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Carbon Buildup 101

Injen1us

Injen1us

Drag Race Newbie
fredf said:
"Catch cans and meth injection help slow it down. "

There is no proof of this.
Click to expand...

Accurate statement. Unless you pull the manifold off dozens of times to measure there is no good measurement of this.

Particularly because alot of people dont know how exactly it forms. Some people say its oil residue in the intake track... some say hyper rich gas/carbon that deposit on the valve as the engine is turned off.

Methanol is a solvent so that should help... but really only if youre pouring TONS of meth into the cyc which then would not be helping with combustion. If you run meth like i do where it is just a cooling point than really youre not getting any of that junk off the valve.



Catch cans dont make any sense to me on these cars. Literally a waste of 400 bucks unless you have bombed your PCV system
 
F

FriggenT1

Banned
Injen1us said:
Accurate statement. Unless you pull the manifold off dozens of times to measure there is no good measurement of this.

Particularly because alot of people dont know how exactly it forms. Some people say its oil residue in the intake track... some say hyper rich gas/carbon that deposit on the valve as the engine is turned off.

Methanol is a solvent so that should help... but really only if youre pouring TONS of meth into the cyc which then would not be helping with combustion. If you run meth like i do where it is just a cooling point than really youre not getting any of that junk off the valve.



Catch cans dont make any sense to me on these cars. Literally a waste of 400 bucks unless you have bombed your PCV system
Click to expand...

It's proven that meth can help with valves that are already cleaned, but it does basically nothing to them once dirty.
 
Phur

Phur

Autocross Champion
FriggenT said:
It's proven that meth can help with valves that are already cleaned, but it does basically nothing to them once dirty.
Click to expand...



Meth with also help with any pesky teeth...[emoji33][emoji57]


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D

Dans GTI

Ready to race!
Someone did a comparison of how much a catch can affects carbon build up. The before and after affects. The conclusion was that there was no real impact. IIRC there are only 2 things that help with carbon build up.

1) Water/Meth
2) Drive the car hard regularly.

I did my carbon cleaning around 80k miles or so and i had minimal build up.
 
hbrown0509

hbrown0509

Go Kart Champion
Dans GTI said:
Someone did a comparison of how much a catch can affects carbon build up. The before and after affects. The conclusion was that there was no real impact. IIRC there are only 2 things that help with carbon build up.

1) Water/Meth
2) Drive the car hard regularly.

I did my carbon cleaning around 80k miles or so and i had minimal build up.
Click to expand...



But I thought there is no proof of water/ meth slowing it down as I was told earlier lol. I’m joking of course lol.



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Last edited:
hbrown0509

hbrown0509

Go Kart Champion
fredf said:
"Catch cans and meth injection help slow it down. "



There is no proof of this.
Click to expand...



I meant to say “may help slow it down.”

I already know that once the valves are dirty the only way to get it off is by manual cleaning. Clean valves with water/meth will slow it down or additional port fuel injection like Audi started doing.


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hbrown0509

hbrown0509

Go Kart Champion
Injen1us said:
Accurate statement. Unless you pull the manifold off dozens of times to measure there is no good measurement of this.



Particularly because alot of people dont know how exactly it forms. Some people say its oil residue in the intake track... some say hyper rich gas/carbon that deposit on the valve as the engine is turned off.



Methanol is a solvent so that should help... but really only if youre pouring TONS of meth into the cyc which then would not be helping with combustion. If you run meth like i do where it is just a cooling point than really youre not getting any of that junk off the valve.







Catch cans dont make any sense to me on these cars. Literally a waste of 400 bucks unless you have bombed your PCV system
Click to expand...



I thought the point of catch cans were to collect blow by and reduce it going back into the intake track for better combustion purposes and reducing the diluting of the engine oil over time with fuel and water condensation? I just didn’t like all the blow-by-oil pooling in the charge pipe and going into the intercooler. Just curious your opinion why they don’t make sense to you on these cars?


