Engine Tuneup - Burning off carbon

**04CompG** · 10-29-2008

A while back a mechanic friend of mine was telling me that its not a bad idea to take the car on the highway at least once a year and drive at 100+ miles per hour for a few minutes. This will allow the car to burn off excess carbon.

Recently, a member on another board posted the following and I want to see what you guys have to say about it. I want to do this to my car before I change the oil next month and would rather do soemthihg like this if its safe rather than risking getting pulled over going 120mph.

He was calling it an "Italian Tuneup" but I took any reference to that out of the following, just so the name wouldn't cause any confusion or anything:

"had never heard of this before, but googled it and came up with quite a few hits. Well I tried a version of this on my 54K mile GP the other nite. I had some remnants of Chevron Techtron Plus fuel cleaner in my tank, and decided to try something. I drove my car as usual to bring it up to normal operating temp. Then I put it in 3rd and proceeded to cruise around on the interstate at 79mph, which is about 3200 rpm's, for about 30 miles. Believe it or not it worked. Car idles better and accelerates smoother. Now I know the fuel system cleaner played some role, however I had added it a tank before this run so there wasn't much left in the fuel. Some say the sustained load on the motor increases the temp and allows carbon to burn off that may otherwise go left untouched. Just thought I would share, as I did a search on this board and couldn't find anything. "

Sounds interesting. I don't go 100mph hardly and when I do its for a few seconds. Being my car 4 years old now I think this might be some good preventative maint.

What do you guys think?

**SyntheticShield** · 10-29-2008

I will agree with this to a point. I dont think you need to go 100mph to do it, as possibly the GP owner mentioned showed. But you do need to flog it a little from time to time, especially if you drive pre-dominantly in the city where you have low acceleration (typically) and low loads and build up moisture and possibly fuel in the oil.

This is why you will see sometimes something like a Cadillac owned by an older person that peddles around mostly, accelerate hard and see streams of smoke come out. Thats carbon deposits getting blown out.

But honestly, if you get it out on the highway for extended periods of time, say up to temp and up to speed for 15 - 30 minutes a few times a week, you'll be good to go. This is why (relatively speaking) that cars that do mostly highway driving last longer than do ones that do mostly city driving. The oil stays cleaner and you keep things like carbon deposits to a minimum. You need things up to temperature to evaporate moisture, fuel dillution and so on.

**Reptile** · 10-29-2008

Mines sparkling clean on the inside. I beat the hell out of it this weekend.

**Quicklynx** · 10-29-2008

Funny story my Dad told me about this. When he was young he was driving his father's oldsmobile and was doing over 100mph. A cop pulled him over and my Father told the officer that "my father told me to take the car out and blow out the carbon in it." Obviously my Dad was just speeding because that's how he is. He still speeds. What was surprising was the cop let him go...

A lot different in the 70's. He said he always drove home drunk and was pulled over several times with no consequences.

Another story, my Mom was trashed and could barely drive her car. This is the 70's still. A cop pulled up behind her, sirens and everything, she thought she was in trouble from noticeably swerving, being drunk, etc.. The cop turned on the loud speaker and told her to turn her lights on. She did and he left... haha

So yea those are my parents, real responsible!

**Smokin2000gtp** · 10-30-2008

Ya doing over 100mph for a while should do the trick, but if there aren't any roads you can do that safely on without getting caught then just beating on it (going wot alot) should work just as well too. It seems a little counter intuitive but beating on your car can actually be good for it.