# Walnut Shell Blasting Intake Valves: Faster and Cheaper



## evilpat (Feb 26, 2002)

Before and after walnut shell blasting of the intake valves by a local BMW dealership. Faster and cheaper than anyone else I found. YES a BMW dealership was CHEAPER than all the VW dealerships and local independents I called willing to take it on; not all were because, and I quote, "it sucks.". BMW was also the only shop I found offering the walnut shell blasting. VW is still apparently prescribing hours and hours and hours with zip ties and acetone. I would typically do this type of maintenance myself but decided 8 hours playing with acetone was not worth it.

Results with blasting are claimed to be more complete than the manual method but I have no comparison and hope to avoid it in the future. Rumor has it there is at least one VW dealership in the Bay Area that has been in contact with the same BMW dealership I used to order the setup to be able to do this, without support from VW. Something about the mother of a BMW tech working at a VW dealership or vice versa. 

There are pics of BMW's tool in this thread (not mine): http://www.e90post.com/forums/showthread.php?t=682116
I am not sure if that is the exact tool that was used but it was likely something similar. Has to be set up to blast as well as vacuum out the media.

Car had 65k miles but the intake manifold was replaced at 35K by VW. Always used high quality synthetics oils changed at recommended intervals and frequently got on the motor. Of course it drives like new now but damn if I don't feel bad about even turning the motor over knowing it will just end up looking like this again :banghead: 

I have to ask VW . . . what is the long term solution for this??? Heck if I am planning to keep this car as long as I have kept every other car I have owned knowing what the maintenance will entail. Going to try seafoam before every oil change as well as a catch can and scope it every once in a while to see how it holds up. It would be nice if VW (and other manufacturers using DI) pulled their heads out of the sand and admitted this is not going as planned. Especially in strict emission states like California that will not allow catch cans to prevent the problem. I know early adopter, new technology, etc but it has been a few years now . . .

Cylinder 2 was by far the worst but they were all in pretty bad shape


































The last time I had the intake manifold off of my other VW the valves looked just as good without any cleaning required . . . at 195k miles.


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## ViRtUaLheretic (Aug 17, 2008)

such is the nature of the beast of direct injection

Methods to combat buldup would be a ctach can and/or w/m but even those two are debatable.
I still had buildup on my car but I ran my car for a while before adding a CC (as they werent on the market, but snagged a VTA as soon as they were available). However, my valves werent TOO bad, and neither were yours.
If you want to see bad valves, look at some of the FSI valve cleaning threads.


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## [email protected] (Oct 26, 2012)

evilpat said:


> Before and after walnut shell blasting of the intake valves by a local BMW dealership. Faster and cheaper than anyone else I found. YES a BMW dealership was CHEAPER than all the VW dealerships and local independents I called willing to take it on; not all were because, and I quote, "it sucks.". BMW was also the only shop I found offering the walnut shell blasting. VW is still apparently prescribing hours and hours and hours with zip ties and acetone. I would typically do this type of maintenance myself but decided 8 hours playing with acetone was not worth it.
> 
> Results with blasting are claimed to be more complete than the manual method but I have no comparison and hope to avoid it in the future. Rumor has it there is at least one VW dealership in the Bay Area that has been in contact with the same BMW dealership I used to order the setup to be able to do this, without support from VW. Something about the mother of a BMW tech working at a VW dealership or vice versa.
> 
> ...


Good write up and info. I think the crushed walnuts was started by Ford a while ago but I'm not sure if they still use this. 

I have heard that there may be some talk abiut adding a 5th injector at the throttle body to help manage this problem, but I don't know how likely that is. Also that does not really solve your long term issue with this vehicle. You can contact Vw customer care about this but I doubt they will be able to she'd any light on this.


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## greasyginzo (Apr 18, 2006)

I really can't believe VW still dicks around with chem cleaning the valves. Just blast it and be done.


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## jspirate (Jan 15, 2011)

greasyginzo said:


> I really can't believe VW still dicks around with chem cleaning the valves. Just blast it and be done.


Dust control! Chemicals can be controlled so much easier. Chems don't work as well, but most of the customers never know the difference and then VW has no complaints about the dust being everywhere.

If I were Corp VW, I would specify the same thing.


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## [email protected] (Oct 26, 2012)

jspirate said:


> Dust control! Chemicals can be controlled so much easier. Chems don't work as well, but most of the customers never know the difference and then VW has no complaints about the dust being everywhere.
> 
> If I were Corp VW, I would specify the same thing.


They also would have to require all dealers to purchase equipment to support this service. This would take a significant investment from dealers.


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## evilpat (Feb 26, 2002)

[email protected] said:


> They also would have to require all dealers to purchase equipment to support this service. This would take a significant investment from dealers.


