sludge under valve cover pics and solvent testing

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I had some time this morning before football so I removed the passenger side valve cover on my 2002 S10 4.3L v6 with 106K miles on it. I recently replaced the intake manifold gasket @ 100k miles and did 2 short interval oil changes since then. The truck runs smooth and normal since the intake manifold gasket replace. When I removed the valve cover, I found some hard crasty type sludge, not too bad but not good either.





What I did was pour a little MMO on top of one rocker, B12 ontop of another rocker, straight gas on a different rocker and Gunk motor medic flush on a rocker.

 
I let each sit no more than about 10 minutes and I wiped up the top of the rockers with a paper towel. None of the solvents ate through the hard sludge. Not even the straight gasoline. I then took an old tooth brush to it and again, the sludge did not come loose or disolve. So then I took a flat tip and dug out the sludge. It was a hard crusty type. I think the sludge was from short tripping and dexcool leaking in.


solvent soaking





 


I dug out a lot of this crusty sludge.

What I got from this,

-nothing in a bottle or a can will clean an engine
-the 4.3L GM engine is great as it runs smooth with all this sludge
-B12 does dry out eveything it touches, I will only use it to clean parts
-I dont think using Gunk Motor Medic (at leas not 1/3 of the formula)as a 5 minute flush would knock out or disloge huge chunks of sludge. I will use 1/3 of the bottle on my next oil change.

Your thoughts.
 
Originally Posted By: barkingspider


I dug out a lot of this crusty sludge.

What I got from this,

-nothing in a bottle or a can will clean an engine
-the 4.3L GM engine is great as it runs smooth with all this sludge
-B12 does dry out eveything it touches, I will only use it to clean parts
-I dont think using Gunk Motor Medic (at leas not 1/3 of the formula)as a 5 minute flush would knock out or disloge huge chunks of sludge. I will use 1/3 of the bottle on my next oil change.

Your thoughts.


Drop the pan get a shop vac and a spray bottle. Spray everything you can get to and clean it with tooth brush, screw driver, what ever you can until its clean to your satisfaction. Vacuum. Up what you can and give it a good hour to help dry all the solvents up. Fill it up with oil let it run till operating temp and drain it.
 
I am not a fan of adding mmo to oil unless you have a situation like this, then i think its just the thing. Since there is not that much sludge, some kreen might be good too.
Short tripping, and if i remember my s-10, it seems that engine really takes a while to get up to temperature. If i remember it takes a good 15 miles. Thats probably what is causing this. Just make sure the thermostat is the right one and working.
 
I would use a screwdriver and digout what you can try to vacuum out with wet vac , then parts brush with diesel and scrub away and let soak overnight , run some marvel mystery oil 1 q and drive around for a half hour , change oil with 1q of marvel oil added to whatever diesel oil and run for 1500 miles then change again to Pennzoil and do 3000 mile oil and filter changes 5-30 . The 4.3 is a great motor had one in a boat i bought brand new in 89, and a new s-10 and my wifes blazer has 290000 miles on it 3000 mile oil and filter changes does not use any oil and does not even turn dark between changes , this motor is not picky on oil just change it at the recommended interval
 
I don't have any experience with cleaning out a sludged engine but my question is....wouldn't any of the products actually work better in a heated engine, in a hot oil?

Maybe putting some on "cold" doesn't work as intended. Strictly a question...I don't know.
 
I'll take a couple of oci to get this cleaned up,at least partially even.15 min just isn't the way otc engine cleaners work.

I wouldn't be disappointed.What would be interesting is using a syn such as ppu or qsud,M1 or similar over 3 oci's,pull the VC again and compare pics then/now.
 
10 min? not nearly enough time. If a solvent can eat through something in 10min it's probably going to eat through other parts of your car as well.

For the sake of science,
see if you can save some of your sludge samples and then run a longer test with them in the the solvent for like 24hours to a week and see what that reveals any different results.
 
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Varnish and the like are quite polar, and really only respond to polar type cleaning (detergents and the like).

When I was cleaning my rocker covers up to stick on ebay
IMG_20141227_131722.jpg


A caustic based degreaser chewed into it almost instantly, and washed off with water.

BTW, I agree with the coolant leak hypothesis...I think mine had one at some stage.
 
Originally Posted By: barkingspider

-B12 does dry out eveything it touches, I will only use it to clean parts

Your thoughts.

Berryman will dissolve the sludge, but it may take more than 10 minutes to do so. It is the only thing that I have used in the past to clean the gunk out of carburetors and I have soaked a valve cover in it and it came out like new.
 
If it took a while to grow the sludge it might take some time to get rid of it. Anything that would do the job quickly might risk damage. Thinning the oil with solvent might compromise the oil's performance. Try "remove sludge from an engine" with Google and see if someone has been successful without using a solvent that thins the oil.
 
Originally Posted By: Shannow

A caustic based degreaser chewed into it almost instantly, and washed off with water.


caustic based degreaser is also known as oven cleaner in states. This is how I cleaned neglected allow wheels I bought used.

not sure you want to use it inside engine.
 
This is just weird! One should not go digging around in an engine with a screwdriver loosening sludge/varnish thinking it's going to help anything other than your OCD.
 
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