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Hi guys, im new to this forum. Anyways earlier today I seafoamed my 1999 Civic LX 4 door sedan by means of half the bottle into the gas tank, and the other half I put into the vacuum line sucked into the intake manifold. Anyways, I let the seafoam sit with the car off for 25 minutes. Then went ahead and started revving the engine. I wouldnt say I redlined it but I definitly had the RPMS over 3,000 for most of the 4 minutes of revving. I then got in the car and drove down the highway going about 60MPH basically hotrodding the car around because I read somewhere that you need to push your car to the limits in order to blow out all the carbon effectively. So after about 4 minutes of driving fast. I went back home and when I parked I noticed thin smoke coming out of the engine bay. I popped the hood and saw smoke coming out of this area (as seen in the pictures) Tried blowing the smoke but it kept coming. I ended up grabbing a water hose and drenching the area in cold water to stop the smoke. So my question is: Was the smoke just seafoam carbon being burnt off? Or did I mess up my engine?

Thanks for your help guys



Area circled in Yellow is where the smoke was being emitted from




Side view of the area

 
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Coming from your exhaust area. Heh. Don't really know. I've never used Seafoam. Most of us here are kinda skeptical of using it. I wouldn't have used cold water on a hot engine though. You risk cracking the block from the extreme temperature change. What did the smoke smell like?

 
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^^ He means cold water on a hot engine but, yes, you'll crack something from the extreme temp change.

The smoke is a normal side-effect of the seafoam. When I do it it usually smokes out of everywhere, including the muffler. You're gonna have the most smoke in the exhaust manifold as that's where most of the carbon buildup usually is.

I had been taught to have at idle, inject the seafoam(or equivalent), race the idle until it mostly stops smoking, then take it on a drive to try and burn the remaining carbon out.

BTW: Congratulations, you just did your first Italian Tune-up!

 
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Lol. I didn't even notice that. Guess I can't ninja edit it now.

 
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doubtful you messed up anything, but just for giggles, i'd take off the exhaust heat shield and check your manifold for cracks. could be a gasket leak as well.

 
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I'm not even gonna start... though I should.

 
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I agree with bowtieguy. I did the seafoam to my ride as well and I noticed smoke coming from that area as well. It turn up I had a crack on the exhaust manifold. I don't believe it was from the seafoam though, just the age of the manifold (11yrs old) cause Ive used seafoam on other vehicles.

 
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Agreed. I bet you have a cracked manifold. It's not hard to change. I used a Dorman from Autozone to replace mine. Easy to install and seems to work okay.

 
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Seafoam is awesome....you dont need to run the sht out of your car to use it effectively though. Just follow the manufacturer directions next time and stop listening to people who dont know what they are talking about.....