I had some time today and decided to spray some TB cleaner into the intake. I've done this on cars in the past and they would run rough until all the cleaner ran through, which would not take more than a 10 to 15 minutedrive. I've made several trips today and it still runs like crap. Has anyone done this and had it run poorly for so long?

 

maybe a small// piece of carbon broke off and is affecting the plugs,,,,,,,,,pull the plugs off and take a look at them , clean + reinstall

 

Yeah, it's fouling the plugs. I've cleaned them three times now; they just keep getting fouled. I should've just left well enough alone. Is there anything else I can do?

 

get a can of Seafoam (checker or autozone....should be about 7 or 8 bux) and run into a vacuum hose that leads into the throttle body....(small amounts at a time are your friend here) and about a half the can....let sit for about 20 minutes and stat the car up....WARNING: it will smoke BADLY for awhile...this is very normal with this stuff.....rev the motor to moderately high RPMs (keep below 6000 basically) but definitely rev up and down......and then when its done smoking...take it for a spin....will prolly run a little better.

take the last of the can and pour directly into the gas tank.....makes a great fuel sytem cleaner as well


this SHOULD clean out a ton of carbon in your engine

WARNING 2: do not repeat until 25,000 or so miles have passed

I completey love the stuff and it does a incredible job of cleaning out carbon and fuel filters and has saved me some serious $$ in the past

 

Are you saying seafoam every 25,000 miles? I thought the can said every other oil change or something.

 

I tried the seafoam last night but it just made it worse. Could I have blown the O2 sensor making it run rich?

 

You may have more sreious problems. Have you though about compression and leakdown tests?

 

I did have low compression on two cylinders when I checked it a few months ago. Other than a lack of power the car has been running ok; no problems idling and no stalling. Now it stalls every time I stop and it's missing big time. Problem started after using the TB cleaner.

 

Recheck EVERYTHING to make sure nothing got left loose (especially all vacuum lines.) Pull the plugs and tell me how they look. Fuel fouled? If so, you may have an intake valve stuck open. Compression test should verify this pretty quickly.

I love seafoam, but won't use it on high mileage engines. If used improperly it can create momentary hydrolock causing valves to bend -- it can also knock off huge chunks of carbon that jam valves open. Also with TB cleanout, sometimes crud gets into the IAC passages causing a stall/poor idle condition, but this won't foul plugs.

 

Plugs are completely black and dry. I put on new wires and plugs (second time this year). I did a compression check: lowest was about 185 and up to 210, other two were right around 190. It starts and runs and I can rev it. If I give it a little gas it stalls and when I let off of the throttle it stalls. It's running real rich and smoking. I think I saw something somewhere like this with the TPS sensor? Maybe I got some crap stuck there?