Throttlebody Cleaning Made Easy - Spray the What?

[rosspbig]

The hissing sound could be due to a leak in your old rotting TB tube. As for the engine light its hard to tell what that could be. get your local auto parts store to run the code and then you will know.

 

 

Has anyone who has cleaned their TBI with this cleaner stuff noticed a increase in power at all? Just wondering......

Edited January 18, 2005 by rosspbig

[90seven]

I noticed an increase in response.

 

That last time I asked the auto mechanics to run a diagnostic check, they charged me about $80.

[90seven]

Update on my self-repair:

 

Strangely and coincidently, the hissing noise that had been annoyin me and the engine check light just stopped and shut off. I was going to have it checked during my next oil change but now I don't have it anymore.

 

Personally, I found this helpful.

[nick1716]

FYI...autozone will check it for free and give you the codes

[Guest tram_bethea]

This worked awesome! Thank you guys for the fix!

 

Have a good one, Tram

[Derrik]

Good method: engine off. small hard plastic brush. open throttle valve. spray a little. scrub alot. Don't spray so much that it flows (this could flood the engine and damage a piston when it turns over). repeat 3-7 times. start the engine, spray-clean it heavily while engine running and throttle valve cycling (open&closing). cycle the throttle valve a few seconds & stop engine & repeat from beginning until satisfied.

 

Best method: Remove the upper-intake manifold, and spray and scrub it clean while off the vehicle. Alternateley, take it to a machine shop, and ask them to blast it.

Edited March 19, 2006 by Derrik

[blamtro]

I went to clean my throttle body butterfly today because of the dreaded "pedal stick". However, when I went to clean it, i noticed the entire upper intake manifold, and I assume all the way down to the valves is coated in the black gunk.

 

What causes this?

 

I am not having a problem with oil consumption. I don't mind cleaning the stuff, it just seems to me to be a problem with this much goo coating the intake surfaces

[mws]

Hmmm... don't know for sure.

A few questions:

 

1) How many miles on your rig?

2) What brand of gas do you use?

3) Any recent dips in fuel economy?

4) What brand of air filter do you use?

[GrimGreg]

88 needs to post that pic of his when he took it apart. Same deal, black sludge in the manifold.

[blamtro]

Hmmm... don't know for sure.

A few questions:

 

1) How many miles on your rig?

2) What brand of gas do you use?

3) Any recent dips in fuel economy?

4) What brand of air filter do you use?

97,000 miles

dont really track fuel brands. if i think about it, i usually fill up at a phillips 66

fuel economy is strong with ~17 in town, ~19 highway

stock air filter system with a wix filter

[zonianbrat]

I think it has to do with where the truck has been driven, type of gas, and how the truck was driven. just my opinion. I did the spray fix and mine was pretty black with what looked like carbon not goo so if it is infact goo you might need to investigate more. I had to do a couple of cleanings on mine but after that I check it every 3-6 months or so and it has been sparkling ever since I did it and no pedal stick either. I would just watch out and do not spray the whole can of carb cleaner in there the first time as it is already kinda hard to start the truck with only using 1/2 the can. I used half the can while operating the butterfly ofcourse then put everything back to gether ran it around for like a day or so then repeated the procedure and it is clean to this day.

[88pathoffroad]

88 needs to post that pic of his when he took it apart. Same deal, black sludge in the manifold.

The black crap in mine was from the EGR and PCV system. Recirculating hot exhaust gas through the intake is definitely a good way to gunk it up over time.

 

[Guest SuperSon]

Glad I joined this forum.Learned so much in just a few hours on reading up on some of the threads.

 

What kind of TB cleaner have you guys used? I have a 93 and last year one of the member here gave me a tutorial on cleaning the throttle body not just the butterfly part coz I was having that black smoke coming out of my exhaust but never got around to doing it.

 

Would it be ok to clean the butterfly along with the intermal of the TB? If I remeber correctly the instruction that was given to me was start the motor then hold the butterfly open and spray some TB cleaner in there..Does this sound right?

 

 

Also the member that i talked to in here a year ago recommended a TB cleaner and I cant rememberr the name of it.

 

 

Any help is greatly appreciated

[mikeysentra]

bought some CRC mass air flow sensor cleaner and carb cleaner today and cleaned the air flow sensor and throttle body. wow all the carbon that came off the TB Butterfly is amazing. I had a intermitentent sticky throttle and now I know why. thanks for the thread. I dont think this has ever been done in the 128,000 my 97 has on it. I would highly recomend that you do this if you havent. the Air flow meter sensor wires were black and the dirty. I hope this helps a little on fuel economy as I am sure that when it is dirty the sensor wont read rite and will run a little rich. I did notice after the test drive that my Pathy seemed to have a little better throttle response and no more sticky throttle.

 

thanks for the thread.

[westslope]

Thanks to MrJim and others for this thread.

 

We 'discovered' this problem when canoe-tripping and touring in the Queen Charlotte Islands off the north coast of British Columbia about 8 years ago. For 6 of 9 days of the trip, we sat through 50 knot + winds and 3 to 4 metre waves. Then there were was the ferry delay and then the ferry we finally managed to board for the long trip to the mainland turned around in 4 metre seas to rescue a small native salmon gillnetter who braved the seas likely to take advantage of the tiny openings (days, sometimes just hours) caused by massive overcapacity resulting from decades of salmon-wealth-destroying management.

