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Walnut Blasting vs. Chemical Carbon Cleaning?

helldiver14

Passed Driver's Ed
Location
Ohio
Bought my first Stage 2 GTI this week and am wanting to do some new maintenance on it (160k). Anyways one of the things I am looking at doing with my buddy and his 09 JCW Clubman is to get a carbon cleaning. In Dayton, one euro shop has walnut blasting and the other has the chemical. The chemical is cheaper, and the owner explained why he decided to bring chemical into his shop instead of walnut. He like how it cleaned everything in the motor, not only the valves and that it was a much cleaner job that leaving small particles of walnuts in the motor. What I've heard is that the walnut blasting is better for motors with more carbon on the valves and that chemical is better for a light coating of carbon on the valves. Has anyone had any experience with either?

Also, both of our plugs are due for a changing, would it be okay to change them before the carbon cleaning or is it recommended to do it after? Thanks ya'll!
 

golfballer78

Ready to race!
Location
southbay CA.
Car(s)
08' R32 dsg
You have to pull the manifold either way yeah? Might as well do it the best recommended process once and not take all that shit apart again to re clean it. But uh, I don't trust shooting walnut shells into daily driver motor. If the other stuff cleans the whole top end, just go with that.
 

helldiver14

Passed Driver's Ed
Location
Ohio
You have to pull the manifold either way yeah? Might as well do it the best recommended process once and not take all that shit apart again to re clean it. But uh, I don't trust shooting walnut shells into daily driver motor. If the other stuff cleans the whole top end, just go with that.

Yes I believe you have to remove the intake. Apparently the chemical cleans valves, turbo, intercooler and entire bottom end.
 

snobrdrdan

former GTI owner
Apparently the chemical cleans valves, turbo, intercooler and entire bottom end.

 

Joshohol

Go Kart Champion
Location
Troy NY
The chemical cant clean any of that. All you are doing it pulling the intake manifold and putting each cylinder at tdc so the valves are closed. Then you put chemical in or blast with walnut. My gti has no build up but my tiguan probably does so its going to get that done soon. I wanna go with the walnut

Sent from my SM-N920P using Tapatalk
 

gti2slow

Go Kart Champion
Location
NH
Chemical cleaning is good when done properly, but it will never clean as well as popping the manifold off and blasting/scrubbing the ports.

There were a few threads on seafoam, I lost my borescope photos from years ago but my results were a little better than whats seen in this thread:
http://www.audizine.com/forum/showt...-Carbon-Build-Up-Sea-Foam-Service-Limitations

You must do it on an engine that is up to temperature, let it warm up and give it a Italian tuneup to make sure the engine is warm. Then spray an areosol version of the cleaner, don't use a vac line you want to fog those ports in solution.

I used a can of seafoam areosol. I emailed seafoam and they sent me a vortech application straw (Melted shut the end and put 4 holes in the side of the straw turning it into a fogger nozzle. Pushed that through a rubber stopper to make this:


That was put in the IAT port. Cleaned mine twice using a half can each time.

I plan to use some of CRC's GDI cleaner and repeat the process and see if if does a better job whenever I have time once the weather warms up.

If the engine is clogged up with caked on deposits I would probably pop off the manifold, otherwise if its not bad I would just run some seafoam/CRC GDI cleaner through it every 10K as a maintenance step.
 

5aprilc

Ready to race!
Location
Rollinsford, NH
Car(s)
GTI
Chemical cleaning is good when done properly, but it will never clean as well as popping the manifold off and blasting/scrubbing the ports.

There were a few threads on seafoam, I lost my borescope photos from years ago but my results were a little better than whats seen in this thread:
http://www.audizine.com/forum/showt...-Carbon-Build-Up-Sea-Foam-Service-Limitations

You must do it on an engine that is up to temperature, let it warm up and give it a Italian tuneup to make sure the engine is warm. Then spray an areosol version of the cleaner, don't use a vac line you want to fog those ports in solution.

I used a can of seafoam areosol. I emailed seafoam and they sent me a vortech application straw (Melted shut the end and put 4 holes in the side of the straw turning it into a fogger nozzle. Pushed that through a rubber stopper to make this:


That was put in the IAT port. Cleaned mine twice using a half can each time.

I plan to use some of CRC's GDI cleaner and repeat the process and see if if does a better job whenever I have time once the weather warms up.

If the engine is clogged up with caked on deposits I would probably pop off the manifold, otherwise if its not bad I would just run some seafoam/CRC GDI cleaner through it every 10K as a maintenance step.

You want to do this on my car?
 

snobrdrdan

former GTI owner
The people have spoken, do it once & do it right.....get it blasted

The chemical spiel he gave you, about cleaning "everything", isn't true and/or wouldn't get it cleaned thoroughly
 
Last edited:

ViRtUaLheretic

╭∩╮(︶__︶&#6
Location
KC MO
Car(s)
2009 VW GTI
seafoam will NOT solve the problem, no ifs ands or buts. It just wont do it.
It might help (maybe a GENEROUS 10%) but it will not completely solve the deposits on the valves.

The only way to clean the valves is to either walnut blast them or soak them with solvent and scrub them by hand.
Its not terribly difficult to do, there are a ton of DIYs on here, golfmk6, and youtube. Just be patient, make sure you have the right tools, and make sure you have purchased 4 injector seals in advance.
 

larcic

Ready to race!
Location
Tampa, FL
i'd stay far far away from the mechanic that told you the chemical will clean everything....
walnut blasting is definitely the way to go. go to my build and look at the pictures and see for yourself. chemical cleaning/scraping by hand works too but they dont come out as shiny/brand new looking. chemical cleaning w/o removing the manifold is a no go and doesnt work. you could also hydrolock your engine pretty easily if you use too much. nothing will clean all of those things that mechanic said at once....smh....i only paid 250 for my walnut blasting it took 4 hours and he finished at midnight. if theyre charging you more than 300$ find someone else. join a local vw facebook group and ask for mechanic recommendations.
 
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