[Fireescape]

Hello
Being a tinkerer and never being able to leave well enough alone I decided to have a look at the intake manifold of my newly purchased 2012  GD diesel i30 with 190,000 km's on it. My partner has a 07 diesel Pajero with 200k on it  and the egr system on that was so full of soot and oily tar like material that the system basically failed. I was interested in whether 5 or so years of development (maybe more like 15 years of development considering the Pajero platform and engine has been basically  unchanged for almost 2 decades) had made a difference to the function of the system. As mentioned I have only had the i30 for around 2 weeks and was told by the previous owner that a vast majority of the kilometres on the car were put on doing Hwy driving on a work commute from the Southern Highlands to Wetherill Park in Sydney, and the condition of the car would seem to confirm this. I would suggest that this type of driving (hwy kilometres) would be the kind of driving that would allow the EGR system to work in it's most efficient way.

To remove the cold side intercooler pipe and access the intake manifold was simple enough, just needed to loosen one worm clamp. I also removed the alloy intake manifold connector to get a better look at the intake manifold , which required removing two nuts and two bolts, all pretty straight forward. I can say what I found wasn't good, evidently 5 years of development has achieved very little. The whole interior of the intake manifold was lined with an oily, sticky tar like goop as far down the intake manifold as I could see. I used a piece of wire to dig some of the material that was partially blocking the intake, it's really terrible stuff, got some on my hands and it was impossible to remove using soap, needing carb cleaner to get it off my hands.

So where to now? I'm going to have to remove my intake manifold to remove the stuff, probably will soak the whole thing in diesel to help get it out. I've also purchased an EGR block off plate (the one with the small hole to stop a code being thrown) in an attempt to stop this material from entering the intake manifold, and engine. I guess that's it, just a little post to talk about my experience with this system, thought others might be interested in my experiences. Hopefully I'll be able to link up two photos, one being the intake manifold itself and one being a 50c piece sized piece of the material I scraped from the manifold. Cheers

[Fireescape]

[The Gonz]

Wow, nice work, Jodi. Shame running on diesel isn't doing the cleaning for you. Are you happy that it's as tuned up as it should be?

[beerman]

I assume that you put the block off plate in and the EGR back on, If so where does all the rubbish go?

[Fireescape]

Hi The Gonz
Sorry , my names Andrew, Jodi is my partner and it's her name on the email I set up the account with.

As far as being tuned up, I'm not sure, I just purchased the car a few weeks ago and have never driven an i30 before then. It's had every service due, so it's been looked after, and feels fairly quick, drove to Sydney today from the Illawarra and it climbed up Mt Ousley in 6th with no problem, with two adults onboard. I personally think the whole EGR system is very ordinary, pumping exhaust gases and material straight back into the engine is the exact opposite to what you would want to do, it can only lead to detrimental outcomes for the engine, in my opinion. It's only function is to lower emissions and it would have to be a compromise that the engineers at Hyundai (and lots of other car manufactures) are forced to implement. As soon as I receive the blocking plate I've ordered I'll install it, clean out the intake and see how she feels. I don't think there will be much of a difference, but if a difference is felt I'd imagine that it would be a positive one. When I remove the intake manifold I'll take some photo's of the runners and intake ports on the head, I'm interested to see if any of the goop in the intake mani had made it that far, but I feel, going on the amount in the manifold I could see, that it must have.   

beerman - No, I haven't got a block off plate yet, it's in the mail. As far as were the material goes after it's installed, I'll block the EGR system off at the far end of the valve arrangement from the intake manifold, so I assume the tube to there will fill with the goop and then the material will just be expelled out the exhaust with the rest of the exhaust material.

[Asterix]

Looking forward to the intake pictures.... 

It's been mentioned earlier that using the a/c should cut off the EGR. Can anyone confirm that..? If it's the case, shouldn't it be possible to "short circuit" the EGR to think a/c is always on...?

[xiziz]

Following this thread, its an interesting topic, never was a fan of EGR. I just assumed it was hooked up too good with the ECU to do anything about it without reprogramming(like the DPF). Found a 4£ plate on ebay, so I might do this as well. Let us know how it goes!

[beerman]

Looking forward to the intake pictures.... 

It's been mentioned earlier that using the a/c should cut off the EGR. Can anyone confirm that..? If it's the case, shouldn't it be possible to "short circuit" the EGR to think a/c is always on...?

