High Fog and Moisture

[Revving2Redline]

Hey good morning everyone. It seems today that we're covered with fog and moisture. I was kind of wondering if today would be a good day to get my mom's new Honda CRV out and drive it on the highway and hope that maybe that the fog and moisture could somehow help break down the carbon buildup as she doesn't drive it very far or very fast or very much. The second that question I kind of wondered when we take my Honda Accord today which is the 17 if driving it on the highway for long periods of time with this high humidity and fog will help keep the carbon deposits down or help clean some of that stuff up?

 

[Cujet]

It won't make a bit of difference. Moisture in the air is not a significant factor in carbon deposits. It will, however, reduce the flame front speed a slight bit, and people sometimes notice smoother operation. However, this smoothness is not to be correlated with overall efficiency, as cool damp air is "generally" related to slightly worse BSFC. Exceptions might be engines with high compression, insufficient octane and greatly reduced timing. In such cases, humidity may allow slightly more timing and a tiny but measurable bump in efficiency.

 

[Revving2Redline]

It won't make a bit of difference. Moisture in the air is not a significant factor in carbon deposits. It will, however, reduce the flame front speed a slight bit, and people sometimes notice smoother operation. However, this smoothness is not to be correlated with overall efficiency, as cool damp air is "generally" related to slightly worse BSFC. Exceptions might be engines with high compression, insufficient octane and greatly reduced timing. In such cases, humidity may allow slightly more timing and a tiny but measurable bump in efficiency.

I want to thank you personally for taking some time to kind of put that in layman's terms for me. I kind of always thought that if there was high moisture in the air and the air got sucked through and the engine was hot that there could be some correlation but it seems to be that there's probably going to be buried a little if any. Thanks again for the quick response

 

[dumkid]

nah, to do anything cleaning you need physical water droplets going through the intake, and i don't recommend driving your car through high water to get water into the engine. water can be used to steam clean engines though