Does Anyone Use Engine Flushes? Pro's/Cons? Share
 

Hey guys, I was wondering if anyone uses engine flushes before oil changes? I usually use a Pennzoil Engine Flush Product. For those that don't know what it is, you simply add it to you're old oil and let the car sit ideling for 10-15 minutes, after which you begin you're oil change and watch the oil come flying out ....usually pretty dark. I've gotton alot of different opinions on it over the last year or so, and wish to know what you guys think about it...

I started using the product after my car's engine felt as if it was being over worked. A mechanic told me to start using it before all my oil changes as it would help flush out any sludge I have built up in my car and help keep it from returning. True Enough after my second engine flush then oil change, my car began to drive like it had turned young again and i actually noticed my fuel economy get noticbly better....

But at the same time some mechanics have told me they would never use the product for various reason, some of which are listed below.

- The product thins the oil out and does not completly drain out during the oil change. It eventually thins out the new oil pre-maturly which prevents the new oil from protecting you're engine during that oil interval. The pre-mature oil break down can last for couple oil changes after the intial flush.

- Another concern a mechanic has brought up with me is the fact this product apparently contains diesel. He told me that I am simply adding diesel to oil and thinning it out and cleaning the engine like a paint cleaner to paint. He told me its never a good idea to add or have traces of a diesel fuel as an additive to oil and let it sit their running for 15 minutes. He told me I am not only cleaning my engine, but the diesel will damage the smaller components inside the engine that the oil is trying to protect and keep lubed....

So what do you guys think of this product? I use it every second oil change, does anyone else use it, and what is the truth about this product? All these companies are pissing me off, they sell a product yet besides simple instructions...offer very little other details.

thanks guys.

A ture "car" person should NEVER need that STUFF! If you change the oil it doesn't need flushed...& as Larry says..."change it HOT & often"

Well, in some cases when cars have come in absolutely Caked w/ gunk I'll run a quart of Risolene in the crank case for a couple of hundred miles... does a good job getting the cleaning process started.. I'll follow that up w/ Rotella or Delo 15/40 oil changed ever 2500 or so miles.. Over the period of a year w/ average mileage the internals will look markedly better!

Jonathan

I just use DELO 15W40 from Wal-Mart, it has excellent soot dispersion and detergent properties. In fact, I developed a few small oil seeps and started burning oil from the valve seals in my 300E afer a few oil changes with this oil, which tells me it has cleared some solids. Yet it is gentle compared to aggressive engine flushes.

Guess you missed the thread a couple weeks ago that linked to
http://www.thecarconnection.com/Enthusiasts/Mechanics_Tale/Mechanics_Tale_The_Flushing_of_America.S281.A10297.html

Brake fluid flushes
 

Not to highjack the thread, but need to clear up what seems to me to be a mis-statement in that article. Flint says that brake fluid flushes were dreamed up by Honda, and suggests they are unnecessary. MB has recommended every-2-year flushing for many years now.

I also take issue with his remark about brake fluid being in a sealed environment. What happens when the fluid level in the reservoir drops due to normal wear of brake pads? The compensating air in the reservoir has to come from somewhere. That air will come with moisture, which in turn gets absorbed by the brake fluid.

I learned from my clients many years ago that another way to get smoother performance and more pep out of a car is to wash the windows and vacuum the inside during an oil change. I can't count the # of follow up calls I got stated how much better the car ran after the C service ( oil change).

I see additives and flushes as a waste of money.

Funny but true. I once had a supervisor expound on that notion while at a conference for my hospital position I held a few years ago. He related that your car feels so much faster and performs seemingly better when it is cleaned...and that perception is akin to a hospital. If the hospital is always clean and tidy, everyone will think it is a better hospital. Of course, that all equated to him wanting those of us not in the maintenance field to pick up the tissues and such we find.

But, as relatively seasoned as I am, and while I know it has no bearing on the car's performance...a good wash and detail always does seem to make my car feel better.

