Intake Manifold Cleaning
I cleaned my first (and last?) intake manifold. It took about 2 hours to remove, 2 hours to clean, and 4-5 hours to reinstall. Lots of picking up dropped bolts from under car!
I brought the manifold to a friend's shop and dipped it into his spirit tank. Lots of scraping to remove the goo:
While cleaning the EGR, temptation got the best of me to remove the anti-shudder valve piston, which of course, broke. I glued splints on with superglue, safety-wired the splints, and then covered everything with hot glue from a glue gun. My wife thinks it will all melt next time it's 95 degrees out and the car is sitting in a parking lot.
I used the instructions from DeafBug--Thanks DeafBug!
A few comments about my experience for the next intake newbie:
The mirror and magnetic pick up tool are essential.
While I used lots of different short extensions on my 3/8" socket driver as well as long ball-end allen wrenches, I think this would have been a great addition to this project, as short drivers often don't clear the parts you are trying to remove:
You only need the 5 and 6 mm.
I had a *heckofa* time getting the three bolts back in for the EGR cooler. I succeeded by installing the *bottom* bolts first, and tying back all of the wires and hoses that were slightly in the way:
I did remove the much-warned about connecting pipe, but not until *after* I removed the EGR cooler. I had better access that way, and could see what I was doing.
I also reused my 6 intake manifold bolts. They looked perfect and perfectly clean, and also had what looked like OEM washers on them, which the new ones did not. All bolts and the 2 connecting pipe nuts got slathered with copper paste.
The only bolts I had trouble with were surprisingly two of the valve cover bolts, which got a little mushy while removing.
I did my cleaning over parts of two days. Disassemble and clean one day, and install the second day. It was nice to take a break and not be rushed. Finally, take heed to Deafbug's warning about the black goo! I took my intake into the basement to scrape it on my workbench. I *thought* I was being careful but there is evidence that I was not on certain throw rugs in the kitchen and as well as the shower in the second floor.