cleaning and keeping clean the engine
 

what is the best way to clean the engine. one thing i've noticed is lots of people have clear cars, but then they open that hood and awww, its horible. what is the best way to clean the headers, have a very small amount of rust starting to show up if u look real close, but i wanna keep it from getting any worse, and fix that little bit already there if i can. thanks for any input.

if they are the stock headers you are screwed, they are cast and its only going to get worse.

yeah the stock manifold looks like crap even new. as for the engine just pressure wash it. most of the washing places around cleveland have some setting for engine cleaning where they pressure spray engine degreser then just rinse the engine

water wont hurt the engine? in certain places?

not if it's cold enough, or the distributor is sealed properly

ugh..i want to wash it now...but im scared water will get in the intake or the cap...anyway i can prevent it? like out something around it....maybe a bag around the intake..

A bag will work fine over the filter, you might consider putting one over the distributor too. Also you want to avoid getting any chemicals and large amounts of water on the alternator, it can cause it to burn out.

You can seran wrap the distributer cap. don't over spray on the alternator ... and my suggestion is to have the engine warm and use a NON-FLAMMABLE cleaner like simple green or FOAMING simple green. (it's the sh*t).

Let the simple green do it's thing for 5-10 mins then hose it off.

I would NOT recomend using pressurized water of ANY kind.

Your begging for problems with that. just scrub any bad bits with a brush. you can also do this 2-3 times... it'll look brand new..

the other thing to look out for if you use somthing like gunk is DO NOT spray it on rubber parts AT ALL.. it'll degrade the plactic. even if it doesn't happen right away the gunk will peel of the protective outside of the plastic and start to dry it out.

simple green/foaming simple green don't do this. also it's bio-degradable.