If thats the case, Im ok, because the A/C is always on 

[nzenigma]

Thanks for the report and pictures Andrew. Well done.
 It appears that the periodic servicing never included some EGR cleaner.
I have worked on a few diesels that I know have been in North Queensland, so assume the A/C is on permanently;  the manifold has been relatively clean.
To fit a blanking plate on a road vehicle is illegal, however, there is no emission test that will detect your crime.  
Some warn that the EGR makes the engine run cooler, without EGR damage can occur; but I have not heard of any melted i30s, so I can only see benefit in what you are doing. 

[nzenigma]

I have blocked the EGR valve off on my last few cars. SEAT, HONDA, HYUNDAI.

 9500 people in London died last year from diesel fumes.   
You dunnit!    

[Asterix]

  

[Fireescape]

Well the deed has been done! I removed the intake manifold yesterday to see what gunk had been deposited by the EGR system. Not real good results. There was a good thick layer all the way down the intake runners and on into the intake ports on the head. The four little butterfly valves on the intake manifold had a fairly think coating of material on both sides, probably around 15%, at a guess, of the air flow to the engine would've been blocked by this material. Taking off the intake manifold wasn't too big an issue, just undo the series of bolts holding it on, plus the high pressure fuel line from the pump to the rail, plus the butterfly valve control , plus a few other sensors and such attached to the bottom side of the manifold. I also removed the airbox and intake pipe to the turbo to access the EGR system. Cleaning out the intake manifold was a pain. I used a pressure cleaner and about a litre of degreaser and a heap of rags to clean the head itself.

The whole intake manifold needed soaking in degreaser before I could remove all the material, it was a good couple of hours work, but came up a treat after I'd finished. I installed the EGR blocking plate in the far end of the EGR system and hope this helps keep the soot and such from entering the manifold in the future, at least to a pretty big degree. The car feels quicker now, especially around the 2000  to 2500rpm area, where there's a difference in the way the car pulls, I would say that there's maybe 10% more power available now, but some of this may be a bit of a placebo effect. Here's a heap of photo's for your viewing pleasure -

The intake manifold showing the amount of material on the butterfly valves


The intake ports on the head, again you can see the material deposited down the port.


The point where the egr system attaches to the intake manifold (the concertina type metal pipe)


The end of the egr hose


The intake manifold looking in from the end (same image from my first post). The second image is the same thing after cleaning



The head after cleaning, you can now see the metal down the intake port


The now clean intake manifold, the butterfly valves are actually yellow, wouldn't have guessed from the first photo.


This is the egr blockoff plate in place (actually on the front side of the valve, I installed it on the other end of the system to hinder the material from getting to the valve itself). You can see the hole that allows some material to pass so a code isn't thrown.


So what's the conclusion I've come to? I would suggest that cleaning out this system is a must do for any higher mileage i30, it definitely builds up to such a degree that the performance of the car is affected to a degree. Doing this work isn't the easiest thing in the world, but it's more than doable with a few basic hand tools.  I'm not sure what a mechanic would charge to do this, maybe a few hundred dollars, it's about 3 to 4 hours work, maybe a bit less if they'd done it before and had a parts washer capable of cleaning the manifold more easily than my technique with the pressure cleaner. Post up if you have any questions. Cheers

[Asterix]

Well done and very nice result..

Taking into consideration your car have done almost 50.000 km/year it must have been driven very lightfooted, I guess. I sure don't hope the internals of my engine look like that. 

I keep telling myself the occasional towing with higher revs than normal, and a little spirited driving now and then, will keep my engine clean...

[nzenigma]

hi Fireescape,
Thanks for your report. Your journalism and technical work are both very professional.

Do you know much about the history of the car?

Taking into consideration your car have done almost 50.000 km/year it must have been driven very lightfooted, I guess. I sure don't hope the internals of my engine look like that. 

The average vehicle does about 15 to 20,000Km per year. I wonder if your 190,000km is attributed to a lot of highway travel or daily commercial use in a city?
As discussed before, if it is from your region, it is unlikely that A/C would be used all the time, therefore switching the EGR off.

[Dazzler]

Wow! Excellent post! Thanks @Fireescape

[Fireescape]

I guess the question of the cars history is the elephant in the room, and it's a question I can't shed a lot of light on. I was told by the previous owner that the car was used predominantly to commute between the Southern Highlands of NSW to Wetherill Park in Western Sydney. This drive would be 95% highway kilometres st speeds above, or at, 110km/h. The problem is that I'm not sure if this is a good thing, as far as the function of the EGR system goes, or not. I'd imagine the A/C would have been used to some degree, going on the darkness of the tint on the windows (95% on the front two side windows before I had it changed to 35%) the previous owner liked to keep cool. So going on pure speculation I'd say the A/C would've got a bit of use in Western Sydney in Summer.... let's say 40% of the time in total hours driven (massive guess here).

