Cleaning cylinder heads - What cleaning fluid is best

keanej

keanej

New Member
Spent today cleaning thick layers of crud off the spair SD1 cylinder heads.

1st scraped away with a knife and then with brush & parafin - the parafin wouldn't shift the thick layer.

There wasn't any cleaning fluid available in Halfords so I'll try some petrol tomorrow.

Anyone know of a more suitable cleaner than petrol ?
 
I'm currently using Gunk in my parts washer, I use white spirit quite often especially in a parafin gun to clean engines in-situ, I sometime use cellulose thinners too for some parts, I washed a head once in celly and it was quite good, but it will attack rubber seals.
 
Once you've got the outsides sparkling don't forget the insides!!! It is very important indeed to make sure that all the coolant passages are clear. If the engine had been run with less than ideal antifreeze or had had a salad cream incident at any time it is quite likely these will be "jellied up". The same applies perhaps even more so to the insides of the inlet manifold. I don't have a magic solution cleaner answer though - perhaps Harvey or someone could recommend?

Chris
 
I've got a drum containing allsorts! It's basically Diesel mixed in with any spare petrol, engine cleaners, a bit of ATF, anything that I've got nowhere else to put it goes in there. Seems to work quite well, and it's cheap!
 
I've used some stuff called Finish Line Ecotech degreaser. I generally use it to clean the chain on my mountain bike but it's also quite handy at shifting oily grime from engines too. It comes in an aerosol or brush on then you just rinse with water to leave shiny parts. Mind you it's about £8 for half a litre from the local bike shop which would probably be enough for 1 engine.
 
Has anyone tried oven cleaner or similar to shift baked-on deposits ? Or barbecue cleaner ?

You need something that foams and clings to the dirt
 
cheers folks

The outside of the heads did come up OK with Paraffin.

It is the inside which has a thick ( half an inch in some places ) layer of hard ( rock hard ) black muck all around where the push rods go.

I'll try some petrol and or thinners over the weekend, just as well I gave up smoking !

John
 
DaveHerns said:
Has anyone tried oven cleaner or similar to shift baked-on deposits ? Or barbecue cleaner ?
Click to expand...
Don't use any old oven cleaner on alloy parts; it should be OK on iron though.

Check the ingredients first. Many oven cleaners use caustic soda as one of the principal ingredients and that reacts with aluminium and magnesium in a big way. Shoolboy chemists dissolve aluminium foil in a caustic solution to make french letter bombs
 
STP used to sell a carburettor cleaner that would shift all that hard, gum "glass-like" deposits from aluminium. There may be other carb' cleaners out there.
Regards, John.
 
Noting your comments re the level of crud in the oil spaces, make very sure coolant spaces are clear! Baked crud in the oil spaces implies an engine that wasn't too well maintained. Probably not too important from the point of view of reusing heads but it does imply that the correct coolant might not have been used, so clean out the coolant passageways as well!

Chris
 
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