 

The vehicle started to idle rough and stall during this challenge-filled vacation. (Actually I loved it--stormy seas are in my veins--but my wife wasn't so keen.)

 

Anyhooow, I now carry a canister of throttle cleaner in the emergency boxes in the cargo space at all times.

 

Next step will be to examine and clean the MAF thanks to 88pathoffroad's excellent instructions and informative images.

Edited July 14, 2008 by westslope

[westslope]

Was about to make a separate thread but thought it might be more useful to add to this excellent, informative thread.

 

Have had to clean the air intake throttle body a couple of times this year already. I use Air Intake System Cleaner made by kleen-flo based in Brampton, Ontario.

 

 

Experienced the problem while cruising up the Squamish River valley north of Vancouver a couple of days ago. I tried to clean it with the kleen-flo product after lunch. Didn't work very well. I suspect that I made a couple of mistakes. For one, the vehicle had cooled down during our picnic lunch.

 

Yesterday, I ran an errand and included some highway miles before recommencing the cleaning operation. This time the engine was hot and this time, I carefully used a clean soft cotton rag to wipe the entrance and valve. Wiping seems to have removed much black material. Afterwards the '93 pathie idled smoothly a hair above 750 rpm. (Where it should be.) Immediately prior to that, it had been idling at just under 1,000 rpm. Up on the Squamish, the idle speed would often drop to near zero.

 

It occurs to me that I should also carefully use a soft nylon toothbrush to knock additional gunk off the valve parts.

 

Funny, been doing this since roughly 2000 and I believe this is the first time, I thoroughly wiped the throttle body with a cloth. Who says old dogs can't learn new tricks?

 

 

Hope the above is useful to those of you experiencing this well known problem.

 

 

 

P.S. If properly used, one of these cans should last for multiple cleanings (a dozen maybe?). You don't have to empty the can in the air intake system!

Edited August 19, 2009 by westslope

[Kittamaru]

If you DO empty the can (and I had to... just kept pouring out black stuff) how long should you wait before starting the vehicle?

[ahardb0dy]

I just cleaned my TB, I just removed the 4 bolts and pulled the TB away from the intake plenum, didn't take it completely off due to the 2 hoses that are attached to it, but I was able to pull it far enough out to get to the back side and clean it really good. It was easy to remove and I was able to re-use the old gasket but if you do clean it this way you may just want to pick up a gasket in case the one on the TB breaks.

[ImaHokie]

Old thread...new pics...

 

At about 140,000 miles, my Pathy's gas pedal was sticking. After the engine was warm, accelerating after stopping at a traffic light was a real adventure.

 

I decided to take the throttle body completely off to clean it.

 

Front side of throttle body before cleaning:

 

 

Rear side of throttle body before cleaning (can't imagine why that would be sticking...can you?):

 

 

Upper intake manifold before cleaning:

 

 

 

Rear side of throttle body after cleaning:

 

 

Intake manifold after cleaning (I used throttle body cleaner on cotton strips fixed to a gun cleaning rod). Next, I'll try Seafoam to see if I can get more junk removed that I couldn't reach.

 

 

The job took a bit longer than planned because the rubber air duct connecting to the throttle body cracked as I removed it...I had to wait a few days for the new part to arrive from Courtesy Parts.

 

 

No more sticking gas pedal! I can't say I've really seen any mpg improvement. Any increase in power? Not really sure about that; I usually think my power is better after washing & waxing the outside. But the fixed gas pedal has been great.

 

Thanks to the previous posters that helped me figure out what was causing the sticky situation!

Edited April 15, 2012 by ImaHokie

[ahardb0dy]

Looks good !! with the edges of the butterfly clean it should idle better when the butterfly is completely closed. When I removed the TB on the Q45 we used to have it was as bad as that on the front and back and inside the plenum, I also found the EGR port completely clogged.

[Towncivilian]

I'd use something like Amsoil Power Foam or Mopar Combustion Chamber Cleaner rather than Seafoam to clean the intake manifold.

[Megaton]

I know this is an old thread but I recently cleaned my TB and MAF sensor and have had idle problems ever since. I was'nt really having any problems before, but they were dirty so I decided to clean them. Now I have a surging, rythemic idle. When I put it in gear ( AT) the idle stops surging but it shoots up to high.( tach isn't working rpm unknown) When I went to the parts house to see if there was a trouble code , their reader could not get any codes. They said it like the car was'nt giving any signals . Weird. I hope y'all can help. Thanks , Tim.

[dougf4]

A different approach that worked for me.  I used B12 Throttle Body Cleaner. I located the vacuum line that runs from the Brake Master Cylinder to the Intake and disconnected the line at the master cylinder.  Ran engine at a fairly high rpm and kept feeding the B12 through the system.  To finish things off I cleaned the Mass Flow Air Sensor (MAF) with MAF Aerosol Cleaner. My engine runs beautifully and is very responsive ever since.