How To Clean An Auris T180 / Sr180 Egr Valve, This Could Be A Good Ide

[BA553T]

Hi Brett

Sorry no I havn't got around to doing it yet but i post some pics when I do. I'm glad to hear there is such a thing as an updated egr valve as I was thinking i had a car which had a different engine fitted ! I hadn't been able to find out much info about an update. I have no problems with my car but would just like to see how clean it is.

Hope you are enjoying you sr, i have had mine now for about 3 months and I love it. 40 ish mpg and good power so i'm happy enough,my caddy van is only a 105 hp and it only gets about 42 !

Good luck with the new car

Eddie

I've managed to sweet talk my mate in taking a look with me one of the days next week. Also, after reading several other posts around the subject, I've purchased some BG244 diesel treatment off eBay (about £20).. gonna run this through the system after the clean.

I'll feedback once the jobs done.

[4raver]

My D4D is only a 1.4 but the fuel ecconomy is phenomenal ...57 mpg round town with a bit of dual carriageway and best so far is 67 mpg on a 140 mile round trip, I have not checked mine but following this feature and I plan to own the car a while I will be checking every twelve months.

I do know that they replaced the Valve on my avensis under the warranty when it packed up rather than cleaning it...too much money "Toyota" if you ask me.

[BA553T]

Hi Brett

Sorry no I havn't got around to doing it yet but i post some pics when I do. I'm glad to hear there is such a thing as an updated egr valve as I was thinking i had a car which had a different engine fitted ! I hadn't been able to find out much info about an update. I have no problems with my car but would just like to see how clean it is.

Hope you are enjoying you sr, i have had mine now for about 3 months and I love it. 40 ish mpg and good power so i'm happy enough,my caddy van is only a 105 hp and it only gets about 42 !

Good luck with the new car

Eddie

I've managed to sweet talk my mate in taking a look with me one of the days next week. Also, after reading several other posts around the subject, I've purchased some BG244 diesel treatment off eBay (about £20).. gonna run this through the system after the clean.

I'll feedback once the jobs done.

Spent a couple of hours with my mate yesterday cleaning out the EGR using a scraper vacuum and some wynns carb cleaner from Halfords. My cars done 28k and there was a reasonable amount of soot build up. The things we noticed with the revised EGR are 1) it now has 2 pipes running through the top carrying coolant (we left these connected through the clean. 2) the small breather hole that are referred to in this guide seem to have gone, almost as though Toyota have realised there's an issue.

The clean by itself doesn't seem to have made much of a difference so whether the revised EGR is more forgiving to soot buildup.

As for the procedure it's self explanatory, just remove the bolts holding the EGR pipe then the ones holding the EGR valve body then disconnect the electric connect (bottom left of the valve body). You with also have to slacken off the plastic rail trunking to get access to one of the bolts on the valve body.

Obviously one part with still be connected to the engine via the 2 coolant pipes, we put a cover over the engine and paintwork to clean this part so that the carb cleaner didn't go over all the lovely shiny paintwork (the cleaner comes out with some force)

[Chris_munday]

Hi,

My Auris 2.2 D4D is 5 years old and has 63000 miles on the clock with one lady owner. This led me to the assumption that she had never had this done (as your guide says clean every 12 months or 10K). Followed the step-by-step and removed the EGR valve to find a rectangular block of black carbon. Also the same on the engine side of the rectangle. Spent 20 mins cleaning both with toothbrush and hoover and re-assembled. Got in the car to see if it made any difference and jesus ***** the difference was phenominal! It felt so much quicker and the throttle seemed to have a much quicker response when I gunned it down the road :).

Would like to say on here that you sir are a hero!!

Greatly Appreciated.

Chris

[Paul Gailey]

I just cleaned my EGR valve on a 105K km 2005 Avensis - it was filthy sooty. Took some fiddling to access the bolts to remove and a fair amount of force to loosen them - after some diligent cleaning, carefully avoiding dropping the soot in and using a steam vacuum cleaner, the car restarted with only a mild cough. Now it smoother and so far has not exhibited dead spots like before. Will keep an eye on the mpg now. I took some photos for posterity - rest assured it was grubby.

