Want to know how to deep clean your engine? While your car’s exterior and interior are important areas of the vehicle that needs constant cleaning attention, your engine bay is just as important.
Every car guy wants a clean and spot-free engine bay. The problem is, most of you don’t know how to detail or deep clean your engine bay. You neither need to be a genius, nor require a special skill to make your engine clean and shiny like new and I’ll teach you how.
So in this short post, I will discuss the simplest but probably the most effective way of deep cleaning an engine bay! And the best thing about this tutorial is that, this will be a water-less detail!
Interested? Lets get started!
Deep Clean Your Engine – Tools and Products that You Need
First off, when I say “detail” in this post, it means the same thing as “deep cleaning” the engine bay. It just differs how people prefer to call engine cleaning. So now you know hehe.
The first thing that you need to learn are the products and cleaning tools you need to detail your engine bay. Basically, you don’t need plenty of soaps or car wash products to detail your engine. So let me keep your cleaning task simple.
Here are the tools your need:
- Car multi-purpose cleaner (any brand will do)
- Engine degreaser (any brand will do)
- Plastic and rubber protectant / conditioner (any brand will do)
- Microfiber towels
- Air blower
- Soft tire brush
- Detail brush set
- Car steamer
Prepping and Safety Measures
As I mentioned above, this engine detail tutorial will be water-less so you don’t need to worry about wasting excessive water on this job. However, we still need to do some safety measures before you start deep cleaning your engine bay.
First is to protect your electrical system by disconnecting the negative terminal of your battery or completely removing the battery from your engine bay. This will prevent any electrical short circuit during cleaning.
Next is to cover your alternator with plastic to prevent excess cleaner or water to go inside. Even though modern alternators are made to work with water and some may argue that it can be wet, it is better to be sure with regards to safety rather than sorry.
Lastly is to cover the inlet of your air intake. After that, use an air blower to blow excess debris that sits on your engine bay.
Now that you prep your engine bay, lets start cleaning your hood!
How to Deep Clean Your Hood
When cleaning your engine bay, you should always start at the top which is the car’s hood. Your hood is the hinged cover over your vehicle’s engine.
Most modern hood has a heat-absorbing “hood-liner” so it won’t damage your hood’s inner and exterior paint. It also contains hinge as a locking mechanism, wiper hoses and sometimes hood bonnets which are often used by performance and sports cars to help scoop more cold air.
To deep clean your hood, you only need to use a multi-purpose cleaner, a soft brush (a tire brush will do), microfiber cloth and a car steamer.
First is to clean your hood liner with a multi-purpose cleaner. Spray the entire liner with cleaner then rub it gently with your soft brush. Then focus your attention to the painted area of your interior hood. Do the same procedure then proceed to use the steamer.
Use the steamer by steaming all parts of your inner hood. Then wipe excess water with your microfiber cloth. Remember not to use the steamer on a specific spot for a prolonged time as the heat will cause damage to plastic, rubber and paint. So use the steamer evenly during the course of your engine detail.
If your hood paint contains hard-to-remove dirt, you may need to use wax to remove them. But most of the time, you don’t need to do this procedure as steaming is enough to remove black dirt on painted areas.
Start Deep Cleaning Your Engine
Before cleaning your engine bay, you may want to take note of these cleaning areas first so you’ll know where to do deep cleaning first.
- Fire wall
- Electrical wires
- Engine itself
- Air intake system
- Radiator top shroud
- Brake fluid reservoir
- Washer fluid reservoir
- Coolant reservoir
- Fuse box
- Turbo (if the engine is not naturally aspirated)
- Charge pipes and hoses
The cleaning procedure for all these parts are the same so you don’t need to do any special cleaning job. I suggest that you clean the engine itself, then go to the firewall, electrical wires, and fluid reservoirs until you have covered all areas of your engine bay.
First is to use your multi-purpose cleaner and a detail brush to clean the firewall, engine, wires, air intake, fluid reservoirs and fuse box. Do this one area at a time. To rinse the areas, don’t use pressurized water or a water hose, but instead use the car steamer and wipe with a microfiber cloth.
This way, you are cleaning your engine by not using water. This is the safest way to deep clean your engine while not compromising good cleaning results.
For hoses that contains grease and oil such as charge pipes of the turbocharger, hoses of the throttle body and many others, you will need a degreaser to effectively remove oil, dirt and grease. Again, spray some degreaser to the affected area and use a separate detail brush. Rinse using a car steamer and wipe using a separate microfiber cloth.
After you deep clean your engine bay, you will need to use a protectant or a conditioner to make rubber and plastic components shine like new.
Just spray a small amount on your microfiber cloth and wipe in circular motion on your air intake, engine cover, wires and hoses, and any other plastic or rubber hoses found in your engine bay. The results will truly surprise you!
Conclusion
That’s it!
That’s how you deep clean your engine bay. It’s simple, fast and doesn’t require much tools and products. And the result is truly amazing! Try this detailing tips on your engine today and make your engine like new again!
Below is the video version of this tutorial on my Youtube channel. The video has English subtitle so enjoy!
