Carb Cleaning With Vinegar

brewsky · Post by **brewsky** » Wed Oct 13, 2010 4:36 am

G,

Its a very common household cleaner available at any supermarket in the US and has been around for many years.

It is based on pine oil and has a distinct pine tree smell.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine-Sol

It appears to work as well as vinegar, but not quite as fast.

With its cost being more than vinegar, I can't really see any advantage to using it other than it smells better.

e3steve · Post by **e3steve** » Wed Oct 13, 2010 6:43 am

Amen to that, Brew. I loath the smell of vinegar (and acetic acid-based silicon sealer), but it does do a good de-crud.

I must try Diet Coke, one of these days; it does clean up copper-alloy coins well!

jensen · Post by **jensen** » Wed Oct 13, 2010 8:18 am

Hi,

Just a precaution. When using vinegar, make sure to use it on aluminium only.
Brass will turn green (oxidises), and can be polished away, but that isn't the case with the passages in the jets. Within jets the oxides are making the surface rough, and this has influence on the behaviour of the petrol and / or air passing through.

I like to use vinegar too, but don't forget it will "eat" the aluminium away. Rather dip in vinnegar a quarter of an hour, rinse it with water, then polish it with a cloth. Repeat just as often as necessary (in most cases I find three times is enough to get the shine back)

Jensen

brewsky · Post by **brewsky** » Wed Oct 13, 2010 10:13 am

Interesting that the Pine Sol had different effects on different parts.

Note the main jet holder, pilot jet, float pin and idle speed screw came out shiney, while the main jet and idle air screw did not.

Also, the petcock lever and pinwheel spring looked like they had received some pot metal deposits from the process.

When I removed the parts from the solution, the pot metal parts were covered with a slick, thick slime (try saying that fast three times in a row!) the same color as the metal. Leading me to believe some of the base metal may have been dissolved?

At any rate, I think I will stick to the vinegar.

Thanks for the warning about the jets, Jensen

brewsky · Post by **brewsky** » Sun Oct 17, 2010 5:31 pm

I left the 1/2 full vinegar jar in a corner in the garage for a few days (hate to throw anything away).

When I went to stick a couple of rusty bolts in for cleaning today, I found these!

They say no matter where you are in the world, you're never more than 10 feet away from one!

davomoto · Post by **davomoto** » Sun Oct 17, 2010 5:41 pm

Are you going to try to restore them? :-)

LOUD MOUSE · Post by **LOUD MOUSE** » Sun Oct 17, 2010 6:02 pm

GOT TA LOVE IT!!!!!!. .........lm

davomoto wrote:Are you going to try to restore them? :-)

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Carb Cleaning With Vinegar

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