Re: Fuel additives - Injector cleaners

["I.Mannix" <mannix@privateI.com>]

Chevron Techron - not _with_ Techron, but *Techron* - some are addititves
"With" the stuff, whereas you can get the goods, concentrate, whathaveyou,
if you look.  Telltale sign you've got the concentrate/good stuff - $12+ a
bottle:).  Expensive, and pretty good.  Better?  BG44K - harder to find,
more expensive, but I've had good luck with it in my cars(which tend to be
mechanically sound to begin with, that's no fun), and a friend bought a can
for his early 80s 320i that was running like crap, sounded off timing wise,
just ran poorly - it would propel itself, but for $50, hey, whos
complaining?  We drained the tank(had been sitting), ran injector cleaner
through the pump, changed the filter, put about 16oz of new gas into the
tank, then two cans of BG44k, started the car on that, let it run for 5
minutes or so, it coughed, sputtered, choked, sounded awful(but as far as
we could tell, it was timed right, and once you got it to 3k, the only
stable rpm, it ran so-so), put another 1/2 gallon of gas in the tank & took
it for a ride, putter putter putter choke spurt cough 3147rpm, ok, not bad.
 I was riding, we were in its "sweet spot," where it actually ran, and the
car started accelerating.  Huh, that's odd.  3rd gear, 40ish mph?  Look at
Jack(owner), he looks surprised - "I'm not doing anything."  Huh.  Told him
to give it gas.  He did, car went faster.  Little more?  Little faster.
Little more?  puttercoughPOP damned thing spit out whatever it was that had
been clogging it.  Cool!  Car seemed 90% or so, not bad!  We were psyched,
drove it around, changed oil, new plugs, etc - over two more weeks of
slight tempertantrums, the car sorted out & ran fine.  

OK, big deal, right?  Well, we all know dealers can be corrupt, but the
previous owner had taken it to a dealership & had it diagnosed - we had the
recipt.  "Needs new fuel injection."  The dealer's estimate was actually
pretty reasonable(early 320s use CIS), but more than the car was worth, and
when Jack talked to the dealer/mechanic(whom he knows, supposedly), they
told him not to buy the car, it was "beyond repair."  Did not seem as
though they were trying to make $2000 through this 320(who on earth would
pay close to 2k to fix an old 320?  Buy a new one....).  We figured we'd
have to at least change the distributor/injectors, but the BG44k seemed to
clear things up enough to where it runs OK(and he sold it for $1500).  I
put a can of BG44K in my tank once-twice a year.  $19 a can.  Might be
snake oil, but when I took my injectors out of the Rabbit, the pattern was
really very good(on an injector cleaner thingy), original injectors, blah
blah blah.  As far as injector cleaners go, BG44 and Techron(remember, not
"with":) - but BG44k seems to be a bit better, for whatever reason.  Those
two are the only ones I've used where I've actually noticed a difference,
for whatever that is worth.  Good luck!


I.Mannix(normally don't believe in expensive liquids, but the crap seems
good.....)
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