And then they wouldn't be able to charge hours AND hours of labor to get it done. If the cost of specialized tools was an actual concern of auto manufacturers my tool box would be be a bit lighter.

The conditions of the valves above was enough to cause enough misfire troubles at cold start to occasionally stall. Could be another unrelated issue but the car has not had a problem since (and now I have cursed myself to some horrible automotive bad luck).


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## genixia (Feb 8, 2002)

That's awesome. Anyone tried dry ice blasting?


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## loudgli (Aug 3, 2005)

[email protected] said:


> They also would have to require all dealers to purchase equipment to support this service. This would take a significant investment from dealers.


BMW dealers were auto-shipped these walnut blasters, meaning they had no say in whether they received them and were billed for them.

BMW has been using walnut blasting since the early 80's on their cars.


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## ViRtUaLheretic (Aug 17, 2008)

some Mini dealers have walnut blasters as well

FWIW the chemical cleaning and scraping wasnt that bad on the TSI, it took longer to uninstall and install the intake manifold myself.


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## G60ING (Jun 27, 2000)

I wish I had access to the walnut shell cleaning:

Cylinder #1:









Cylinder #2:what::









Cylinder #3:









Cylinder #4:


















The tools for getting to the crud:









Oh and my #2 plug looked like crap:



















I did have some engine misfires that I cured with new plugs and coilpacks. No codes over the past week but the idle would typically be a little lumpy and missing under part throttle but good performance under WOT. No codes. *Does anybody think I might have an injector issue on #2?*

Thanks


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## Klim18 (Nov 13, 2008)

So let's say I have 80k miles on my TSI, how bad do you think my valves are? Also, assuming they are pretty ****ty, after cleaning them will I feel any difference in power/response?
Thanks!


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## soze (Apr 16, 2008)

Good info for the future cleaning of my valves. Thanks for sharing.


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## MK6GTI (Aug 1, 2009)

Klim18 said:


> So let's say I have 80k miles on my TSI, how bad do you think my valves are? Also, assuming they are pretty ****ty, after cleaning them will I feel any difference in power/response?
> Thanks!


You should be able to notice a difference. But if it's running good, not sure if I would open up the manifold to clean the valves.

OP, your valves didn't appear to be that bad even for having 65K on the motor.


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## murph81 (Sep 5, 2011)

Is there any port adaptor around for TFSI engines yet?

http://www.ecstuning.com/Search/SiteSearch/Vacuum_Blaster_Adapter/ES2165972/


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## kbad (May 26, 2007)

hey man .. pics tell a thousand words - and vw needs to become more sensitive to this oversight of their design! .. apparently bmw is now offering it as 'recommended suggested maint' for all di engines, eh .. if you are going to diy, there are forum diys and quite a few utube how-tos .. you can get a portable blaster, some walnut media and the GM cleaner, you're good to go .. here's a bmw kit .. you can even build your own for a few bucks like these .. btw, you should also check out your pcv system, dv and rear main seal while at it .. good luck!


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## ryan mills (May 3, 2002)

I did mine all by myself on my BMW. I bought a blaster from harbor freight and walnut media for about $50. This picture is about 5,000 miles after I did the job.














It worked really well, just had to wash the engine bay afterward. 

Here's what they looked like at 60k miles (before walnut blasting).... Not terrible, but not that good either.


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## ryan mills (May 3, 2002)

murph81 said:


> Is there any port adaptor around for TFSI engines yet?
> 
> http://www.ecstuning.com/Search/SiteSearch/Vacuum_Blaster_Adapter/ES2165972/



Mountain Dew bottle, scissors and duct tape!!!!!! Improvise my man!


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## gtboost (Oct 11, 2005)

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[email protected] said:


> They also would have to require all dealers to purchase equipment to support this service. This would take a significant investment from dealers.


the cost of the equipment is not that bad considering the potential of profits for the dealer. There is 1 place outside of the bmw dealers that do this in my area and all are pretty costly. $600-800 on a n54 bmw (I just sold mine). When I had mine done I was in and out in 1 hour after a valve cleaning. Once you remove and install a intake manifold you can do it very fast. $600 for an hours work is pretty significant. I will probably buy the tools myself to do it on the TSI and probably offer it as a service to local guys because not many people offer it around here.


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## Repny2dafullest (May 17, 2017)

I know this is an old thread but I did a walnut media blast on my 2.0t fsi passat. I got walnut shells everywhere I even think I've gotten some in the cylinders as I thought I was lucky and all valves looked closed at the same time. Not sure if that was even possible. Any how I put it back together and car started misfiring like crazy. I hit the gas and still getting worse. So I take out the manifold and I see that the intake runner flaps habe been burned on the first 2 cylinders. I then see that I might have gotten some walnut media in the fuel injectors. So I pull them out and tried to clean them out with a 9 volt battery and some brake cleaner pressurized through a gas line. But I believe since they are high pressure fuel injectors the aerosol pressure is insufficient. Long story short I need my car and am lost at what to do. I got a need manifold with new flaps. 're installed and same thing this time no burning as I didn't want to risk burning those too. Im thinking I need to re seal the fuel injectors as the plastic crappy clips are half gone and broken. I need help please I am starting to lose my mind...lol. and the fuel injectors seal tool is a rip off $200 just to put a seal on a injector. Is there a cheaper way to that because that's ridiculous.


