Oil in the heat exchanger - how to clean?

[Christien]

I've had oil leak and seep into my left heat exchanger. I'm fairly certain it's from the oil return tubes, which I'm in the middle of replacing. I need to clean out whatever oil is remaining - last time I drove the car the oil in there caught fire. Nothing major, small flames coming out where the arrows are pointing - about twice the size of the flame on a disposable lighter. But because of that, I don't want to just drive and burn it off. Chances are it's leaked/spread enough elsewhere over the winter (last drove it in early December) that I could just burn it off safely, but I don't want to take that chance.

Any ideas or tips?

[kens_74_911s]

If you are sure the leak is fixed anything left it will burn off in a short time - Use your time to take a drive and get it hot. Unless you just want to do more work. My 2cents worth on it anyway... If you are concerned , get it warm not hot and hit it with a pressure washer in that area it will move some of it so you don't have to worry about buring up that really should not happen anyway. It looked pretty clean compared to what you described.

[tijnes]

I've had that happen to me. Mine were SSI. Drove the car for over a 100 miles and it was still fuming up inside the cabin every time I turned on the heat. Shortened my life by a couple years I'm sure.

I ended up taking off the heat exchangers and soaking them in diesel fuel. After that I powerwashed the inside as best as I could with some simple green.

No more smoke and fumes after that.

Martijn