So, 190,000km of mainly HWY kilometres with 40% A/C use, every service carried out, car very well cared for over that time (most people think it's a new car). This might be either the best conditions to avoid this build up, or the worst, hard to say. It's a pretty easy check to see what your intake manifold looks like inside, just take off the rubber hose on the right hand side of the manifold (use blunt nosed pliers to undo the strange wormclamp) and have a look.

I'm trying to assess the difference cleaning it out has made to my car, power wise, difficult to tell but this may give you an idea. Mt Ousley, the long climb out of the Illawarra going towards Sydney, is a road I drive regularly. Last week, before I cleaned out the EGR system, my partner and I drove up it, in 6th at around 80km/h (maybe 90). The car struggled on some of the steeper sections, although not enough to change down to 5th. Today we did the same thing, but with my two sons in the back, probably around another 90 to 100kg of weight on board, and two suitcases in the boot (having a weekend in Sydney). Again in 6th, but this time the car didn't struggle in the least, flew up and was able to maintain it's revs all the way from bottom to top. I guess that's the difference between a completely clean intake manifold and a egr blockoff plate and a gunged up intake manifold and open egr system, not a massive difference, but a difference all the same.

[The Gonz]

Assumptions stated and qualified, comparison made logically. Good science, and an important enough difference to be noticed.

[Asterix]

How did you clean the intake on the head..?

I mean, all the crap you have removed, how did you get it out..? I wouldn't like to get all that into the cylinders and blown out into the cat/DPF when starting the engine again.

[Fireescape]

The port on the head is actually quite shallow, you can see the valve stem about 8 to 10cm from the mouth of the port. I just placed a rag over my finger and cleaned out each port, could almost get the whole way to the valve this way.

[nzenigma]

Assumptions stated and qualified, comparison made logically. Good science, and an important enough difference to be noticed.

Praise well earned and perfectly stated by Gonz. 

We recently had pages of posts on a suspect SR, but we could never pin the problem down because seperate allegations of lack of power and gear crunching were not, any shape or form, evidence based.

[eyecon]

Well the deed has been done! I removed the intake manifold yesterday to see what gunk had been deposited by the EGR system. Not real good results. There was a good thick layer all the way down the intake runners and on into the intake ports on the head. The four little butterfly valves on the intake manifold had a fairly think coating of material on both sides, probably around 15%, at a guess, of the air flow to the engine would've been blocked by this material. Taking off the intake manifold wasn't too big an issue, just undo the series of bolts holding it on, plus the high pressure fuel line from the pump to the rail, plus the butterfly valve control , plus a few other sensors and such attached to the bottom side of the manifold. I also removed the airbox and intake pipe to the turbo to access the EGR system. Cleaning out the intake manifold was a pain. I used a pressure cleaner and about a litre of degreaser and a heap of rags to clean the head itself.

The whole intake manifold needed soaking in degreaser before I could remove all the material, it was a good couple of hours work, but came up a treat after I'd finished. I installed the EGR blocking plate in the far end of the EGR system and hope this helps keep the soot and such from entering the manifold in the future, at least to a pretty big degree. The car feels quicker now, especially around the 2000  to 2500rpm area, where there's a difference in the way the car pulls, I would say that there's maybe 10% more power available now, but some of this may be a bit of a placebo effect. Here's a heap of photo's for your viewing pleasure -

The intake manifold showing the amount of material on the butterfly valves


The intake ports on the head, again you can see the material deposited down the port.


The point where the egr system attaches to the intake manifold (the concertina type metal pipe)


The end of the egr hose


The intake manifold looking in from the end (same image from my first post). The second image is the same thing after cleaning



The head after cleaning, you can now see the metal down the intake port


The now clean intake manifold, the butterfly valves are actually yellow, wouldn't have guessed from the first photo.


This is the egr blockoff plate in place (actually on the front side of the valve, I installed it on the other end of the system to hinder the material from getting to the valve itself). You can see the hole that allows some material to pass so a code isn't thrown.


So what's the conclusion I've come to? I would suggest that cleaning out this system is a must do for any higher mileage i30, it definitely builds up to such a degree that the performance of the car is affected to a degree. Doing this work isn't the easiest thing in the world, but it's more than doable with a few basic hand tools.  I'm not sure what a mechanic would charge to do this, maybe a few hundred dollars, it's about 3 to 4 hours work, maybe a bit less if they'd done it before and had a parts washer capable of cleaning the manifold more easily than my technique with the pressure cleaner. Post up if you have any questions. Cheers

Nice work really nice work. Did you have to install new gaskets for the intake runners and EGR valve? I guess I need to make sure I have a full parts list before getting stuck into it.

