Thoughts on Injector Cleaner?

[Grantkat]

I would love some thoughts on using an injector cleaner, more specifically polyetheramine (PEA) based.

From my research PEA is the way to go assuming you want to use one in the first place.

So, does anyone have experience with this? Do the P80's have any issues with the use of this kind of product?

[454cid]

I use it every so often, when I find it on sale. When, I'm more purposeful with it, is when I buy a new car.

[Sveedy]

I use Techron or Redline. Add it to your tank right before you add the fuel. That makes for a bit stronger solution when you first start up.

[V50M66]

Complete and total waste of money. All grades of gasoline already contain all of the detergents required. It's much more beneficial to the health of you engine to be running premium gas in these cars.

[Krons]

I’ve found Berryman B12 to improve fueling and pick up a little bit of gas mileage. I’ve also used Marvel Mystery Oil which isn’t as strong but not super expensive and seems to help my vehicles run smoother. YMMV.

[abscate]

If you had a really high mile car you might take the injectors out and send them for a ultrasonic cleaning and testing, at about $100.

I agree with our CT friend that the cleaners in tank are probably wasted money. If the injectors are faulty the fuel trims will be messed up, or the injectors times will show wrong. Fuel trims are not cylinder specific so a bad injector will misfire or code a P0171 or P0174

[Grantkat]

good input - thank you all !

[Sveedy]

Probably most useful for a car that has been sitting for a while where the fuel could varnish inside the injectors, lines, pump etc.

I'm of the school of thought that believes that there are differences in fuel quality between the top brands and the cheap ones. They might all start out the same in the refinery, but I think there are different types and amounts of additives in the brands. So with that in mind, adding cleaners or lubes to the fuel would make a difference on some level. I also tend to think that the manufactures of the additives do quite a bit of actual laboratory analysis in order to make their claims valid, which we might not notice as much in the seat of our pants.

[scot850]

I only do a cleaner after I get another old car. Especially if it has been sitting for a while. I do only use it once on a full tank of fuel and when I am going to do a longish run to give it a good chance to support an 'Italian' tune while on the run.

I typically don't like using these products too often on old cars as they can potentially cause more issues than help by cleaning all the carbon deposits off the piston rings that can often be helping keep the compression up on worn rings.

Most cars (read Volvos) I have owned have usually been previously owned by the careless previous owner(s) that did little maintenance and typically used regular gas. Some of the regular gas brands in the older days used little or no cleaners in them so the cars can get gummed up as others have mentioned.

Adding a winter 'storage/stabilizer' product I do if I am the one doing the last fill before putting a car away. But I do have my wife fill the R with premium gas prior to storage.

Neil.

[V50M66]

If you’re worried about getting quality gas, only go to Top Tier stations. They have more stringent standards on quality and additives and generally aren’t any more money than any other station. The difference is notable in both my ‘98s, which are tuned to within an inch of their lives. Top tier 93 is all I run.

No use spending $100 cleaning injectors when a brand new OE Bosch set is like $150 off FCP. They basically never fail though, so as long as you’re running quality gas you shouldn’t have issues.

My ‘98 NA wagon has over 255k miles on it and sees incredibly hard use (over 7k rpm on a daily basis and thousands of track miles per year), with a completely original fuel system, zero issues to speak of, and I’ve never run any additive through it.

Volvo themselves state to not run any additives in the fuel or oil.