Engine Drivetrain 2nd Gen S Make your own Walnut Shell Carbon Blaster

Reading up on DIY walnut blasters...wondering if this project was completed? Perhaps there are other DIY threads y'all can link me to? Thx.

 

^^^ It will be, but the project is only in its second year of production.

 

^^^they woke me up MM, so I started posting early. :lol:

 

Nice work!! Looks great!

 

I used mine, just today.....it worked extremely well.

Not wanting to carbon up Metalman's thread , I bought the small pressure pot blaster from Harbor Freight with a 25% off coupon, I bought the factory adaptor that fits in the port, I made a wand out of a piece of 5/16" metal fuel line, bought 25lbs of fine walnut shells from Harbor Freight, and used my existing shop vac......worked a treat!

Here are some before/after pics.

The last one is what 10K/once yearly oil changes look like inside the engine, I think that will do nicely!



The dealer said he'd seen worse!



After.....





I pulled the valve cover just to make sure I had the valves closed before I blasted them, I think this engine looks pretty damn clean for 55K miles.....

 

I have to say, I can't tell a lick of difference, maybe after some time/mileage I'll see a difference in fuel economy, but to me it runs exactly the same. But I was pretty tired tonight when I drove home (I did the work up at the schools shop), maybe I'll have a different opinion the next time I drive it....we'll see.

 

Very nice Dave. Do u have a part number for the factory adaptor? How much time did it take u? Do u have a picture of your wand?

 

thanks MM, I knew it was in here, but I didn't remember which post....

You NEED the factory tube for the vacuum cleaner, otherwise you don't need anything exotic to do this. I just took a foot long piece of 5/16" brake line, cut the flare off one end and put the fitting that came with the Harbor Freight pressure pot over the remaining flared end, then carefully bent a 90 in the middle......I made the radius fairly large so that I could remove the fitting again and use the pressure pot as a normal sand blaster. My first attempt I bent the 90 at too tight a radius, then I couldn't get the fitting on the pipe - learned my lesson there.

I did not go thru nearly as much of the walnut shells as I thought I might, maybe 5- 8 lbs of the 25lb box I got from HF - be sure to buy the "fine" sized shells.

However, it's easier if you have two men, one to operate the wand, and one to control the valves on the pressure pot. the factory setup has a dual feed handle, that allows you to blow either air or air/shells mix with one hand. I could have done it myself, but it was easier with two people. I did the work at the shop at school where I teach, they have a REAL air compressor, I think my little home sized compressor would have done the job but we would have spent a lot of time waiting for it to catch up again using a nozzle as large as this. There's no way to see inside while you're blasting of course, so you just have to sorta feel your way along, moving the wand thoroughly in one side of the port, then pulling it back and angling it over to make sure you get the other side too....it didn't take too long per port once I got the hang of it.

I also did not open the feed side valve all the way, rather about halfway turned out to be enough.....but had the air on full blast. You want a lot of air volume and pressure.

Here's a pic of the pressure pot and wand....

 

Obviously the most time consuming and hardest part of the job is getting the intake manifold off and on again, and the hardest part of that job is just learning where the hidden fastener is (there is one, way down on the left side as you face the engine) and how to unhook the control valves and such that attach under the manifold. One tip, the two control valves are only attached using rubber, somewhat like an exhaust hanger.....you don't have to unbolt them.

Since you can't see the valves except with an inspection mirror - and my car is an automatic - I took the valve cover off so I could see the position of the valves and make sure they were closed on the cylinder I was blasting. I just used a socket and ratchet on the crank bolt to turn the engine over.

 

This was quite useful for those very few of us who don't have welding equipment and experience, metal lathes, training in use of lathes, and spare hunks of piping sitting around. Looked through my portable garage and found none of these.

But your citing the BMW adapter ($59 or so) and the 20-lb Harbor Freight blaster (as opposed to all their other blasters from $35 up to far too much) was very helpful. I'm going to see whether my local tool rental shop has a blaster I could use. Maybe make the J-shaped end.

 

After seeing this thread pop up again, I noticed absolutely NO difference in how my car ran or in the fuel mileage after I did the valves.....FWIW. Others have said they saw smoother running and better idle, as well as improved fuel mileage.

Oh, and I've done just over 15K miles in the last three years driving since I did the blasting....being retired sure cuts down on your daily mileage.

 

I'm thinking it makes more of a difference if you are really carboned up. How bad were your valves Dave?

 

If you go back a few pages, I did a video of my valves and posted some before/after pics......I'm told mine weren't so bad but they looked pretty gooped up to me.

 

My clubby had 130K before I had it done. It seemed to run a bit smoother and have a bit more power. It wasn't night and day as others have noticed.