The subject says it all. With my previous car I never really cared to do this, but the winter crud on the road has started to get my engine bay dirty and so I was wonder how the best way to go about doing it was.

A friend of mine once told me to find a cleaner at the auto store with citrus in it, and spray that nice and good around the engine bay. Then rinse it with water.

Is this correct? And is there anything else I need to watch out for when I do this?

I want to keep my baby nice and clean, inside and out.

Thanks.

 

don't get your alternator wet...cover it with a plastic bag and a rubber band.

 

i've always been worried to spray water into the engine bay, isn't it better to always have the engine steam cleaned?

 

Some of dealers before sending a car to an auction, will not only steam clean the engine, but will spray clear over it as well. It looks unbelivable when it dries.

 

I just go to the do-it-yourself car wash, make sure to leave the car at idle, then spray all inside the engine bay with the high pressure nozzle, I even get down on my back and get under the front end of the car. I try to stay away from the alternator and intake areas. I have done this on all my vehicles, never had a problem at all. Let me rephrase that, leave the car running, I once did it on my Camry with the car off, then it didn't start, had to wait 20min at the car wash before it would turn over.

Usually the water in the high pressure nozzle is hot, so I would consider that just as good as a steam clean, it gets the engine bay so clean its amazing.

 

Just don't get down hard on the electrical connections and the alternator housing with the sprayer nozzel.




Also, don't directly spray the headers/ or EM directly when running.

 

Maybe it's better to faggetaboutit. LOL

 

i just dampen a towel and wipe down...as far as the chasis on the sides goes, that i scrub with soap and water and wipe up with the same towel on the undampened side...i NEVER rinse the engine bay

 

I've washed my engine every month...the only thing that I try to avoid getting wet is my intake, but I have an AEM bypass valve so I probably don't even need to worry about that.

-Aaron

 

I pressure wash the engine couple time not single problem... next time I will use also some of the Green Stuff to prep the cleaning..

 

I clean my 01 CLS' engine bay with "Simple Green" every time I change oil (every 5k miles). I just spray it on and wait 5 minutes. After the 5 minutes rinse it off. I have never covered anything, or worried about full water pressure. My car just turned over 45k miles and has never missed a beat. The engine bay and under carraige looks better than brand new! The mechanics at my Acura dealer tell me they feel like they need to shower before working on it, but then again all they've done is TSB017 (twice) and tire rotation.

 

I hear what your saying about the car being that clean. My dealer doesn't even want to work on the car because I'm so fussy. When he sees me coming he gets sick...

 

The thing that bugs me is it's not that hard to clean as you go along with the work. I do it and it doesn't take me any longer to get the job done. They just chose not to do it!

 

It's just simple: CLEAN IT FROM DAY ONE ! Wipe it down with a dash cleanser !
NO NEED TO:
Hose down, pressure down ! If you keep it clean FROM DAY ONE, you'll NEVER need to pressure/hose it down, unless you live and drive on dirt roads 100% of the time....................