How to Remove Carbon From Piston, Cylinder Walls, and Block Deck

As your engine makes power a group chemical reactions are happening faster than you can blink an eye and, as with any chemical reaction, there just so happens to be byproducts as the energy is not created 100% efficiently, understandably so. As a result, you might find that you have carbon buildup on the inside of your engine.

With this carbon buildup, you can expect to see a dirty chamber, tops of pistons, and engine block deck. As you can probably imagine, a thick and hard substance like this could cause the engine to have some problems. It isn’t always the worst thing in the world but you’re better without it than with the carbon and it doesn’t take too long to get rid of, so why not tackle it if you’re in there anyway?

This time, the Humble Mechanic shows us how to clean up an engine as to prevent cylinder hot spots and the potential for a poorly seated head gasket. Maintenance like this can go a long way toward saving time, money, and they a lot of headache in the long run.

Check out the video below as a couple of basic tools and WD-40 are used to clean up the engine to get it ready for whatever the next step is in your engine build or refurbishing process.