Crockpot antifreeze

I just got my crock pot cooking and started cleaning a few engines. I just put them in whole to see what would happen. I did take a stuffer back plate off the Fox. The only anti-freeze I had laying around is the orange colored stuff. Is there a difference between the green stuff verses the orange or enviromentally friendly kind? It seems once you take the engine out it needs imediate attention. Can't let it dry out. Any other hints? Jim J

I've only used the green stuff. I get excellant results with it, leave it in overnight and in the morning there is a dirty scum on top of the antifreeze. I simply suck out the good stuff below the scum and reuse it.

LAST EDITED ON Jul-24-04 AT 09:45 PM (CDT)
 
The antifreeze method works great. Just did my Silver Fox 40 and OS 40fp. My flying buddy Hib from Boulder, turned me on to a very low toxic antifreez called Sirra. Don't know if it is sold country wide but the fumes were a lot less noxious than Prestone. The Siarra cost a bit more, but darn well worth it to me.

I would really hesitate to put my engines in the crock pot unless I disasembled them. THree reasons The O ring around the venturi and the back plate gasket and the need to get rid of the antifreeze after the cleaning job. I feel one should blow as much as possible out of our bearings etc with the air gun and then flood them with air to0ol oil or what ever you use for after run oil. Dont like the idea of residual amounts of antifreeze sitting my engines. Keith V

LAST EDITED ON Jul-24-04 AT 06:53 PM (CDT)
 
I only use anti-freeze that is designed to be used on aluminum cooling systems... It cost more but I have not had any problems with it. I have never tried anything else. I heard (probably in the forum archives) that some anti-freeze can leave a white or gray film if not washed off before cooling. I don't always disassemble engines, depends on how stuck they are. An hour or two in the crock can free up some of those hard to remove head screws. Back plates, venturi's, NVA's, prop drives...all come off first. (unless,of course, they are stuck) I have left (OK forgotten) parts in the crock for week with no ill effects.

****SAFETY REMINDER**** Anti-freeze is highly toxic to pets that like it's sweet (TO them apparently) taste, so keep it covered and deal with the waste immediately! And keep your own "special" pot holders in the shop to deal with hot anti-freeze covered engines...

Oh yeah, follow Keith's advise too...flush 'em out and oil 'em up

Around Christmas the OveGlove(sp) was being advertised on TV, thought they would be pretty cool for handling hot engines either right from the crock pot or when heating with a heat gun to remove bearings. Went to Wallgreens and picked up a couple, I wasn't disapointed they work great.

LAST EDITED ON Jul-24-04 AT 09:45 PM (CDT)
 
Yes, By all means dissasemble the engine before crockpotting.

1- Take off head, backplate, crank shaft unless it has ball bearings, venturi-N/V and "O" ring, piston/liner.

2- Crockpot overnight, not "O"ring. (Never use crock pot again for anthing else).

3- Scrub motor and other parts with toothbrush or lightly with brass brush on stubborn stains ( your option weather to use toothbrush or brass brush for brushing teeth again). Uggggh!

4- Boil in water for a few minuites. (Never use pot for anything else)

5- Dry off all parts with heat gun (any brand, especially ones used for shirinking film covering).

6- Oil all parts (especially ball bearings if engine has them) with Marvel Air Tool Oil well before assembly.

7- Assemble engine, set spray bar.

8- Option- Hook up can of Air tool oil to fuel intake and turn over with electric starter till oil comes out exhaust. Clean off glow plug element with alcohol now or before starting. Some guys run the engines immediatly and oil as per post flying session.

This proceedure is a combination of things I learned over the years on this forum and Stunt News. Thanks guys. Hopfully those guys knew what they were doing, I believe they did cause it works great!
Have fun and enjoy your new looking and hopefully better running engine.
I'm still open for other suggestions on this procedure or any other antifreez methods.
Hope this helps, Jerry Bohn

LAST EDITED ON Jul-24-04 AT 10:03 PM (CDT)
 
WATCH THE TEMP!!!

I notice nobody mentioned the temp, set on low for overnight, high can clean backed caster in a couple of hours. Left on high for too long and your 70's tumble polished Fox 35 case will be a nice dark gray! after parts are cleaned, rinse with hot water, dry and oil well.

Also, VENT! the fumes can/will give you a h*ll of a headach.

