Can a fuel additive clean piston rings?

The elephant in the room asks: Why are your rings stuck in the first place?

I mean yeah, DMSO or that AC Delco cleaner are a quite messy process and no fun to handle, but they work to free the rings. But it's just a band aid, without addressing the root cause. Hard carbon deposits, that are a result of deficient combustion efficiency, accumulate in the ring grooves and in effect cement the rings into the grooves.

Frank
 
The elephant in the room asks: Why are your rings stuck in the first place?

I mean yeah, DMSO or that AC Delco cleaner are a quite messy process and no fun to handle, but they work to free the rings. But it's just a band aid, without addressing the root cause. Hard carbon deposits, that are a result of deficient combustion efficiency, accumulate in the ring grooves and in effect cement the rings into the grooves.

Frank
It is and isn't a band aid. From what I've seen, it cleans them so well, that it takes another 100,000 miles for it to clog up again. His engine is at 140,000. Premature, but not outrageous. My sister's honda started to really burn oil at 200,000. After cleaning it, she's gone 2 years with it working just fine and I'm sure she'll never experience that problem again for at least another 50,000 miles. I blame a small portion of these sticking rings to car manufacturers and oil companies claiming 10,000 mile oil change intervals. Cheapest insurance is a simple oil change every 3,000 miles.
 
Cheapest insurance is a simple oil change every 3,000 miles.
How does oil have anything to do with stuck piston rings? It's a combustion problem, not an oil problem.
I drove 100000 miles without oil change and still don't have stuck rings, blowby or excessive oil consumption.

Frank
 
How does oil have anything to do with stuck piston rings? It's a combustion problem, not an oil problem.
I drove 100000 miles without oil change and still don't have stuck rings, blowby or excessive oil consumption.

Frank
Pistons have oil rings (the last ring closest to the crankcase) that wipe excess oil away. In my sister's case, the leakdown test showed a compression close to a brand new engine so I knew the piston rings were just fine. But you're correct. Stuck piston rings are usually a combustion problem. But if the oil ring isn't working well, oil can get past the oil ring and stick on the piston rings creating more carbon desposits. Combine that with manufacturers keeping piston rings closer to the top of the piston and you create a ring prone to carbon deposits. I assume you meant you didn't change your oil in 10,000 miles not 100,000
 
If fuel gets past the rings to dilute oil, it's definitely possible to get additives there. But the question becomes, what additive will work, it must not be very volatile.
Wasn’t the old Evinrude Carbon Guard mainly a heavy dose of Techron …?
 
Pistons have oil rings (the last ring closest to the crankcase) that wipe excess oil away. In my sister's case, the leakdown test showed a compression close to a brand new engine so I knew the piston rings were just fine. But you're correct. Stuck piston rings are usually a combustion problem. But if the oil ring isn't working well, oil can get past the oil ring and stick on the piston rings creating more carbon desposits. Combine that with manufacturers keeping piston rings closer to the top of the piston and you create a ring prone to carbon deposits. I assume you meant you didn't change your oil in 10,000 miles not 100,000
Okay - fair enough.

And no, I actually meant 100,000

Frank
 
To answer your question, I don't think seafoam, gumout, or any fuel system cleaner will do anything.

I'm going to list a method that worked for me. My sister's 2009 Honda Accord was buring oil like crazy. After leakdown tests which came back good, I figured that maybe the oil ring is clogged up or sticking. First, I sprayed seafoam into the engine. Then, I added gumout to a full tank of gas and drove it until empty. Then, I added 1 ounce of gumout per quart of engine oil. Then, I tried Mopar Combustion Chamber Cleaner (which I believe is MUCH better than seafoam). None of these things worked.

Finally, I tried this.

ACDelco GM Original Equipment 10-3015 Engine Cylinder/Combustion Chamber Cleaner​


If this doesn't work, I don't think anything will. However, you need to really, really be careful. Try not to inhale any of the fumes. This stuff stinks and can cause you to pass out if you breathe it in. Here's what I did. Needless to say, don't touch the stuff.

1. Make sure the fuse to the fuel pump is removed or use another method to temporarily disable any fuel being sent to the cumbustion chamber. You can even unplug the electrical connectors to the injectors I suppose.
2. Try to start the care to burn off any fuel left in the lines and to ensure you've disable the fuel system.
3. Remove spark plugs
4. Pour entire bottle equally to each cylinder through the spark plug holes and let it sit overnight or at least 6 hours. You'll want to cover the spark plug holes with sort of lint free and fairly cleantowel or rag. This is just to preven any debris, bug, dust, etc. getting in there. If I remember correctly, you don't want to leave it more than 12 hours.

