How To Use Seafoam To Clean Your Engine

palbuddy

Member
People recommend this a lot in this forum. It looks that seafoam needs to be poured into the pcv valve... I am slow on this. Could you take a look at my engine
IMG_1259.JPG
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I think the black guy in yellow circle must be the pcv valve... right? now should I pour the seafoam fluid INTO the hold as suggested by the arrow in this picture or it is the other direction?
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Thanks!
 
when i did it to my trooper, i pulled the end of the hose off my brake booster and let the idle vaccum suck the fluid in, do it slowly though, don't stall the motor
 
Disconnect the PCV from the hose and stick it back in valve cover. With the car running, pour the seafoam in the hose. You'll need to hold the throttle or have someone in the car. Use 1/3 of the can or you can buy Deep Creep (aerosal version) and shut the car off for 5 minutes. Then start it up. Your idle will be smoother and the acceleration will be more crisp. You can also add it to your oil or put it in the gas tank. Pouring it in the hose that leads to the top of the PCV is more of a upper cylinder cleaning or decarboning. Its better to use this point as it leads directly to the manifold.
 
call me dumb but where does the seafoam go after pouring it in the hose(obviously out the other end) but wheres that?also where do you get it at?
 
Last edited:
palbuddy said:
People recommend this a lot in this forum. It looks that seafoam needs to be poured into the pcv valve... I am slow on this. Could you take a look at my engine
IMG_1259.JPG
.
I think the black guy in yellow circle must be the pcv valve... right? now should I pour the seafoam fluid INTO the hold as suggested by the arrow in this picture or it is the other direction?
IMG_1260.JPG


Thanks!
Yep pooring it in the pcv line is a good way to clean #1 & #4 cylinder in the lower plenum. If You want to do this, and I highly recammend doing so, but do it the right way. I've done this with a 5 gas exaughst analizer and it cleans things up dramaticly and brings back some ponies. through the pcv vacumm line dosen't do squat!!!! look at where those lines go to. you won't clean the upper plennum or any part of cylinder 2 & 3 or any part of the VICS butterflys. On any vehical the vacume line closest to the throtle body(but isn't connected to the TB) is the best line cause it will clean more (or all depending on the manifold). On our Proteges its the same line for the 1.6l 1.8l and 2.0l its the brake booster hose. It plugs in the middle of the manifold so it will spread the cleaner evenly through the cylinders. Have someone rev the car to 2000-35000 rpms the engine will want to die but keep reven to keep it alive. suck about 20 oz. into the manifold and kill the motor. (must get VICS to open to clean those runners so try to keep it below 3000 then after 50% of the fluid is gone keep VICS open above 3000-3500 rpm max) unless you put a carberator on your car you won't hydrolock the motor. the motor needs to sit for 10-15 minuets to alow the cleaner to soak into the carbon. Try to start the motor then and pump the gas pedal. if at any time white steam (its not smoke so chill) comes out its 1000% normal. rev the motor for about 3 min. and let it idle for 5 min. then take it out for a drive to clear out the sytem. Basicly what you've just done is steam clean the inside of the motor. Works freakin awsome. after it stops steaming (with the Engine off) reset the ECU by unpluging both + and - terminals and hold them together for 30 seconds. this drains all eletricity from the system and resets the ECU much faster then waiting 1 hr. or all night. I've used sea foam before and its ok but GM Top End Clean works the best. Its about 6-10 dollars at any chevy dealer. it works in Geos BMWs Mazdas F1 race cars or any 4stroke engine. Ignore the GM logo.
 
do you think it would be a good thing to do right before an oil change? i have 500 miles till one. and i'm at 5.5k miles and have never taken it in for maintainence...
 
I did this a while back.......my motor was running i pulled off the PCV and the car sputtered and died..didnt suck up much seafoam. What is the proper way? Pulling a vacuum line off while a car is running will cause it to die, right?
 
Boston5761 said:
I did this a while back.......my motor was running i pulled off the PCV and the car sputtered and died..didnt suck up much seafoam. What is the proper way? Pulling a vacuum line off while a car is running will cause it to die, right?
yeah it'll do that sometimes. its realy a two person job. but you won't clean the whole system through the pcv. look behind your manifold. see that big line that runs towards your master cylinder. thats the break booster vacume line and that is the one to suck it through. but disconnect it from the booster side. I stuck a Mcdonalds straw in that line as an extension and sucked it straight from the bottle that way.
 
what are the things that could go wrong?

or be carefull about?

Im going to do this with my next oil change.
 
yeah i dunno where my brake booster is either, any pics?
i guess i could go look at it real quik but eh i'll just wait
 
awsmp5 said:
yeah i dunno where my brake booster is either, any pics?
i guess i could go look at it real quik but eh i'll just wait
I don't have pics but it's the bigger vacuum hose next to the brake fluid resivoir. unplug it from there. you can see where it gose behind the manifold in the middle looking from the passenger side fender.
 
With all the cameras in cell phones you would think snapping a pic wouldnt be such an issue, not saying it has been, but there is no posted pic.

Unfortunatly the discriptions dont clairify much as its not that simple, there are ALOT of hoses all over the place, even with Pics sometimes its hard to tell, next to imposible without.
 
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