Carbon buildup after 34,000 miles with single valve catch can (scope view)

[pablo94sc]

Wo. That's kinda nasty looking. Now I want to get a borescope in mine.

@KayaPayaPigDog which scope did you buy for this?

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[AugPal]

Wo. That's kinda nasty looking. Now I want to get a borescope in mine.

I still want to know what gas & oil he was using.

Over the years (40 years) I have been involved with many stardard gas engine overhauls and I don't ever remember intake or exhaust valves looking that bad with 3 times that mileage. Maybe it's common now with these Hurricane or Ecoboost turbo charged engines.

 

[cb4017]

I still want to know what gas & oil he was using.

Over the years (40 years) I have been involved with many stardard gas engine overhauls and I don't ever remember intake or exhaust valves looking that bad with 3 times that mileage. Maybe it's common now with these Hurricane or Ecoboost turbo charged engines.

It would be interesting to know what gas and oil he uses but I doubt it would make much difference.

The intake deposits are a common result of the direct injection. No fuel washes over the valves during the intake stroke. That's why some manufacturers are adding port injection to DI engines.

If you want to go down a rabbit hole, look up direct injection intake deposits on your search engine.

 

[pablo94sc]

I still want to know what gas & oil he was using.

Over the years (40 years) I have been involved with many stardard gas engine overhauls and I don't ever remember intake or exhaust valves looking that bad with 3 times that mileage. Maybe it's common now with these Hurricane or Ecoboost turbo charged engines.

He said Exxon and shell high-test in the video, not that it really matters since the gas isn't washing the valves. What's also concerning is that I can almost guarantee the IC is coated internally with oil if his valves look like this. Makes me wonder if our trucks would benefit from methanol injection in the airstream, not for charge cooling, but valve cleaning. The cooling/octane boost is just an added bonus. This will require a custom tune, though.

 

[Lion77]

The oil formulation may not be well suited to the application. Theres some strange assumption that "if I run a diesel oil in a gas engine it will work better", or "this property looks better on the paper spec so it must perform better", but thats not necessarily the case.

Even if said oil has a higher shear, it may not flow as well and could have a lower NOAC rating, so you get more localized heating because your not cycling the oil through bearings fast enough and it breaks down faster. The tolerances in gas engines tend to be tighter than in diesels for example.

The variable geometry oil pump in modern ecoboost and even 5.0L and I believe the 2.3L too regulates by pressure, not flow rates. So a higher viscosity oil will flow less at the same pressure, thus more localized heating and burn-off. Unlike the older positive displacmenet g-rotor pumps that ran higher pressure at low rpms, modern variable geometry pumps are programmed to lower pressure for fuel economy.

He spends a lot of time driving on trails at low rpms in high heat with a lot of gear and is using a non-oe spec oil....

The more complex engines become the more possibility for unintended consequences unless you account for all the variables!

Oils are formulated for specific applications and more bigger better is not actually better in specific applications.

The only way to know how that truck would operate differently is if he returned to using MC FS 5W-30. Ford invests a lot of research into optimizing their oils for their engines, why change and risk unintended consequences unless you really know what your doing?

I.e., you might be able to improve over the OE oil if you do frequent UOAs to watch the NOAC and shear, additive package usage rates etc. But it takes a lot of time and dedication and for how much real gain?

My recomendation for that truck in the video would be the following:

1. Indiction cleaning
2. Return to using MC FS 5W-30
3. Return to the factory intake + OE paper filter.
4. Continue using top tier gas.

In another 34k, repeat the bore scope to see if there is a notable difference and id bed my bottom dollar there will be.

If I had a dollar for every time someone does all these changes to their vehicle then ends up with issues and thinks thats now typical of their car / engine vs an a-typical example they unintentally created....id be rich!

 

[landiscarrier]

Nice and interesting video. I’m all for regular oil changes with full synthetic and 93 octane top tier fuels and if it not broke don’t mess with it.

Would definitely be interesting to see dyno numbers to see if this really does affect HP.