Now the messy part:

5. You're going to need to get rid of that stuff before you put the spark plugs back in or you WILL hydrolock your engine. I just left the towel loosely over the spark plug holes to minimize the spray and cranked the engine. It still did get all over the side of the cylinder head, but it wasn't bad to be honest. A less half a$$ approach would be to stick a fluid transfer pump into each spark plug hole and try to suck up as much as you possibly can. Harbor Freight sells one for 5 bucks, but make sure you get one with a tube thin enough to get into the spark plug hole. Be careful to not get any on your hands and to not inhale the fumes. I don't know where you can dispose of it. Be careful with that stuff. Once, most of it was out the engine, I removed the towel and cranked and cranked until I did not see any mist shooting out the spark plug hole. Crank the engine over and look for mist shooting out. I was able to look through my windshield, but you may need to have someone crank it while you look. Wear some type of goggle and stand back so that junk doesn't spray on you or your eyes. PLEASE MAKE SURE you do not reinstall the spark plugs and try to turn over the engine with that liquid still in there. You WILL bend/crack a rod, valve, ring, piston head.
6. Reinstall the spark plugs.
7. Reinstall the fuel pump fuse/ enable the fuel system.
8. Fire it up. Drive it gently for a mile or two. (White smoke WILL be coming from the exhaust, but this is expected and will go away after a few mintues)
9. GET AN OIL CHANGE. (Some of that stuff will have made it's way down into the crankcase and into the oil pan). You don't want that stuff sitting in your oil or engine.

My Sister's car went from burning at least a quart and a half per 1,000 miles to less than a quart per 3,000 miles. Less than a fifth of the previous oil consumption. I was shocked it worked, but it did. This was over 2 years and 30,000 miles so I can safely say the engine wasn't damaged and it solved her oil consumption.

I'm pretty sure this will work for you. I have no idea how easy accessing the spark plugs are and you may need to use a funnel to pour that stuff into the spark plug holes. I did this in 2 steps. I rotated the engine by hand until the middle 2 pistons were on the bottom of the cylinder, poured into those 2 and let sit for 6 hours. Then I rotated the engine until the outer 2 pistons were at the bottom and poured into those 2 and let those sit for 6 hours.

You may want to replace the spark plugs while you're doing this. It's a good opportunity.
My hunch is that this very same procedure using Berryman's, Sea Foam, etc., might also work as well. In other words, do this instead of just adding the stuff to the fuel tank. This is a lot of trouble, but evidently gave good results.
 
They make some gas additives called an "upper engine lubricant", don't have a clue if they work.
Saw Youtube videos, some saying they do and some saying they don't.
So, flip a coin I reckon...Lol
 
i want to hear this story. most engines die before 50,000 miles on an oil change.
Not much of a story to it.

It's a 2002 Explorer (V6 - ex police interceptor). I got it really cheap about 10 years ago with about 150,000 on it, and drove it for some years with regular oil changes and all.
A few years later (with some beer and a bet involved) I started this experiment to see how long it will last as my daily driver without any oil or filter changes.
Actually I expected it to last no more than maybe 10 or 15 months max.

Well - little did I know.

Now with over 300.000 and about 100,000 without oil/filter change - much to my surprise - it is still doing fine.
To be fair - since I have it, the engine seldom sees more than 2500-3000 rpm, most of the time it's cruising at 2000ish at around 60 mph.

The Oil is the cheapest no name supermarket 15W30 I can find - and I only top it off from time to time, but not much.
Maybe 2 quarts (or so) a year. So technically it's kind of a permanent creeping oil change if you will.

I have all sorts of problems, like electric stuff, rust, wheel bearings etc. but the motor is okay. Just came home from a 1200 mls roundtrip.
No issues, but I need a new front/right hub assembly (again).

Once it is toast, I gonna have an oil analysis done and a "forensic" dissection of the motor, to see what happened.

Frank
 
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Not much of a story to it.

It's a 2002 Explorer (V6 - ex police interceptor). I got it really cheap about 10 years ago with about 150,000 on it, and drove it for some years with regular oil changes and all.
A few years later (with some beer and a bet involved) I started this experiment to see how long it will last as my daily driver without any oil or filter changes.
Actually I expected it to last no more than maybe 10 or 15 months max.

Well - little did I know.

Now with over 300.000 and about 100,000 without oil/filter change - much to my surprise - it is still doing fine.
To be fair - since I have it, the engine seldom sees more than 2500-3000 rpm, most of the time it's cruising at 2000ish at around 60 mph.

The Oil is the cheapest no name supermarket 15W30 I can find - and I only top it off from time to time, but not much.
Maybe 2 quarts (or so) a year. So technically it's kind of a permanent creeping oil change if you will.

I have all sorts of problems, like electric stuff, rust, wheel bearings etc. but the motor is okay. Just came home from a 1200 mls roundtrip.
No issues, but I need a new front/right hub assembly (again).

Once it is toast, I gonna have an oil analysis done and a "forensic" dissection of the motor, to see what happened.

Frank
that makes alot more sense, it does get a small amount of fresh oil, and more importantly it actually has oil in it, unlike some of my aunt's cars.
 

This IS NOT a fix all but like I have said time and time again; to solve the problem that you are dealing with might require attacking it at more than one angle. For GDi issues, I still think going pea aerosol through the throttle,
Redline Si-1,44k, or other known credible sources to half a tank of fuel, and a product flush or cleaner like HPL EC30,BG EPR,AMSOIL,LIQUIMOLY,or Gumout Multitune in the oil crankcase is sure to have some success.
To another thought, a lot of the ring issues are the consumers fault too. Junky fuel, not cleaning throttle/pcv/egr, cheap oil, not getting the vehicle driven enough to burn everything off. Vehicles that sit run like S#$%!
 
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