Hi All,
I’m planning on giving my 5 a good clean later. The engine bay is currently letting the side down badly, so I thought I’d
ask for hints on getting a nice shiney engine bay. Elbow grease and scraped fingers are a given, but are there any
tips for making my life a bit easier. I’m guessing a lot of water + electrical components = bad idea
Cheers,
Steve
I’ve used “Muc-off” (pink spray) before & found it to work well on surfaces that aren’t too heavily caked, using a 1-2in paintbrush as necessary. I’m sure there are better/stronger products too, or ones that leave a shiny finish.
Bill
It all depends on how dirty
Can you post a picture and I’ll try to tailor make a reply based on the work required?
Thanks
There are certainly a few ways to tackle it - and lots of water is not really necessary.
A bottle of APC cleaner of mild dilution to start with, some old microfibers plus a small and medium detailing brush.
First pass on this should basis, should see the main areas vastly improved; but cant see how heavily soiled your engine bay is.
Any more severe areas/oily deposits… either a stronger APC mix and or dedicated degreaser may be required.
When done - you can go over the main items with a protectant/sealer to help it stay clean.
Works for me - I hope this helps
All purpose cleaner brushes and plenty of microfibres is what you need. Don’t worry about a didicated degreaser unless you have partivulary oily areas.
Change your cloths regulary or you will wipe dirt around and it will leave a film when it dries.
Work logically, don’t be temped to get stuck into the oily hits first. Work from the bonnet first. Then do the edges of the engine bay working inwards.
Spray all purpose cleaner, aggitate and then wipe dirt away with microfibres.
Use se a proper engine degreaser on thick grease and oil if needed but usually a strong all purpose cleaner is suffice.
i like to dress the plastics and polish the painted metal After.
Just did my 93 S-Special this week by only using Meguiars All Purpose cleaner and a microfiber cloth / detailing brush, followed by Auto Glym Vinyl & Rubber cleaner, not show stopping but very presentable.
I cant offer any more advice…all good ones given aready
Just to add…I was confronted once with a very very dirty engine bay on an early Mk3
I did use, selectively, short blasts of the pressure washer, but unless you know what youre doing, I don’t recommend it:
Lots of APC and MF cloths and a detailing brush is the way and finish with 3M Vinyl protector spray
Here it is finished:
Finally…Cant resist posting one of mine too:
Good luck…Just take your time and don’t get it too wet
I finally got around to cleaning the engine bay of our 2001 Mk 2.5 a couple of months ago. It’s amazing what comes off just with hot water and a wet cloth, although you do need to keep it well rinsed in a different bucket or you end up just moving the dirt around. I also find a cloth with WD40 sprayed onto it quite good for the dirtier bits as it shifts grease and oil and you can then finish up with the hot water cloth. Other than a vacuum cleaner to shift the worst of the leaves and other garden debris that seemed to have accumulated under the bonnet that was all I used.
That looks very nice
Thanks for all the replies folks! I only managed to get the outside washed and polished
yesterday and it was too dark before I remembered to take a photo of the engine bay. It’s amazing how many scratches, dents and
chips a good wash and polish reveals. Boo. I also massively underestimated how long it would take to do.
I’ll take all your comments on board take some before and after pics once I’ve given her a clean this weekend.
My engine bay isn’t really that dirty. It’s just not shining the way I would like.
With many many hours of dedication you can get the bug and get really serious
Or spend thousands of pounds on someone else to do it profesionally.
Detailing while making life worse for yourself.
I pressure washed mine after rescuing it from sitting outside not driven for 3 years
I first vacuumed out a couple of 8 gallon shop vacuum’s worth of dried leaves, twigs, a mouse nest etc.
After a thorough vacuuming I put the very smallest nozzle on and went into every nook and cranny again.
I used a cloth with degreaser to clean the outside of the starter and alternator, paying particular attention to the underside of them and then bagged them in plastic and taped them off. Then I used sheets of aluminum foil to totally crimp around the plastic and tape.
I cleaned the spark plug wires with a cloth and degreaser paying particular attention to the area where they sealed to the rocker cover and then taped each of them off with plastic and aluminum foil at each end.
The aluminum foil stopped the plastic from being blown back and possibly working loose if I made a mistake and accidently directed the pressure washer at them.
Any other electrical components were treated the same way.
By the time I was done the entire area looked a tad odd… like a hair salon with highlights being a specialty.
Started on the driver’s side of the car and one at a time unbolted anything bolted to the firewall and inner fender in about a quarter of the area. Washed the electric connectors off totally and then cleaned the terminals inside with a 3000 grit foam polishing pad glued to a small wooden tongue depressor. Cleaned the interior of each connector with cotton ear buds then snapped them back together. Applied Klasse sealant to the outside of connectors and polished them dry.