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Injen1us

Injen1us

Drag Race Newbie
hbrown0509 said:
I thought the point of catch cans were to collect blow by and reduce it going back into the intake track for better combustion purposes and reducing the diluting of the engine oil over time with fuel and water condensation? I just didn’t like all the blow-by-oil pooling in the charge pipe and going into the intercooler. Just curious your opinion why they don’t make sense to you on these cars?


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Click to expand...

That's exactly what they do. Some people say that it is a contributor to carbon build up too. That part I'm not so sure.

The reason I don't think they make sense on these cars is because I measure it often.

Everytime someone says: "look at how much gunk I pulled out of my catch can! And in only 5k miles!" And they hold up a 12 ounce water bottle and expect that to sell me. But if you break it down (and I have a half dozen times) the engine consumes about 1/2ml of oil every mile...

I'm not sure if you can visualize a ml... But it's basically 1/3 of a penny. Now quarter that... Now that is how much is consumed in the avg mile.

Insignificant. Your engine won't know the difference
 
brobst

brobst

Go Kart Champion
Idk man, maybe I didn't quite follow the analysis above, but if my water bottle fills up from catch can gunk before an oil change, that's 500ml. Given the car takes ~5qt=4700ml, 10% of your oil becomes that crap.
Maybe thats not bad, iono

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F

FriggenT1

Banned
brobst said:
Idk man, maybe I didn't quite follow the analysis above, but if my water bottle fills up from catch can gunk before an oil change, that's 500ml. Given the car takes ~5qt=4700ml, 10% of your oil becomes that crap.
Maybe thats not bad, iono

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Click to expand...

Part of it is vapor and condensation I think
 
F

FriggenT1

Banned
Injen1us said:
That's exactly what they do. Some people say that it is a contributor to carbon build up too. That part I'm not so sure.

The reason I don't think they make sense on these cars is because I measure it often.

Everytime someone says: "look at how much gunk I pulled out of my catch can! And in only 5k miles!" And they hold up a 12 ounce water bottle and expect that to sell me. But if you break it down (and I have a half dozen times) the engine consumes about 1/2ml of oil every mile...

I'm not sure if you can visualize a ml... But it's basically 1/3 of a penny. Now quarter that... Now that is how much is consumed in the avg mile.

Insignificant. Your engine won't know the difference
Click to expand...

The buildup is a chemical reaction to the steel on the valvesvalves. Once carbon is on the valves, the build up speeds up even more.
 
Jeffs2013GTI

Jeffs2013GTI

Drag Race Newbie
Oil Catch Cans are NOT a cure for Carbon deposits, even though they are being sold as such.

Due research on the web people still have the problem, if anything it just slows it down.

Also, if you live in cold climate where it freezes? This can be an issue as well, again read up on that.

Lastly, In states like California where Emissions are taken too seriously, an oil catch can is an Automatic fail at the emissions test.

If your willing to spend $500 on a catch can? Why not just go crazy and do Water or Water/Meth Injection instead? THIS would actually do something and get a performance gain at the same time.

I believe if you change out yoru PCV Valve every 50k or so as a precaution, use good oil with a low NOACK rating and use top tier gas, these will all help about as much as that catch can will.

Just look at it as part of maintenance on the car to have the valves cleaned every 80k miles or so. This goes FOR ALL DI MOTORS not just VW's by the way.

Just part of owning a DI car unfortunately.


Dub On....


Jeff
 
Injen1us

Injen1us

Drag Race Newbie
brobst said:
Idk man, maybe I didn't quite follow the analysis above, but if my water bottle fills up from catch can gunk before an oil change, that's 500ml. Given the car takes ~5qt=4700ml, 10% of your oil becomes that crap.
Maybe thats not bad, iono

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Click to expand...

Now convert the ml consumed to miles driven. You'll see that the amount your engine consumes is minimal
 
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