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Easy Metal Cleaning

Just like cleaning your oven

Internal engine parts that are constantly exposed to hot oil develop a burned-on brown patina during years of use. Trying to clean this coating with solvent is useless—the surface remains hard and dirty brown. But, from America's kitchens comes the solution: spray-on oven cleaner. It works great and is available at almost any market in the country.

After allowing the part to warm up in the sun, apply a liberal amount of oven cleaner to the surface and let it work for about 10 minutes. Then scrub the surface with an abrasive pad or steel wool and watch the brown funk come right off. A second application might be required if the residue is really heavy. Then simply hose off the part and it'll look like new metal. We demonstrate here on an oil-pan windage tray that has had 36 years of bathing in oil, and it was dark brown when the process was started. The results speak for themselves.

Spraying

Follow the instructions on the can—oven cleaner is relatively caustic. Heavy rubber gloves are required to protect against skin irritation or burns. The cleaner works best on warm parts. We let this windage tray bake in the sun for about 20 minutes, but you could also heat it in an oven if necessary. Simply spray the cleaner liberally over the part and let it set up for 10 minutes or so. The cleaner starts to bubble almost immediately, very similar to the way paint stripper works. You can see the brown coating dissolving.

Scrubbing

The cleaner has loosened up the burned-on oil deposits to the point that almost no hard scrubbing is necessary. In this case, we cleaned both sides of the item at the same time. Be sure to scrub all the creases and contours of your part with steel wool or an abrasive pad. We hosed the part to see what we missed and then applied a second dose of cleaner. The second shot got it all, and we still had most of the can of cleaner left for other parts.

Hosing

After completely scrubbing the part, give it a good blast with the hose. Carefully inspect the part for areas you might have missed and re-clean if necessary. We allowed the windage tray to air dry and then toweled off any wet spots. This is the best-kept secret in automotive restoration and rebuilding for cleaning oil-baked parts. But make sure to read the oven cleaner's instructions carefully—the cleaner can damage paint if not used correctly. After seeing the results, we plan on using a lot more oven cleaner on engine parts.