HOW TO: Sea Foam
 

What you Will Need:
-2 Cans of Sea Foam Motor Treatment
-1+ ft of Small Vacuum Line
-Phillips Screwdriver
-Ventilated Area


STEP 1: GAS TANK
According to Sea Foam this: "Cleans fuel injectors, cleans carbon as you drive, lubricates upper cylinders, de-ices and removes moisture, stabilizes fuel"

Dump 1 full can of Sea Foam into a full tank of gas.

STEP 2: CRANKCASE
According to Sea Foam this: "Frees sticky lifters and rings, increases R.P.M.'s vacuum and compression, cleans dirty parts, removes moisture, cleans PCV valve systems"

Dump 1/2 can of Sea Foam into your crankcase (the hole on your valve cover where your oil goes. This is best done approx. 100 before an oil change.

STEP 3: ENGINE INTAKE
According to Seafoam this: "Cleans carbon build up, cleans intake valves and pistons, gives smoother idle, cleans catalytic converter odors, cures hesitations and pings, restores power and pickup "

First, make sure your car is running at normal operating temperature and unscrew the cover covering the throttle cable. This is for keeping the revs up once you remove the vacuum line from the intake manifold.

Next, locate the brake booster vacuum line and loosen the cable clamp but don't remove the line yet. It is connected to the rear of the upper intake manifold. Located here:


Then, remove the brake booster vacuum line while a buddy or your third hand maintains a high rpm idle by pulling on the exposed throttle cable. With a (now 1/2 full) can of Sea Foam, take your "straw" (1+ ft of Small Vacuum Line) and place one end in your "drink" (Sea Foam). Place the other end just inside the opening of the nipple where the brake booster vacuum line was connected. You should see it sucking it through the "straw" and into your engine. Make sure this is a SLOW sucking over a minute or so not all at once!

Once you've sucked in the contents of the can, (you may start to see smoke come out the exhaust) shut off the engine. FYI: Cover the vacuum hole with your hand when trying to shut off the engine cuz it won't want to shut off with the leak! Hook the vacuum line up and replace the throttle cable cover.

Wait 10 minutes or more. Make sure ALL your doors are closed (house door included) cuz its SMOKE SCREEN TIME!!!!. Then start the car. I revved mine up a little during this period and then let it idle until the smoke was mostly gone. I then took it for a little spin on the freeway. Smoke was gone when I returned and it runs GREAT.

According to Sea Foam "Immediate Results: Smoother idle, increased R.P.M.'s better throttle response and improved performance."

Nice write up, i'm going to have to try that over spring break next week and see how much of an improvement I get!

I did this a while back on my 318 with 136k miles. It seemed to smooth up the idle, but I don't know how much of this is a placebo effect. It didn't make any huge differences, I think I still need to change my O2 sensor.

The bigger difference in the operation of my car was replacing the thermostat. That made for a 10% improvement in economy as it was running cool (hence rich) all the time (especially in winter).

I think the sea foam will help if you have been running rich for some time, but make sure you fix whatever was causing it to run rich first or you won't do any long term good.

Doing lots of internet research on this subject I found that it is something many mechanics do to help older cars. They often use water or ATF instead of sea foam to suck through the intake. I will stick to sea foam as I know it is safe. I think it is highly unlikey to damage something using this technique as long as you don't suck so much fluid that you cause hydrolock. Overall it is a fairly safe procedure.

Is this the vacuum line I feed the seafoam into?

http://img228.imageshack.us/img228/4708/seafoamnz7.jpg

Yes.

Easy easy easy
with about 1/4 tank of gas, i dumped a can in
and half of another can in where the oil goes
and the other half up that vacuum line. It was easy because i was able to rev the engine with one hand on the throttle cable and then slowly with the other hand sucked up the seafoam.
Re attached the original line and shut off the car. it was making smoke at that time.
waited 10-15 mins and drove off took it for a spin on the freeway, a total of 80kms. now did some more driving today and im going to do an oil change.

so far so good, more responsive, got rid of the pinging noise i was having and the engine is smoother.