Crazy in engine piston ring cleaning ideas

[Mr_Infamous]

I can kinda see how a "piston soak" would be effective at cleaning deposits, but wouldn't it be profoundly more effective if an ultrasonic toothbrush motor (or whatever is small enough to fit) is dropped down in the solvent and allowed to vibrate the piston? Alternatively, and probably far more effective, just use a powerful electric motor to "jiggle" the crankshaft forward and backward by 0.1° or whatever would be best, at ridiculous speeds like 10kHz (or whatever would be survivable and practical within a 1kW standard residential AC power outlet limit).

Second idea is to take some super thin stranded AWM jumper cable wire, spread the strands out slightly in a cone shape so it can still fit, then push it straight down through the spark hole of a TDC piston with the top surface pre-cleaned. When it contacts the piston, the strands will fan out; stop just before they actually touch the cylinder walls. When the other end of the wire is connected to the positive battery terminal, most of the short circuit current will probably flow through the rings and carbon deposits, and it could be possible that the deposits burn like in a self cleaning oven before the battery explodes, the piston cracks, or the copper melts. Honestly, I'm only 80% joking about this idea.

 

[Cujet]

The interesting thing about 'different' ideas is they can often lead towards a new discovery. Even so, done correctly, chemical cleaning is 100% effective. Take a look at 'Easy Off' oven cleaner for it's ability to clean carbon. Berryman's B12 is every bit as good in a combustion chamber. Left long enough, the parts will be spotless.

 

[michaelluscher]

I've seen something similar to what you describe on TikTok*
It seems a variation on the method H/K dealers use with the pressurized machine/Valvoline solvent


There's also the addition of rocking the engine via the crank bolt
I've had good luck with B12/Kroil and time/gravity, but I could understand for stubborn applications/efficiency, how you'd want to speed it up
It's an interesting theory, for sure

*I make no claims to the accuracy of this video, it's purely a visual aid

 

[Urshurak776]

I agree with @Cujet without a doubt. Berryman's B12 cleaned up the piston rings on my sons Kia Rio. Ran it another two years after that and it didn't burn a drop of oil.

 

[GW.]

Not bad ideas! Or just try Restore and Protect.

 

[CR94]

... just use a powerful electric motor to "jiggle" the crankshaft forward and backward by 0.1° or whatever would be best, at ridiculous speeds like 10kHz (or whatever would be survivable and practical within a 1kW standard residential AC power outlet limit). ...

The flywheel might make it difficult to jiggle the crank that fast, especially at the cylinder nearest the flywheel. (That's probably well above the torsional natural frequency of a crankshaft.)

Just hitting redline puts alternating inertial and frictional "forward and backward" forces on the rings at roughly 100Hz.

 

[nobb]

Good ideas, but the engine crank rotating thing wouldn't work. There's way too much rotational mass to be rotating the crank at that frequency. Also may not be a good idea as you could cause microscopic wear on the various bearings.

 

[PandaBear]

The agitation would work only on the exposed part of the cylinder / piston. Those part of the engine don't get too dirty if you have no ignition and fuel problem. The hard part to clean and needed the most is the piston ring area, and agitating everything else doesn't guarantee solvent reaching it faster.

I was thinking periodic cranking manually from the crank bolt would be the best, as the compression and expansion stroke would push the piston ring in and out of its groove and sucking in, pushing out solvent. Ultrasound probably won't do much other than evaporating the solvent faster, like the misting humidifier do to water.

 

[CleanSump]

Picture this simple setup. An arm attached to a lever on the harmonic balancer. The other end of the arm is on a pivot pin on a small wheel turned by a reduction gear attached to an electric motor. The distance of the arm from the center of the crank and reduction gear wheel can be varied to adjust throw and frequency. Add a variable speed controller on the electric motor to further control frequency of the crank rocking.
Similar to a steam engine driving a flywheel, except instead of a flywheel turning, you're pushing/pulling a lever attached to the harmonic balancer back and forth.
You can adjust from a slow rock back and forth to a fast vibration.
Not taking credit for designing anything as all of it except the electric motor was done before Archimedes was a baby.