New Vehicle with DI - Any Tips?

[glock19]

Originally Posted By: wallyuwl
My advice is to not buy a vehicle with a DI engine. It is the main reason I just bought a new F-150 instead of a new Silverado. The F150s, starting in 2018, are dual injected so you still get some fuel over the valves and the Silverado Ecotec3 engines are just DI. If you can use 5W-30 instead of 0W-20 do it. The DI will cause fuel dilution and that combined with a light weight oil won't help.


I wish I had known the issues with DI before I bought my Sierra. At this point though, I'm just going to run it and see if it becomes a problem.

 

[wallyuwl]

Originally Posted By: glock19
Originally Posted By: wallyuwl
My advice is to not buy a vehicle with a DI engine. It is the main reason I just bought a new F-150 instead of a new Silverado. The F150s, starting in 2018, are dual injected so you still get some fuel over the valves and the Silverado Ecotec3 engines are just DI. If you can use 5W-30 instead of 0W-20 do it. The DI will cause fuel dilution and that combined with a light weight oil won't help.


I wish I had known the issues with DI before I bought my Sierra. At this point though, I'm just going to run it and see if it becomes a problem.


Some videos on Youtube of very dirty valves in these engines at less than 30k miles. You can get them cleaned manually (deposits actually scrapped off) but it is an expensive job.

 

[dailydriver]

Originally Posted By: wallyuwl
My advice is to not buy a vehicle with a DI engine. It is the main reason I just bought a new F-150 instead of a new Silverado. The F150s, starting in 2018, are dual injected so you still get some fuel over the valves and the Silverado Ecotec3 engines are just DI. If you can use 5W-30 instead of 0W-20 do it. The DI will cause fuel dilution and that combined with a light weight oil won't help.


There is an aftermarket company which make an add-on, auxiliary port injection system for my 1.6 EcoBoost, plug-in, piggybacked controller and all. YES, a tune is quite necessary with this setup, which was developed for those who add much bigger turbo setups than factory to these cars, since their stock, DI high pressure fuel pumps run out of capacity at around the 300 WHP level or so.

I am thinking about adding this system in the future, even if I still retain the small factory turbo, solely for it's intake valve washing functions.

 

[red7404]

IMHO. you need to run a VERY small amount of Marvel Mystery Oil in the intake. by using this product http://www.ampcolubes.com/

 

[Patman]

Originally Posted By: BJD78
Top tier fuel already has plenty of detergents in it. Not sure if adding more would really do much. I remember that was a topic on Car Talk some years ago and Tom and Ray told a caller that adding extra detergents to a gasoline that already has enough would not be of any noticeable benefit. Basically more is not always better.


I agree, if you buy a car new and use nothing but Top Tier it's entire life, you shouldn't need any additional cleaners at all. That's my plan with the Corvette actually, and it also has direct injection.

 

[artificialist]

There was an Infiniti based on the Nissan Armada and it had a direct injection 5.6 V8. It was sold for several years before any Nissan got the direct injection V8. I don't recall the Infiniti having any major problems from having that engine, but not many of them were sold.

 

[antonmnster]

Put 1100 miles on my 07 BMW 335 over the weekend, bringing it to 191,500 miles. Turbos, DI, electric water pump. I've cleaned the valves once.

Just drive it, change the oil once in a while. And don't overthink it!

 

[Nick R]

I have 94k on my DI focus, and I've had no problems that aren't related to the transmission or sync system.

 

[TWG1572]

That's right. The Titan is based on the Infinity QX80 platform. The DI engine and 7 speed transmission have been used in there since 2009 I believe. One of the reasons I got comfortable with buying the truck is that there was not much to be found on the internet regarding problems with the Infinity. Not selling many may have something to do with it, but at least the engine has been out there for a while.

DI is definitely one of those things you don't want to Google, because the internet is full of horror stories. I'm not discounting them, just realize that looking at them is kinda like trying to self diagnose your medical issues via the internet. All possible diagnoses lead to cancer.

My intent is to drive it and enjoy it. I like how it drives. I'm a tall guy, and I'm very comfortable in it. I'm not going to obsess about the DI - but I do want to make sure I'm doing the right stuff from a routine maintenance perspective. I think what I've gleaned is to watch the oil level, use oil with as low of NOACK as possible (I'll probably stick with M1 AFE or PP, depending on which is on sale), and drive it like I stole it every now and then. I can do that!

 

[Olas]

Couple of options and strategies;
The very lowest NOACK you can find
The lowest sulphur fuel
Blocked off/mapped out/restricted EGR
locate the catch can AHEAD of the radiator so it sees the lowest temperatures to promote best condesenation
Depending on smog law in your area you may want to ditch the PCV entirely and use a vacuum pump to keep your engine clean.