[Dazzler]

@eyecon

Long time no speak (December 2013!)

How you going Dennis (I think I remembered right)

I'm still making a nuisance of myself and back in an i30 (New PD SR) 

[eyecon]

Haha yes ol mate. As you live and breathe. Was poking around trying to find info re confirming the location and possibly changing the water pump myself, but to no avail. One of the pulleys is seized this morning and believe it to be the water pump assembly. Caused the belt to snap too. Then I went searching for a manual through one of your links you posted in another thread, and that got too hard when dealing with VMware players when downloading onto an iPhone. All I want for now is a diagram showing me where the water pump is. Easier said than done. Then I stumbled on this business with EGR cleaning, which I plan on doing asap. It might surprise you now (or maybe not) that my humble i30 has now gone 447,000km. It took this long for water pump failure to occur. No denying that I've certainly gone where no man has gone before ol mate.
So when is your next trip to Canberra? 

[Paolo5]

Hi eyecon!

Good to see your post..

447,000km!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WOW!!!

What is your secret to having your diesel do that amount of km? 2 stroke oil in the fuel?

Do you still have the tuning box fitted?

Cheers,
Paolo

[sundiz]

I saw one i30 on sale here in Finland with 507 000km. I quess if you don't abuse your car and service it on time, these little diesels can cope high kms. By the looks of it, it does not seem to be in too bad shape:
Hyundai i30 1.6 CRDi 84kw Comfort Wagon Farmari 2008 - Vaihtoauto - Nettiauto

[nzenigma]

I'm not surprised, mainly because I'm a fan , but what was the price? Its all in a some foreign gibberish! Dammit. 

Question : bit off topic but  are you guys running 2.0 Litre diesel or 1.6L?
 They are all 1.6L down here but 2.0L seems the norm in France and elsewhere.; I ask this because I have been sourcing some glow plugs and have been getting conflicting reports about the plug compatibility between the two engines.
Consequently, I avoided Koreans who were too flaky, gave up on the conflicting Poms and bought a set in Poland.

[Dazzler]

Haha yes ol mate. As you live and breathe. Was poking around trying to find info re confirming the location and possibly changing the water pump myself, but to no avail. One of the pulleys is seized this morning and believe it to be the water pump assembly. Caused the belt to snap too. Then I went searching for a manual through one of your links you posted in another thread, and that got too hard when dealing with VMware players when downloading onto an iPhone. All I want for now is a diagram showing me where the water pump is. Easier said than done. Then I stumbled on this business with EGR cleaning, which I plan on doing asap. It might surprise you now (or maybe not) that my humble i30 has now gone 447,000km. It took this long for water pump failure to occur. No denying that I've certainly gone where no man has gone before ol mate.
So when is your next trip to Canberra?

We were last there in May 2015, so must be overdue. We quite like Canberra in the spring and autumn (not so much in the Winter and Summer)

Just start a thread in Diesel -repairs and Maintenance or whatever it's called, titled "replacing water pump" and asking your questions. Hopefully you'll get all the info you need fairly quickly. 

[sundiz]

I'm not surprised, mainly because I'm a fan , but what was the price? Its all in a some foreign gibberish! Dammit. 

They ask 2050€, but I would guess they would sell it with something around 1800-1900€

[eyecon]

Hi eyecon!

Good to see your post..

447,000km!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! WOW!!!

What is your secret to having your diesel do that amount of km? 2 stroke oil in the fuel?

Do you still have the tuning box fitted?

Cheers,
Paolo

Hey Paulo, how you doing mate. Car had been good to me over the years. Usual wear and tear stuff gets replaced as I go along. Nothing lasts forever I guess.
Haven't used oil additive for a few years now. It was always a bit of a chore preparing and sourcing the right oil.

And I removed the Spider tuning box a few years ago as it was becoming faulty until one day it stopped my car from running. Haven't bothered sourcing another one. Stock standard buddy. Even removed the halo LED lights too.

You're running a tuning box aren't you?

[eyecon]

We were last there in May 2015, so must be overdue. We quite like Canberra in the spring and autumn (not so much in the Winter and Summer)

Just start a thread in Diesel -repairs and Maintenance or whatever it's called, titled "replacing water pump" and asking your questions. Hopefully you'll get all the info you need fairly quickly. 

No worries mate. Will do.