Spray, scrub, rinse, dry, repeat

With the airbox off the car, I’d be remiss if I didn’t do some detailing on the engine. There are a couple of things to be concerned about when detailing the engine of an early 308.

The first is moisture. While moisture is essential to actually clean the engine, there are plenty of places you don’t want moisture to get… the spark plugs and extenders, the distributer caps, the coils and the alternator to mention a few. This is the reason I don’t use a steam cleaner (although my mechanic used to)

The second thing to be careful with is the chemicals you are using. The 308’s block and heads are unpainted aluminium which can be damaged by certain cleaners and if those cleaners also contain solvents, be careful around painted surfaces as well.

My cleaner of choice is a spray bottle of Simple Green and some elbow grease followed up with a spray bottle of water to rinse and then compressed air to dry. Now Simple Green can attack aluminium if left on too long. The manufacturer’s recommendation is not to leave Simple Green in contact with aluminium for more than 10 minutes so that is the approach I take.

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Disclaimer: 308restoration.com describes the restoration work I perform on my car and only my car. I am not a professional mechanic. The website content is presented for entertainment purposes only and should not be seen as any kind of advice, information, instruction or guidance for working on any other car. The opinions stated here are my own and no-one else’s.