Pretty touchy subject. I'm of the opinon to keep your engine as dry as possible. That's being said, I also clean my wheel arches periodically, so I want the whole car clean.

First, never pressure wash, or spray your engine bay with a hose. Some do, and I cringe at the idea.

The best plan, is as follows.

Take your car to a professionaly detailer and have him steam clean the engine bay. When you get there, park your car to where it's gonna be cleaned, and bag up all the elctronic parts. Plastic baggies, thick towels or whatever should be placed over wiring, alternator, and all other components prone to dammage by water. This will be as good as your engine will ever look.

Then, periodically, you can use a can of CD-2 engine detailer purchased at your local autoparts store. This stuff works great, and doesn't require rinsing like many eninge cleaners.

 

Pinesol. Tried the spray on degreaser and WD-40 exactly as told; and felt like a dipshit for doing it afterwords. My engine looked clean but had horrible beads of water on it and smelled like shit. Anyways...

Degrease Your Engine

I heard many times over and over again not to acutally use somthing harsh for degreasing your engine, do you really want liquid that eats grease in seconds and makes you want to stand 10 feet back when you spray it? No. Why? Think of your belts / hoses and even rubber stripping around in the engine bay.

Use pinesol and brushes. It will look great and it wont eating your belts and hoses and also adding horrible shit to our air.

Good luck!

 

I use Simple Green... full strength. Great stuff. My car was professionally detailed by the dealer before I bought it last summer, so I've only had to do minor cleaning. If your engine bay is really cruddy, you can use a degreaser -- GumOut's "Foamy Engine Cleaner" is good stuff. Use a paint brush and/or toothbrush to get the crud out of the nooks and crannies.

After cleaning, I use Maguiar's "Quick Detail" spray and a clean, soft rag to give everything a nice shine. Armor All or Maguiar's vinyl and plastic protectant works great on hoses and so forth.

 

Originally posted by ADS328@Apr 24 2005, 08:46 PM
I use Simple Green... full strength. Great stuff. My car was professionally detailed by the dealer before I bought it last summer, so I've only had to do minor cleaning. If your engine bay is really cruddy, you can use a degreaser -- GumOut's "Foamy Engine Cleaner" is good stuff. Use a paint brush and/or toothbrush to get the crud out of the nooks and crannies.

After cleaning, I use Maguiar's "Quick Detail" spray and a clean, soft rag to give everything a nice shine. Armor All or Maguiar's vinyl and plastic protectant works great on hoses and so forth.

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never pressure wash an engine, unless no what u r doing.
Now have any of you used "Car Brite's" super kote (its for doing your dash in)
well clean engine as much as possible using a damp and dry cloth, then spary super kote on, let sit, then wipe gently. and there a shiney brand new looking engine.

P.S. super kote is grat for your dash, its a none shine cleaner. it restores the colour and leaves it looking brand new. its great for bmw and audi dashes because its not shiney, so the sun doesnt reflect off it and blind u (especially when driving).

Trust me i've used it, and its good!!!

Car brite is an american product.

 

I take armour all citrus wipe cleaner and a couple of hours to piss away. My engine bay looks spotless. It take generally one can(not costco size) The I use protectant on the ruber, vinyl and plastic parts. When you open my hood you smell orangy goodness followed by a nice looking engine bay.

Those wipes are awsome they make cleaning a hell of a lot easier both inside the cab and the engine bay. When you see my '93 318is the first thing everyone asks is"is the car new" no dust no nuthing except for some spot on the paint from lack of care at some point when another person owned it. they dont have a texture there alittle underneath; By the way can those be fixed by using compound? If so what grade finest, mild or coarse?