I've been using the crockpot clean my engines for several months now with great results!

I usually remove the backplate and head before putting an engine in the pot and then add enough antifreeze to totally immersed the parts. I've learned the hard way to leave the screws and socket heads in a separate container, that stays on the workbench.

With the crockpot set on low, it usually takes 48 hours in the pot to get everything looking new again. Then I take everything to the sink and go over the parts with a toothbrush to remove whatever grunge is still adhering, before rinsing everything under running water.

Then, all the parts transferred to a cookie sheet and placed in the oven at about 220° until the parts are completely dry.

Finally, I reassemble the engines using new backplate gaskets, lube them liberally with automatic transmission fluid and turn them over a couple hundred times with my starter motor to distribute the lubrication throughout the engine. The used antifreeze goes back into the original container, that I store on a letter to do that shelf in the garage.

I have no idea how long the antifreeze will last but I am still working with the same jug that I started with. After cleaning in excess of 20 really dirty engines, it's obviously contaminated but still works as well now as it did as it did when I started. Knowing me, I probably won't change the antifreeze until I notice a difference in the cleaning action but then again, I'm a cheapskate!

I don't know who thought up crockpot engine cleaning but it sure works!

Once through the crock pot, I rinse the parts in fast running hot tap water, imediately spray them down good with WD-40, then hit them with compressed air. Oil parts with air tool oil before assembly, especially piston/cylinder and case/crank bearings.

One last point to make: The antifreeze will *destroy* any type of plastic or painted surface. Remove nylon parts, O-rings etc. or they will be pitted and ruined. Be sure to get the plastic crank bushing out of your McCoy engines! You will have to re-paint the cylinder heads on your McCoy red head or Torpedo green head engines, but if the paint is in poor condition and you want to re-paint, this is a good way to remove the old paint. I am using standard Prestone antifreeze with good results.

All of you are great....good tips Keith and Bob R. The Sierra Anti-Frezze is the enviromental friendly kind. Next time I buy some anti-freeze I will try the green stuff. I put an OS .35 in yesterday on high for a couple of hours then turned it down for over night. 2 Hrs took alot of the stuff off. I left the backplates on so I wouldn't destroy the gasket. The Fox was a cork on and they are easy to come by, but the Max S gaskets I have to make. In my book I made special mention of painted and anodized surfaces that could be ruined very quickly. Better safe than sorry when cleaning and taking apart engines. I have four rules for my life that have worked well the past 15 years. Be yourself... Mind your own buisness...Ask for help...and help others....the hardest is minding my own buisness and it gets a lot easier to ask for help then feeling like a fool because I didn't. This was a brand new crock pot i bought for $2 at a local church rumage sale...great buy. Now where do I get a real stiff brush...tooth brushes seem to be a little too soft...off to Harbor Freight. Jim J

I found that even if the ceramic crock pot part is broken you can still use the base for the heating part of the process. I just use a small coffee can to hold the anti-freeze and engine parts, and place it in the middle of the base. When I'm done I put the plastic cover on the coffee can and my anti-freeze is ready for storage.

If you keep an eye open on garbage day you might pick up a new engine cleaner for free! I had to pay for mine, I dropped the crock and broke it, Mama got a new one and I kept the old one.

I've been "crocking" my engines on low temp in antifreeze for years. I use it full strenth and buy the cheap stuff from Wallyworld. I don't do painted or plastic parts and usually just take the back plate and head off (for what it's worth I cooked a plastic throttle arm off an RJL K61 rc to see what would happen and it didn't melt). Normal cooking time is overnight. For the really blackend castor ones a few more hours and scrubs with nylon tooth brushes work. I use toothpicks to get the crud out of the fins after it is softened a few hours.

I also did a test on an old Fox 40bb rc to see if leaving it on the bench dripping wet from antifreeze would cause rust or problems. I pulled it out and sat it in Florida's 90% humidity for several weeks...I then pulled entire engine apart and everything was perfect. Since that time I don't worry about drying immediately after pulling out of the pot. The antifreeze protects them, bearings and all. However, I normally leave motors in the antifreeze until I can flush with castored fuel and bench run immediately thereafter. Along with that experiment I kept that same Fox in cold antifreeze for about 3 months...it didn't clean it or do anything to the finish.