Wanting to give my 100K miles turbo diesel a treat, I thought to put a diesel system cleaner in a tank or two of fuel with the main purpose to clean up the injectors cheaply. They are not bad and fine on these warm mornings but a bit poor and uneven on cold mornings and I would cheerfully put in a few quid's worth of patent medicine in the hope of improving things even marginally - but on the cheap.
Am I wasting my money? Any experiences with Redex diesel treatment please?
Thanks,
Tony.
The message from Tony contains these words:
What's the smoke like? What you're describing sounds more like a glowplug dying.
It was somewhere around Barstow, on the edge of the desert, when the drugs began to take hold. I remember Tony saying something like:
Throw in a pint of Dexron ATF - works just as well, if not better.
Why not use the money more wisely, and whip the injectors out and take them to a diesel specialist, they'll test them for free.. or a quid each at some places and tell you for sure if they are ok or not, then get them to clean them with the ultrasonic injector cleaner, re-set the opening pressures etc, cost me about 5 quid per injector last time i had this done,
end result injectors performing like they did when they were new.
It's a 2.0 L Ecotec 16v engine and removing/refitting the injectors is a major operation. 'Whipping out' is not the phrase I would use.
Tony.
Grey for the first 10 to 15 seconds or so then it clears. The problem is just marginal up to now and I wanted to try something trivial before digging in deep next winter if I have to. Like a fuel system cleaner MIGHT just do the job. It's a 2.0 L Ecotec turbo diesel. It runs a treat amd starts just fine in this warm weather but is more uneven starting in the winter. After 15 to 20 seconds (ish), it runs fine summer or winter. Last time I checked, a few months ago, the glow plugs all were continuos circuit rather than open circuit.
Tony.
I have some of both the Redex and Dexron ATF. Will try both but I don't expect a sudden striking effect. I assumed it would be very gradual.
Thanks for the tip.
Tony.
It's a waste of time. Your glowplugs are on the way out. Mine tested fine but cold starting improved greatly when i changed them.
Thought for today: Why does Diesel Redex appear green until you hold it up to the light where it appears to actually be red in colour. Weird.
JH (must take more water with it...)
The message from Tony contains these words:
Grey sounds even more like a dying glowplug. Pull 'em and check 'em. If they need replacing /don't/ buy the really cheap ones - they sometimes don't even last the month.
The message from "Jon Harris" contains these words:
Same with slightly milky water. Transmitted light is reddish, reflected light is blueish. It's akin to Rayleigh Scattering which is responsible for the sky being blue but sunsets being red.
I wanted to do that with the injectors in my 110. Local diesel specialist told me they cant do them as they are two stage injectors and they don't know anyone who can.
Managed to pick up some new ones cheap though, must get round to fitting them.
O.K.. Thank you for the advice. Tony.
To "whip the injectors out" on this engine one must first remove the camshaft and timing chain, not really an easy job for the average home mechanic, and one for which a garage would relieve the car owner of large sums of cash.
James.
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