 

[NevadaJim]

So just curious, would running duel catch cans better or is a single sufficient? I only have about 1500 miles on my 26 RR and have been trying to decide what is best for me. I use full synthetic oil and 91 octane. Truck is completely stock at this time.

 

[bobloharsmoke]

Thats the result of DI and driving a lot on trails at slow speeds. Low oil pressure and rotational velocity with high temps is a combination for boil off. Not sure what oil he uses, but honestly those valves aren't as bad as you think, they look nasty but the thickness of the film isnt that bad.

Look at DI engines that see short trips for 100k miles and the valves have so much carbon and suite its piled on. That amount isnt going to affect air flow and until its at a point of affecting air flow its irrelevant.

Also note the big no no ive been saying, an aftermarket air intake. Those reusable filters simply dont do as good of a job as paper disposable. A lot of that buildup looks like a combination of oil vapor and contaminants, it looks gritty like dust mixed with oil vapor.

Anyone know if he was using synthetic blend or full synthetic and was it Motorcraft or something else? Oil base stock quality has a big effect on NOAC.

I would argue the 2.7L in an XLT or Lariat trim with dual injection is better suited to trail work because it obviously has port injectors in addition to direct injection. Raptor really isnt a trail truck in my opinion due to having a performance DI engine, BUT you certainly can use it for that, just may need to do induction cleaning every 60k~75k.

You just cant use the 3.0Ls power on trails and those are probably the worst conditions other than short trips for carbon buildup on intake valves, but they have to get a lot dirtier than that before there are performance issues.

He uses Motorcraft Full synthetic 5-30 and changes his oil often. he’s posted multiple videos about it.

 

[superj]

That's not a lot of build up for a direct injection engine. Like mentioned above, check an engine with double or triple the mileage and you will see why they feel a loss of power. The air still flows fine through that.


I had a direct injection Nissan v8 prior to this ford and that video shows clean valves

 

[lardo]

If the F-150 starts using the 3.0L EcoBoost rather than the 2.7L in the future, I wonder if they’ll also modify the 3.0L for dual injection, like they did with the 2.3L & 2.7L.

 

[cb4017]

If the F-150 starts using the 3.0L EcoBoost rather than the 2.7L in the future, I wonder if they’ll also modify the 3.0L for dual injection, like they did with the 2.3L & 2.7L.

I wonder the same thing.

The 2.7L and the 3.0L are the same architecture engines. Seems like it wouldn't be a stretch.

Actually, I wonder why they haven't already done it.

 

[AugPal]

He said Exxon and shell high-test in the video, not that it really matters since the gas isn't washing the valves. What's also concerning is that I can almost guarantee the IC is coated internally with oil if his valves look like this. Makes me wonder if our trucks would benefit from methanol injection in the airstream, not for charge cooling, but valve cleaning. The cooling/octane boost is just an added bonus. This will require a custom tune, though.

Thanks for the infor on his gas used. I didn't watch the whole video

IC? internal combustion?

You have a much better understanding of these engines than I do. I still don't understand why his intake valves look so bad. With these engines the intake valves just let air in, and the gas is sprayed in separately correct?

 

[hand-filer]

Thanks for the infor on his gas used. I didn't watch the whole video

IC? internal combustion?

You have a much better understanding of these engines than I do. I still don't understand why his intake valves look so bad. With these engines the intake valves just let air in, and the gas is sprayed in separately correct?

More than just air. Excess crankcase vapours are also redirected into the intake tract to be burned during combustion.
These oily vapours are what collect on the intake valves.

 

[superj]

Yup, everything that goes through the pcv or gets sucked back into the intake for recycling that you used to see at the throttle body gets caught and burned onto direct injection valves

 

[Lion77]

He uses Motorcraft Full synthetic 5-30 and changes his oil often. he’s posted multiple videos about it.

I stand corrected on the oil, but as myself and others have said, that's not really a lot of buildup and its oily, not hardened. There are DI engines with far more buildup than that which do need cleaning and have drivability issues.

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