This last part was really fruitful because in two of the connectors I found a lot of corrosion and a small bit of arching marks. I sanded the marks down and then polished them with the 1500 grit. when I checked them a few months later, just in case, they were pristine so doing that seems to have prevented any further arching.
Same procedure for relays
while everything that was disconnected was cleaned this way, the bolts were put in cleaning solution to soak and also cleaned and buffed.
When one area was done I then put a couple of thick cardboard sheets in the area in such a way that I could direct my pressure washer at the area I had just detailed and avoid spraying anywhere else other than the small area I was concentrating on.
Sprayed degreaser on and let it drip for a few moments, scrubbed it off with micro cloths while using a soft detailing brush and ear buds to get into tight areas, then pressure washed with hot water being very careful to direct it into nooks and crannies I might have missed with the cleaning cloths and keep it away from any electrical even though they had been taped off.
Gave it a good rinse with clean water, dried the paintwork off with cloths and then waxed, polished and sealed the paint.
Bolted the parts back on. Rearranged the cardboard sheets and did the next section as above
Things like the screen washer bottle and radiator overflow bottles were removed entirely, set to soak in hot water and then scrubbed inside and out thoroughly with brushes, rinsed and then wiped dry and the outside was sealed with Klasse sealer before being reinstalled, mostly because of the casting ridges that are part of the bottles, they attract the dirt and oil first and I thought it might help either help repel or at least minimize the effort to remove any in the future.
On the other side of the car I removed the AFM, the air filter box, all the air ducting and took them to a table and totally cleaned, polished and sealed them.
I cleaned the aluminum and stainless on the rocker panels with aluminum cleaner as well but it was a given that I could not get under there easily so someday…
In short, everything that could be unbolted easily was unbolted, cleaned, polished and sealed and the areas they were bolted to were washed, waxed, polished and sealed.
I found no rust but if I saw that something had friction rubbed the paint even slightly while bolted on I paid particular attention to that area to see why it had happened.
In some spots I cut rubber gaskets out of an inner tube before bolting the part back on…making it slightly smaller than the component so that it would not squeeze past the edges and possibly collect moisture. Only had to do that once or twice I believe.
This all took two days to do properly although I was somewhat handicapped by having to use a cane while doing it. I had bright lime green hoses and vacuum lines installed instead of the old ones, the others were in good shape but I figured if anything was going to leak in the future around them it would be far easier to see before it became something major.
I made ONE mistake while doing all of this but it was a superlative mistake! I did not know what the AFM was or for that matter how to disconnect it and tore out terminals when I disconnected the connector to it.
I realized that something was wrong before I pulled them out entirely, shoved them back in and figured out how to do it properly and then as stated above cleaned it and re-installed it.
When the engine compartment was completely done and looking stellar I started it up ready to go for a drive.
Except…it didn’t start…it TRIED but…it was like…it wasn’t getting fuel…it was fine when I started to clean the engine but now.
What the heck?
Nothing had changed since I drove it in to start cleaning…all I did was clean the engine and…uh OH!
Those terminals …
Went online, found pictures of the engine compartment, traced information and found out that thing I had cleaned while pulling terminals out was the AFM.
Took it out…(properly this time) pried it open…yep…ripped out the solder…got my soldering gun out and repaired as per instructions and tried it again…SUCCESSS, it started…only it ran rough…Ok…it coughed with enthusiasm and not much else.
Opened it up again, looked at how it was SUPPOSED to look and realized I had left the tiny arm on the wrong side of the actuator bar or whatever that thing was.
At this point what I SHOULD have done is remove the unit, take it to the work table and do it properly but I was TIRED so instead I gently pried at…SNAP!
Even I know you can’t solder a tiny arm like that and expect it to work properly.
Found a used AFM online, it was there two weeks later, I spent the down time reading as much as I could about OTHER things that I might run into and not understand…and well…BREAK!
The other AFM came, I cleaned and polished IT and installed it…car purred.
The difference was amazing when I was done and while checking everything after a 6000 km round trip I made later that summer I was glad I had installed the lime green hoses.
The PCV valve had just started leaking, but because the area around it was clean and the hoses were a bright color I was able to see it replace the unit before it caused a real problem.
The sealant I used seemed to work, now I can open the engine compartment and use either an air compressor or a shop vac with the hose reversed and a small nozzle on it to blow any dust out once a week before it collects and becomes a problem. It’s been a year now and I have not “had” to wash it.
Halfords Silicon lubricant (couple of cans)
Bottle of white spirit just in case
Loads of lint-free rag
Couple of (preferably old) toothbrushes
Couple of pointy wooden sticks (I use chopsticks)
Lots of time, not so much elbow grease
Job’s a good’un
All this fancy s41t! - waste of money IMO. But call me old fashioned.