Reader Question
Austin, hello there bud. I was going to steam clean the engine in my car today and my friend told me he reads your newsletter and said I better talk to you first before I did it.
Wuz up?
David
Hey David,
Ya, your friend might have saved you some money and a lot of headache. I HATE engine steam cleaning for these reasons.
1. Your engine could care less what it looks like, so it will not improve performance or make it run smoother, cooler or better by doing it.
2. It sends up a ton of red flags when you are shopping for a used car. First question I ask myself is “what are they trying to hide”?
3. The likely hood that you will get water where water is NOT supposed to be is extremely high. There are tons of delicate electrical sensors that can really get hurt with high pressure water spraying on them.
I see at least 1 customer a month (brought in on our wreckers) from a car wash bay after they steam cleaned their engine…it looks gorgeous but won’t start now. It can cost you big bucks to repair and a lot of hassle and time loss.
Now, if you want to clean off some old (or new) engine oil leaks or some other kind of fluid leak than I would recommend you get a few cans of CRC BraKleen and use that instead.
CRC BraKleen does not need water, and dries almost instantly. It is non flammable so you don’t have to worry about washing it off or it causing a fire on a hot engine.
It will literally dissolve any fluid and it will evaporate away with almost no elbow grease from you. The rubber hoses, air cleaner box and any other hard plastic stuff you can use a rag and some silicone spray to make them pop and shine again. Amorall of course can be used.
BraKleen can be bought at any parts store and I would recommend the part number 05089, it works best.
Here is the spec sheet from their website