WolfgangFox

Hey all,

I just got my new-to-me 96 F150, and the undercarriage and engine bay look like someone has been driving through mud quite a bit. The interior of the truck is perfect, but it's extremely dirty. The folks in Southern Utah constantly drive through the desert, and I believe this truck belonged to a farmer. We have had a lot of rain recently, and apparently he was driving through mud quite a bit.

Besides going through one of the automatic carwashes that does the undercarriage for 5 seconds quite a few times, how do you mudders get the mud off of your undercarriage?

The engine bay my thought was to disconnect negative battery cable, but a bag over battery, alternator, and distributor then just spray it down. After that, take Simple Green or Mean Green, spray it all over the engine bay, then hose it again? That should not hurt anything should it, as long as I don't create shorts, and let it dry thoroughly?

-Pat

WolfgangFox

Going to try the lawn sprinkler for the undercarriage tomorrow. And see what happens, unless someone has better ideas?

Steve83

Yes, many mudders use sprinklers to loosen the bulk of the undercarriage mud. But you have to move them around every hour or so to get the nooks & crannies. I grew up in Louisiana, and I'd spend an hour or 2 under the truck after every trip so mud never dried on the chassis, and it was always totally clean.

You don't have to do anything with the battery or alternator - they get soaking wet when you drive in rain, just like everything else outside the cabin.


(phone app link)

Washing the battery is good for it because it removes acid & corrosion. Washing the alternator & belt remove belt residue, oil, and carbon. Washing the radiator removes bugs & dirt. Just don't BLAST the radiator or condenser fins - folding them over is worse than the dirt & bugs. If you blast the distributor, remove the cap & dry it out thoroughly before attempting to start the engine. Ford recommends applying silicone grease to the cap, to make it more-resistant to water:


(phone app link)


(phone app link)


(phone app link)


(phone app link)

ngoti8tor

You can get water in the alternator, but try to keep any type of cleaners away from the alternator, as they will break down the insulation on some of the wiring inside the alternator.

WolfgangFox

thank you!

Just finished washing the undercarriage with the sprinkler, and man I should have done it out in the street! Took me about 15 mins to clean the driveway afterwards.

I also just got a hose and went around all of the trim underneath and got a lot of mud out that way as well. This thing was filthy. At first I thought it maybe had been submerged, but the interior is clean and not damaged, and it's the original interior.

On the engine bay I just left everything hooked up, did not spray directly on the battery, distributor cap, or alternator. Did a rinse first and got a lot of it, then used simple green, and once again did not spray on battery, distributor cap or alternator. Then hosed off again, and it actually looks cleaner now, then my last 89. lol

Going to let it dry for a couple days before starting it up, I'm sure that's overkill but I wash a lot of electronics in restoring arcade games, and I always dry stuff to the nth degree.

Steve83

All the engine bay electronics are either potted in, or not affected by fresh water (except the high-voltage side of the ignition system while the engine is running). If the distributor bowl is dry, the engine will run fine. At worst, there may be some minor misfiring until the plug wires get warm enough for the water to evaporate off. None of the 12V circuits in the engine bay will be affected by clean water, unless you blast them up-close with a pressure washer, and cut through the potting or break wires.

WolfgangFox

thanks Steve83. I've been seeing a lot of your posts, and have done a lot of research just by them.