You’ve most likely previously heard about the popular EGR valve, the anti-pollution valve. It is not generally appreciated by motorists because it tends to cause more concerns than anything else… In truth, dependant upon the use you are going to make of your car, it can become congested and cause you a lot of complications. If this is the situation, you are most likely concerned about how to clean the EGR valve of your Nissan Altima ? Don’t be anxious, we’ve well prepared this content to help you with this process. To do this, we will initially look at the intent of the EGR valve, then what are the failures that the EGR valve of your Nissan Altima can bring about and at last the section that will most likely concern you the most, how to clean the EGR valve Nissan Altima?
How to Clean your Nissan Altima EGR Valve: Role and Operation
Purpose of the EGR valve
The EGR valve of your car has been added to diesel engines mostly to lower pollution emitted by cars and to meet EURO standards on Nissan Altima . It will as a consequence influence the quality of exhaust gas output and reduce toxic particles, mainly Nitrogen Oxide.
Operation of the EGR valve
Before we discover how to clean the EGR valve on your Nissan Altima , we will examine how it operates. As seen before, its goal is to clean the exhaust gases, so it will be installed 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 reduce all unburned toxic particles. It will function principally at low speed because at high speed the combustion is sufficient to burn all these gases.
How to clean your Nissan Altima EGR valve: Identifying faults
The EGR valve, nevertheless very effective to limit the pollution emissions of your Nissan Altima , will sadly tend to clog up because of soot/gas deposits that will accumulate in its system, which will ultimately risk obstructing the functions of the valve, until entirely blocking the engine motor, here are the symptoms that a defective EGR valve on your Nissan Altima can trigger:
- Motor light on
- Performance loss
- Technical assesment refused
- Black gases
- Automobile that grazes at low speed
- Low RPM settings
How to clean your Nissan Altima EGR valve: In practice
And now we’ll begin the section you are most enthusiastic about, how to clean the EGR valve of your car. Here are the two approaches that you can use.
Do it yourself
How to clean your Nissan Altima EGR valve system: Without dismantle
Despite the fact this approach is less efficient, it is however possible to consider a “rough” cleaning of your EGR valve, in fact, you will only need to use fuel additives, similar to the products used to clean the injection. These specific products 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 Nissan Altima.
How to clean your car EGR valve: With disassembly
Here is the most beneficial approach, which will require sufficient access to the EGR valve to carry out the operation yourself. If so, the procedure 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 simple steps are carried out, now comes the time for cleaning. To get this done, 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 as well 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 Nissan Altima.
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 complications (removing too many parts that hinder access for example), how to clean the EGR valve of your Nissan Altima? In this 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 Nissan Altima
Finally, some individuals make a more radical decision to limit the risk of a failed valve. Instead of cleaning the EGR valve of their Nissan Altima, they simply prefer to block it in the closed position. This manipulation will have the consequence of greatly increasing the pollution emitted by the car, of no longer complying with pollution requirements, of having an engine warning light all day on and in the end risk fouling the engine. We strongly recommend 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 want more tutorials on the Nissan Altima, go to our Nissan Altima category.
