"Jeff Burke" wrote in message
...
On 11 Aug 2006 15:17:01 -0700, "basskisser" wrote:
Again, there's been many many documented tests where they've used
various products much like, if not Seafoam, to clean carbon deposits.
Now I'm not saying that if the top of a piston has very minor carbon,
that seafoam won't make it look clean, but if you've got carbon enough
so that your compression has gone up, and results in pinging without
higher octane fuel, then it ain't going to do much for you.

Check with the Vulcan riders at vroc.org. The Vulcan 800 is known to build
up
carbon from using high octane fuel or from lugging it too much. Seafoam
does the
trick on the 800, it sure worked on mine. I don't think the carbon problem
is
causing any boost in compression, I think the "spark knock" that some have
cured
with Seafoam was caused by carbon making hot spots that caused
pre-ignition.
Some bike got so bad that the engine actually had a knock in the engine
that
sounded like piston slap or bad bearings, turned out to be real bad carbon
build
up that actually hit the pistons. Those bikes had to have their engines
torn
down. This could have been avoided if they used Seafoam, but not cured
once it
went that far.

Seems like I recall old shade tree mechanics using a device that hooked up
to a garden hose and created a very fine water mist at the carb inlet on
cars that had carbon buildup on the tops of the pistons. The very small
amount of water that mixed with the air/fuel mixture was supposed to burn
off the accumulated carbon.

I don't think I'd try this on a modern, fuel injected, $14.000.00 engine
however.

Eisboch