Cleaning out the mayo from the engine!

[M3GTR]

The racer had a BIG problem at the last race resulting in the oil and water almost 100% mixing! Not sure yet if it is a cracked head or head gasket failure (although the gasket looks ok). Problem now is that every pipe and every nook and cranny where there was either water or oil is now filled with mayo! Any ideas? Pipes are easy enough, as are the header tank etc, but what about the water ways in the block? Is there a good flushing agent I can use?

[NICKE30CAB]

TRAFFIC WASH every time (traffic film remover) run it in there for 20 -30 mins then drain out and flush with water.

[BrAdZ]

on previous cars i have plumbed in a hoze to the system, and that washes out all the crap

[Jos]

Engine degreaser maybe? Although something water soluble might be a better choice, washing powder is pretty kick ass at removing oil especially if really hot, but I have no idea what it might do to the iron block, probably nothing as it is alkaline, would probably get rid of the scaling inside the waterways too. Then loads of water to flush it all out.

Don't hold me to this, been a long time since I did chemistry

Bad luck on the failure. Hope you can get it running again soon.

[325icab]

yeah definatly tfr truck film remover. the best Ԛ£10 you will spend. i struggled trying to get it out untill i used this

[Jos]

tfr is good stuff, I cleaned the underside of the car with it, mind you the oil and crap on the engine block laughed at it and I had to use a serious degreaser to get it off.

[gareth]

i aksed this a while ago and have to agree with the Traffic Film Remover comments above. it's perfect for the job. i lost 3 litres of oil into the cooling system before i changed the head... it looked like a gallon chocolate custard when i 'tried' to flush it!

it took a day of norma driving to clean it all out with the TFR in there. i then flushed and refilled with TFR in there again and ran it for another few days... then flush and refill with water and cooling system cleaner to remova all traces of TFR in case it did nasties! now 6 months on there's not even a dirty tinge to the coolant! just nice, clean, fresh and blue!

the water pump went recently (after the above) but it was the original 160k old pump so may not be connected...

it's a lot easier to change a water pump if it does go than remove the sludge any other way!

[koos]

We used to use clothes washing powder on 600hp cummins engines when the oil coollers went poof, 2 or 3 flush's and wham it's done, I know it sounds a bit odd but it works!!

[gareth]

... and gets your cooling system whiter than white!

[koos]

was waiting for a err.... reply!!!!

[Jos]

agreed on the washing powder, really is fantastic at removing oil, also quite good if you 'forgot' to steep the cooking pots and it's all gone hard in the bottom of the pots