Same principal holds true for yourself.
You'll feel much better if you shower at least once a week.:D

But on a more serious note, I would only do an engine flush on a very old engine, that was retrieved from a barn.

I understand its a waste of money to flush a well looked after engine. But I'm more so wondering if an engine flush is good preventive maintance as it would help signifigantly reduce the risk of a engine sludge problem, if one were to ever occur.... I do my own oil changes, but I've noticed that after I do an engine flush, my car runs alot better for the first couple K's. Also my oil changes are done every 6 000km, which is about 4000 miles.

That stuff is snake oil. I don't use it, never will.
You could eat off the valve trian in my 603, the cam, lifter's, and tops of the valves look brand new after 254k miles.

Thats on straight Mobil 1 for the past 25k miles, no idea what the PO used.

In the shop we only sell engine flushes on the new 112, 113 motors when they begin to consume excessive amounts of oil. When the FFS intervals get ignored the engines begin to carbon up the piston rings leading to oil consumption. If flushed before the bores get beat they usually can return to service without issues.

As a preventative maintennace it's complete overkill. I wouldn't drive the car with it in the oil either. We run the car for 30 mins in neutral @2500RPM to flush them. The stuff is meant to thin the oil and dissolve gunk, not support your bearings under load.

Just so you know my 1982 300SD reccomends ALL fluids to be flushed every year in the spring. Honda was a very small car company in 1982.

I think it does more harm than good really.... A poorly maintained engine with sludge and varnish in it still runs..... Removing the sludge and varnish could damage the engine further by reducing compression if your sludge and varnish happened to be in an area where it was providing some kind of seal.....

Leave well enough alone..... Change your oil in a reasonable timeframe and leave the engine cleaning to the people who end up doing the overhaul when its time......

Around twenty years ago I was running a mom and pop auto parts store. A fellow came in and bought a quart of engine flush. He looked like the type that would get really p.o. if I warned him about not using it so I kept my mouth shut. The subject car was a early seventies Olds with a 455. It sounded a little ragged, but nothing too alarming. The next day the same guy came flying in the store wanting to kill somebody because he dumped the flush in and drove around for a couple of hours.....until a rod came through the block.

Engine cleaner is kerosene, and shouldn't be used for the same reason you shouldn't use detergent oil in a car that had been run on non-detergent oil. All the crud gets knocked loose and plugs up the motor(esp the oil pump pickup), ergo no oil pressure... and a thrown rod.

Frequent oil changes are best, though I have been guilty of putting a little Sea Foam in the oil to free up lifters and rings. I always worry about reducing the lubricity of the oil. Anyways, just my .02 cents.

THanks for the info. I don't drive the car with the Engine flush, just leave it started for the time mentioned on the bottle. Similar to what you do. The bottle actually says, do not drive the car and simply let it idle.

Hey thanks for that repsonse. That was one of the better repsonses and very detail filled. What you said makes alot of sense, and it makes me wonder even furthur what really is the benefit of using this product.

I'll also be talking to my friend, who uses an engine flush product for every oil change on his 2003 Honda Accord(since brand new) and does his oil changes every 4500 kms. He maintains its the reason his oil comes out looking new, but i wonder if he's damaging his car by thinning his oil. He thinks his car's engine will last forever as sludge and junk will never deposist in his engine......

If you use an engine flush of any discription just put a slightly heavier oil on fill-up....I use a flush once every 2 years then replace oil with Castrol 25w-60w

This works fine for me....purrs like a kitten:rolleyes:

Hmmm,

Its a shame people don't put VIN numbers in their posts. Would be nice to google boards like this and see all the not so nice things that have been done to the car you might be interested in buying.

As cumbersome as the FAA makes aircraft service its really nice to be able to read the log book entries and see what the previous owners have done to it over the years.

Speaking of Aircraft. After a Major Overhaul most aircraft engines are run on Mineral oil rather than the standard oil to break in the engine. Reminds me of some of this engine flush stuff.

