer)

As Adz has said lower parts of the car for sure... we all do an oil change and drip drip... thats when i would get a degrease onto it hard and then blast it to hell...

last time i did mine i actually got under the car and did it all by hand took ages!!!

I have had my engine bay looking like the bellow pic once, but tell you want it was a lot of work..

That pic was done all by hand and with no high pressure at all... as you can tell you can get an awesome effect if you spend the time on it...

[adznight]

Fark Mav! BLING BLING! Can't wait for warmer weather!

[blu3chip]

picked up my car with a sparkling engine, was told by the previous owner that tyre shine does the trick?

[Mavric]

tire shine is good i personally prefer the detailer grade silicon...

there are a few things u can use just have to be careful of the temps and what u put what on....

[Rav]

Tyre shine flammable i know from experiance i use to make flame thrower with it, Like a deoderant can with a lighter.

[foznice]

I thought silicon dried out the rubber hoses and stuff in your engine bay?

[ak_stylez]

i cleaned my engine bay with the degreaser and highpressure water both from the carwash. didn't really do all that much, but the water had no adverse affects at all.

i've got a series 2 though, so starter motor is down with the ecu (right?), and i covered the snorkle and a few other little bits with plastic bags.

next time i might try a canned degreaser.

[skybarge]

yeah I'm down with the others and the high pressure clean

basically make sure it's a nice hot day, open your bonnet,

get your air compressor out, set to round 80-100psi, usually they come with a degreasing gun, put half water half degreaser into it, then use the nozzle to clean the engine bay, then let it sit for a few hours drying out, then use silicone spray on the engine/pipes

makes it look nice and doesn't dry out or crack, that's what most car yards do as well, so if you are unsure, goto a car yard and ask to watch someone detail an engine bay

or just take your car there, pay the money and get the interior, exterior and engine bay done at the same time, it won't be cheap though

[skybarge]

Oh and Mavric, nice engine bay i fully rate that 10/10

[anticeptik]

Nice Plenum man

As for washing with a high pressure hose or something my mate didnt use common sense and poped his igniter.

ive also been told you can ware out the loom casing after a while of high pressure rinsing, cant confirm that though.

I use both, high pressure for like the chasis and clean off the rest with a rag and degreasor