You’ve likely previously read about the famous EGR valve, the anti-pollution valve. It is not generally appreciated by car owners because it tends to develop more concerns than anything else… In fact, dependant upon the use you are going to make of your automobile, it can become clogged and bring about you a lot of problems. If this is the case, you are likely concerned about how to clean the EGR valve of your Chevrolet Bolt ? Don’t be anxious, we’ve made this article content to help you with this process. To do this, we will first check out the intent of the EGR valve, then what are the failures that the EGR valve of your Chevrolet Bolt can bring about and finally the section that will likely concern you the most, how to clean the EGR valve Chevrolet Bolt?

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How to Clean your Chevrolet Bolt EGR Valve: Role and Operation

Role of the EGR valve

The EGR valve of your car has been integrated to diesel engines primarily to lower pollution emitted by vehicles and to meet EURO standards on Chevrolet Bolt . It will therefore influence the quality of exhaust gas output and eliminate toxic particles, mainly Nitrogen Oxide.

Operation of the EGR valve

Before we learn how to clean the EGR valve on your Chevrolet Bolt , we will examine how it works. As described before, its objective is to clean the exhaust gases, so it will be placed at the engine outlet, thanks to a valve, it will be able to return the unburned exhaust gases to the engine for a second burn which will eliminate all unburned toxic particles. It will function mostly at low speed because at high speed the combustion is enough to burn all these gases.

How to clean your Chevrolet Bolt EGR valve: Identifying faults

The EGR valve, even though very beneficial to limit the pollution emissions of your Chevrolet Bolt , will regrettably tend to clog up because of soot/gas deposits that will build up in its system, which will inevitably risk blocking the functions of the valve, until completely blocking the engine motor, here are the symptoms that a defective EGR valve on your Chevrolet Bolt can cause:

  • Motor light on
  • Power loss
  • Technical inspection refused
  • Black gases
  • Automobile that grazes at low speed
  • Low RPM settings

How to clean your Chevrolet Bolt EGR valve: In practice

And now we’ll commence the section you are most interested in, how to clean the EGR valve of your car. Here are the two ways that you can use.

Do it yourself

How to clean your Chevrolet Bolt EGR valve system: Without taking it apart

Even though this methodology is less effective, it is however possible to consider a “rough” cleaning of your EGR valve, actually, you will only need to use fuel additives, equivalent to the products used to clean the injection. These particular solutions must be injected into the running engine, at the right operating temperature, diluted in about 20 litres of fuel and run the engine for 3 or 4 minutes in high rev to clean the EGR valve of your Chevrolet Bolt.

How to clean your car EGR valve: With disassembly

Here is the strongest methodology, which will require enough access to the EGR valve to perform the treatment on your own. If so, the process is fairly easy. You will need to disconnect the electromagnet from the EGR valve, remove the few screws that hold it in place, and remove it. Once these guidelines are accomplished, now comes the time for cleaning. To do this, you will need to use a product such as solvent, petrol, oven cleaning product, which you will leave to act for ten minutes, then scrape off the rest using a scraper, finish cleaning with wire brush. If you want to go further, you can even clean the two conduits on which it is connected which may be scorched, for this, use a scraper and a vacuum cleaner to avoid dropping deposits in the conduits. You will only have to reassemble it and you will have finished cleaning the EGR valve of your Chevrolet Bolt.

Have it done by a professional

If, your EGR valve is not reachable because of the series or the engine of your car and if removing it would cause too many difficulties (removing too many auto parts that hinder access for example), how to clean the EGR valve of your Chevrolet Bolt? In such a case, it would be better rather than launching yourself into an overly complex process, you turn to an auto mechanic. He will be able to carry out the job more cleanly and will be able, if required, to change the valve if it is dead. The cost of cleaning dependant upon the difficulty of access is between 70 and 300 €.

Remove the EGR valve of your Chevrolet Bolt

At last, a number of people make a more radical decision to limit the risk of a failed valve. Rather than cleaning the EGR valve of their Chevrolet Bolt, they just choose to block it in the closed position. This manipulation will have the outcome of greatly increasing the pollution emitted by the automobile, of no longer complying with pollution requirements, of having an engine warning light all day on and finally risk fouling the engine. We highly suggest against making this choice. If you have other questions or want to learn more about your car, don’t be reluctant to take a look at our dedicated page.

If you have any further questions about the Chevrolet Bolt, do not hesitate to consult our Chevrolet Bolt category.