I have a ticking lifter on my 99 C280. All the lifters was replaced about 10 000km ago. Before the lifters were replaced, it had a constant ticking. After the lifters were replaced, the lifter ticking is intermittent. Usually on a cold start (but not always - about 50% of the times), I'll have the ticking for about 10-20 minutes before it goes away. Sometimes the ticking will come back even if the engin is still warm, for example after I have driven for 200 km and stop - when I start up after 5 minutes it will tick for a few minutes before silencing.

I dont know why it still ticks even when all the lifters where changed. The only thing I can think of is that one of the lifters is not getting oil due to partially blocked oil galleries, etc.

Is it advised to do an engin flush, or put a detergent in the oil, to try and open up oil galleries. Or what should I do?

I afraid of causing more problems if I flush, such as all the varnish/deposits coming loose and block up the whole engin.

The car has been running on Magnatec for whole of its life (160 000km). Apart from the last service before the lifters was changed when it had Mobil 1 in. I think the previous owner tried to use a synthetic to see if it wouldn't solve the problem before changing the lifters. I bought the car on 150 000, with noisy lifter, but under the agreement that he will change the lifters.

What is the possibility that the ticking noise is something else (not a lifter), keeping in mind that it is intermittent and usually is only noisy in the first 10-20 minutes after a start.

Thanks for helping. I really need to solve this, and have asked for advise in a number of forums over the last few months (this one included), without real pratical advise.

Personally I would have the engine partially dissasembled and have it cleaned.... If there is something blocking it now there are chances that you could make it worse by putting in a cleaning agent that might dislodge more of the crud and stop the oil flow all together.... Maybee you could go in half with the person since the lifters did not fix the problem afterall......

Its not the easy way out and its more expensive but it is the way to make sure that everything in there is ok..... As well you might want to pose this question to a couple of good independant mechanics in your area and see what answers you get from them......

I collect antique clocks and its common practice for sleazy Antique dealers to blast the back of the clockworks with wd40.... It makes it run in the short term but eventually the wd40 gums up again and provides little lubrication to the clock and causes more wear in the process..... You would essentially be doing the same thing to your engine..... A short term fix that might make the same symptoms return and do more harm in the long run......

My car use to run like crap before i did my oil flushes. Felt like it was struggling...I did it for 2 oil changes and my car ran great. I've seen the oil, and it comes out very thin and filled with junk and dark dark black...I personally don't fear it would cause gunk to stay inside you're engine, i think it'll all flush out after a couple oil changes with flushes, but my only worry is what that stuff is made out of....

IF I were you, i'd try the product to see if it improves you're problem. They sell millions of this product nationwide, so i doubt it wrecks engines. I'd try this $5-10 dollar luck before spending big money on ripping you're engine apart..which you might have to do in the end anyways.

Have you tried auto-rx? I have used it on 3 cars '95 C280 135K miles, '96 Maxima 127K miles, and a '00 Passat 105k miles. When looking at the cams on my C280 after treatment, all signs of varnish are gone. The C280 filter looked as if the varnish had been transfered to the filter like the testimonial / pics on the auto-rx site of the MB S500 after the cleaning phase. The Maxima filter (which is an extremely small filter) had noticeable thick dark sludge coating the filter after the cleaning phase. I'm still on the rinse phase and will cut the filter open when I'm done with the cleaning phase to see if there is any additional sludge. I didn't notice any sludge on the VW filters and its color looked similar to the C280 but a bit darker after the cleaning phase. I used a roto-zip tool with a metal circular blade to cut the Maxima and VW metal shells from the filters. Although my C280 had no noticeable ticking sound, I do believe the engine runs quieter. It seems that my normal idle is up slightly on the VW (760 ish to 780 ish). And on my Maxima, my overall mpg appears to have increased by almost 1 mpg to about 24.5.

Thanks for the sitez!

i found another good one... http://pages.prodigy.net/jforgione/MB_S500.html

Your profile indicates you have done over $15K worth of repairs to your 94 C220. Care to fill us in on the engine related repairs you have had to do? Might be somewhat enligtening for someone considering putting this stuff into their engine for comparison purposes.