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## ryan mills (May 3, 2002)

Repny2dafullest said:


> I know this is an old thread but I did a walnut media blast on my 2.0t fsi passat. I got walnut shells everywhere I even think I've gotten some in the cylinders as I thought I was lucky and all valves looked closed at the same time. Not sure if that was even possible. Any how I put it back together and car started misfiring like crazy. I hit the gas and still getting worse. So I take out the manifold and I see that the intake runner flaps habe been burned on the first 2 cylinders. I then see that I might have gotten some walnut media in the fuel injectors. So I pull them out and tried to clean them out with a 9 volt battery and some brake cleaner pressurized through a gas line. But I believe since they are high pressure fuel injectors the aerosol pressure is insufficient. Long story short I need my car and am lost at what to do. I got a need manifold with new flaps. 're installed and same thing this time no burning as I didn't want to risk burning those too. Im thinking I need to re seal the fuel injectors as the plastic crappy clips are half gone and broken. I need help please I am starting to lose my mind...lol. and the fuel injectors seal tool is a rip off $200 just to put a seal on a injector. Is there a cheaper way to that because that's ridiculous.



I was able to purchase new injector seals and install them by making a tool buy cutting an plastic inflatable raft nozzle to just slightly larger than end of the injector, and slowly push them on. 
I then put the injectors in the freezer for about an hour or so to let the seals shrink back to their original size. It seemed to work flawlessly, and I haven't had a problem since.



http://www.acehardware.com/product/index.jsp?productId=1292081&KPID=975664&cid=CAPLA:G:Shopping_-_Catch_All_-_DT&pla=pla_975664&k_clickid=9f1b38e7-3d3f-44a5-9395-5cd6da57665d&gclid=Cj0KCQjw4eXPBRCtARIsADvOjY1glxS4s9dBtGHbsexecy99IhZr68Ygk-Iryn87iOzZErXjT9sGIaYaAt7dEALw_wcB


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## G60ING (Jun 27, 2000)

I did walnut shell blasting last weekend on my 3.6 VR6. 

I made a huge cover for the engine out of garbage bags and a plastic Flange to hold the cover down on the head. I put rubber caps over the fuel injectors. I did this with the engine out of the car (corrado 3.6 swap) so I won't know for a week or two if I hosed up any of the other pars of the job by walnut blasting. 

Here are my results from blasting:


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## _Riddle (Oct 16, 2015)

G60ING said:


> I did walnut shell blasting last weekend on my 3.6 VR6.
> 
> I made a huge cover for the engine out of garbage bags and a plastic Flange to hold the cover down on the head. I put rubber caps over the fuel injectors. I did this with the engine out of the car (corrado 3.6 swap) so I won't know for a week or two if I hosed up any of the other pars of the job by walnut blasting.
> 
> Here are my results from blasting:


What was your setup like? Did you make a funnel of sorts so that the walnut media goes directly into the intake port and doesn't get everywhere? BMW uses a type of attachment like this.


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## G60ING (Jun 27, 2000)

_Riddle said:


> What was your setup like? Did you make a funnel of sorts so that the walnut media goes directly into the intake port and doesn't get everywhere? BMW uses a type of attachment like this.


The 3.6 doesn't have any attachments available from what research I've done so I made my own. I made a PVC flange that had a vacuum port and a hole for the media gun. That didn't work so great. The hole for the gun didn't allow for good movement between two sides of the intake port. I ended up just holding the vacuum near the opening and catching most of the media. I'd recommend a using a 2.5 vacuum with more power. I'd also recommend a setup of eye protection and dusk mask. 

My engine was out of the car and I dragged it to the front of my garage so all the excess would bounce outside. I used my PVC flange to hold down a garbage bag tarp that I made from two large bags. I also covered all of the open fuel connections with rubber caps. 

I made my own nozzles to get far into the intake ports on the VR6 from a copper toilet pipe. They bend very nicely. When I do another 3.6 engine it will be easier because I will have my pvc flange's openings enlarged to the size of the intake ports. 

The media gun was under $20
The walnut media was $22
the copper pipe was $2.50 each
The PVC board from lowes was $20

My 60gallon ingersol rand was right at home with this job. I wouldn't reomend doing this job with an oil-less 30 gallon compressor.


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