I finally got down to taking care of the CEL P0401 ... took apart the EGR manifold ... couldn't believe how bad the carbon was.

Cleaned it all out, used a drill bit by hand on the manifold side (didn't take intake off) with a shopvac on at all times to suck it all up.

Replaced injector seals, gaskets, replaced a bunch of vacuum hoses and some return fuel lines ... WOW, what a difference in the way the car runs ... totally amazed at how much quiter and better idling ... should have done this 100k miles ago!!

 

:goodjob:

Did you follow up with some carb/choke cleaner on the EGR valve? If not, you can give that a go next time to really cleanse the crap out of it.

 

Oh yeah, cleaned it all out, even put some vacuum on the valve, cleaned the inside. What was also kinda scary was the amount of carbon around the injectors ... NASTY!!

 

Yeah, I've seen pics, it can get pretty bad. Injector cleaner FTW.

 

does injector cleaner actually work? I always thought that due the engineering of the injector and the cleansing agents in gas, that they stay pretty clean?

 

I didn't see any issues where the injector fires at ... it was just around the sides of the injector ... so I think you're statement is correct.

Though, if by putting it in it cleans other parts of the fuel system ... that might be worthwhile once every few years. I've never used a bottle of fuel system cleaner ... I just spray the TB intake area out every now and then.

 

---^

Diddo, suprising how nasty they get real quick. Granted the PCV doesn't help the intake manifold either lol.

 

3 different machanics later its all set. have a new vacuum silenoid and egr valve, but all that i needed was to clean out al the carbon like you did. what a waste of money.