Honda Civic Fuel Injector Cleaning – Can You Do That?

The fuel injection system is one of the most tender parts of modern engines. Fuel is injected into the engine by spraying and sometimes, injectors get clogged or just stop spraying gas properly. But it's extremely important to maintain the optimal gas pressure and spraying in order to get decent power and torque from your engine. Also, malfunctioning fuel injectors can cause big technical problems with the engine.

Honda Civic is known for poor fuel injection quality. We mean, the injection system needs maintenance quite often. Well, we should tell you that any car needs injection maintenance, it's not something special for your Civic. But the Honda injection system is too tender, so it may need more attention than, say, the Chevy injection system.

Injector cleaning in honda civic

Today, we'll be speaking about the following:

  1. Honda Civic injection cleaning - how is it completed?
  2. How often should you clean your injectors in a Honda?
  3. Can you clean the injectors by yourself?
  4. What are the signs that your Civic needs injector cleaning?
  5. What will you get after cleaning the injectors?

Let's get started!

The procedure - how to clean the Civic injection system?

Cleaning the injector is actually a hard task if you don't have some special equipment. Unfortunately, you will not be able to clean the injector if you don't push the cleaning liquid under high pressure through the injector's body. This is possible in two ways: you can do it on special equipment or with the help of some self-made cleaning system.

Also, to clean the injectors, you will need to take this system apart. It's not hard to do if you have some experience, but it's actually harder than you may think. If you have never done this before, better consult with a specialist or just have this work done by specialists.

Here's how they clean injectors in repair shops:

  • taking the injection system apart - they do it partially to connect the Civic injectors to the special cleaning system;
  • connecting both ends of an injector to special tubes that send the cleaning solution under high pressure and then get the dirty solution at the other end;
  • turning on the system of injection cleaning and waiting for some time while the cleaning solution does all the work;
  • disconnecting the tubes and checking the work of the injectors - they should now spray fuel optimally;
  • if some of the injectors don't do the work really well, the cleaning procedure is repeated;
  • if the cleaning doesn't lead to success, the specialists recommend replacing the malfunctioning injector;
  • after that work is done, these guys assemble the injection system and check if the vehicle works well.

After the procedure is completed, the injectors will spray the fuel as they should do it. This will result in optimal work of the engine. At least, it will work much better than it initially worked with dirty and clogged injectors. Well, it doesn't always change the way your vehicle works, but it's necessary for the Honda Civic because the injectors may clog worse and create problems unless they are cleaned regularly.

Be careful when you choose a person or a service center for injector cleaning. A lot of small repair shops will not use expensive equipment and will just clean the injectors manually which doesn't help at all. You will pay money and get no results. Your Civic will continue working poorly and burning a lot of fuel.

Can you clean the injectors in your Civic by yourself?

Some bad news here for you. Cleaning the injectors is only possible in a specialized service center that has all equipment for this. If you try cleaning the injectors by yourself, you will need to construct a self-made system for cleaning these parts. It will need to supply the injectors with the cleaning solution at very high pressure. Can you do that? Then yes, you can clean the Civic injectors by yourself.

But we warn you that special equipment will do the job much better. It doesn't only send the solution to the injectors. It also checks the quality of spraying. So, after 10 minutes of cleaning, your injectors will work like new.

How often should you clean the Civic injectors?

We would divide the service into three parts.

The first part is checking. Every time you come to the regular maintenance, ask your mechanic to check if the injectors work well. A professional can do that with the help of computer diagnostics.

The second part is average cleaning. Every 30,000 miles we would recommend cleaning the injectors with the help of professional equipment. It's not very expensive, but it will improve the way your Civic's engine work.

The third part is the full maintenance with a complete check. We recommend doing that every 90,000 miles. At this point, you will probably need to replace one or two injectors to make sure these parts still work well.

How will you feel your Civic has clean injectors?

Have you ever driven a new vehicle? That wonderful feeling when your engine doesn't shake and once you touch the acceleration pedal, the vehicle starts moving dynamically. A great way to improve your driving experience with a car that has some mileage on the clock is to clean the injectors.

Here's what you will actually get:

  • the gas mileage will drop a little - about 7-12% of the economy is a good motivation;
  • the Civic will accelerate faster - you will win some time when you drive;
  • also, the idling will be smoother, so your car will not shake when it idles;
  • the engine will work properly and will not get damaged because of the wrong fuel mixture;
  • you will probably feel that the car became fresher, got more dynamic, and is now fun to drive.

These are all positive features. But bear in mind that if you just maintain your fuel injectors every 25-30K miles, you will not feel any sharp changes. Your injectors are probably only a little clogged at this mileage, so you will just maintain your engine in a good condition. But if you don't clean the injectors for 90K miles, and then you suddenly decide to clean them, you will feel the difference.

The signs you will need to clean the Civic injectors

  1. High fuel consumption.
  2. Check engine light on highways.
  3. Bad acceleration on higher RPM.
  4. Unstable idling.
  5. Stalling without an obvious reason.
  6. Bad engine start.
  7. Hard to start moving, especially on the slope.
  8. A certain loss of power.

Can dirty injectors kill your Civic engine?

Actually, dirty injectors are one of the reasons why the engine in your Honda may die much faster than you expect. You could have read that Civic engines live about 250,000 miles in newer cars and even over 300,000 miles in older vehicles. This is true, but only if you maintain the engine properly. One of the important parts of maintenance is actually cleaning the injectors.

Here's how dirty and clogged injectors may kill your engine:

  1. Once an injector gets clogged, it stops spraying fuel properly into the combustion chamber.
  2. One of the cylinders starts malfunctioning. For example, it can start missing one or two strokes because of the wrong air-fuel mixture.
  3. The air-fuel mixture keeps deteriorating and it starts exploding in the combustion chamber which may kill the engine much faster.
  4. The unburnt fuel (because of missed strokes) comes down to the oil pan and dissolves the oil.
  5. The obvious results - your engine gets worse oil, and one cylinder gets damaged because of explosions.

You may think that the injectors are not that important in the longevity of your engine. But it's not true. These parts may sharply decrease the durability of the Civic engine and lead to a sooner death of the block.

We are pretty sure that cleaning the injectors is much more economically correct than replacing the engine once every 150,000 miles or something.

How much is it to clean the Civic injectors?

It depends on the repair shop or dealer you choose for this work. We would say that the average price across America is $40-$50 per one injector. But if you go to an official Honda dealer, prices may come up to $100 per one injector. The quality doesn't depend on the price - it only depends on the quality of the equipment they use for cleaning.

Final words

Unfortunately, gas injectors need cleaning. We recommend cleaning the Civic injectors once every 25,000 miles. Once every 100,000 miles you should properly check the injectors and decide whether they can work another 100,000 miles. In most cases, we recommend replacing the injectors with the new original parts at this mileage.

This will save your engine from fast wear and will stop extra fuel consumption. Cleaning the injectors is economically correct because otherwise, you just spend hundreds of dollars monthly for the fuel that you could save up if your Civic injectors were clean.

C
CarAraC Research

About the authors

The CarAraC research team is composed of seasoned auto mechanics and automotive industry professionals, including individuals with advanced degrees and certifications in their field. Our team members boast prestigious credentials, reflecting their extensive knowledge and skills. These qualifications include: IMI: Institute of the Motor Industry, ASE-Certified Master Automobile Technicians; Coventry University, Graduate of MA in Automotive Journalism; Politecnico di Torino, Italy, MS Automotive Engineering; Ss. Cyril and Methodius University in Skopje, Mechanical University in Skopje; TOC Automotive College; DHA Suffa University, Department of Mechanical Engineering

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