[big al your pal]

removed my EGR valve on my auirs t180 54000 m manky inside cleared and replaced goining from 31 m up to 41 m took me about 1 hour but with made up tools thanks for the clean pics

[Aycee]

Thanks for the guide, very helpful. Think I will try this as my fuel consumption is poor. Are any gaskets or seals required and does anyone know the torque settings for the bolts?

Thanks

[Steve Swinton]

The symptoms.

The MPG is disgraceful this time last year we was averaging no less than 38mpg over a tank and around 42-45mpg when driven on a run with cruise control set at 70mph. Over Christmas we did approx 1500miles and have managed best on a run +4oc 31mpg driving with cruise control set at 70mph, when it was cold we was down to 21mpg and have now risen to around 30mpg driving like your gran going to church. These figures are a long way short of the figures that Toyota quote and of what we was achieving this time last year with similar temperatures, it may be worth noting the car makes a pinking sound at around 1800-2300rpm if you put your foot down and there is a small delay / flat spot in throttle response (not turbo lag) when you press the accelerator, I suspect this is the fly by wire throttle system but is it supposed to have a delay?

How to clean, I did have to borrow a few pictures as I had cleaned mine by the time I made this thread.

1. Remove the engine cover, this just pulls up and unclips.

2. Now you can see the EGR Valve, you will need a 12mm socket, Ratchet and extension to remove this.

3. Remove these 2 x bolts 1st for the pipe above the EGR valve.

4. Now undo the other 4 x 12mm nuts and bolts from the EGR valve and unplug this from the wiring loom, this can now be removed.

5. This is now what you will find.

Dirty manifold with 2 x blocked breathing holes.

Dirty EGR valve with restricted air flow.

6. I cleaned these using an old toothbrush, small screw driver, carburettor cleaner, old cloth and a dyson cleaner to suck the muck out. Try to scrape and brush out the thick carbon then use the carburettor cleaner to clean the finish this off.

Now once all this is cleaned out just simply refit, This took me a total of 15 minutes so I assure you this is very easy.

The results

This will vary for everyone but in my experience I did a 360mile round trip the next day with mainly cruise control set at 70mph, going there (more downhill) the roads where very very wet with poor visibility and approx 7oc and we averaged 41.1MPG by the time we got there. When we come home with mainly cruise control set at 70mph, slightly uphill most of the way the roads where dry and approx 3oc the average MPG had dropped to 40.0. When I filled up we got 37.4litres in the tank which I rounded up to 38 and worked out at 43MPG (I always brim the tank). This is now showing a big improvement / approx 20% for a 15minute job of cleaning the EGR valve. I will also note the slight flat spots in throttle response are a lot less than before.

I would like to say a big thank you to cabcurtains for bringing the EGR valve to my attention and to twingo69 as I borrowed a few pictures from his thread to make this guide.

UPDATE

Ok it has been nearly 5 months and around 4k since I did this do this morning I thought I would check the EGR valve. To be honest the manifold was very very clean maybe a small less than 1mm coating of carbon and the EGR valve had a little more, I did clean this again while it was removed but in my opinion looking at what I seen today I would recommend cleaning this around every 12months or 10k.

UPDATE

Well over the next 12 months the MPG just continued to drop, Toyota claimed there was no problems with the car but by Feb 11 we could only manage 28-32MPG at best. I had also noticed the car had started to do a lot of DPF recycle burns and suspect the DPF was maybe on its way out, we had no warrenty left on the car so had a shop around and exchanged for a 5 month old 500 mile CRZ. What can I say but for sure the CRZ is one of the best cars we ever owned and was fantastic on fuel (49MPG average for every turn of the key over 9 months and 9000 miles) but due to the birth of Lewis we needed a bigger car so exchanged this for a CTR (FN2), I will say that so far over 7000 miles this has returned 29MPG for us which puts a quicker petrol car in the same area as the T180 when we traded this in.

What never made sence was when we first bought the T180 we could get 40-44MPG no problem then at around 30'000 miles the MPG just started to drop while nothing really changed, we never found a cure for this or a fault but for sure this is problem and Toyota must know about this because they dropped the 2.2 and 2.0 Auris diesel cars and have now agreed to use BMW diesel engines from 2013. Why the worlds largest car manufacturer would need to use a BMW diesel engine is beyond me unless it shows they are struggling to get a modern diesel to be clean and efficient while being very driveable.

The above is absolutely correct in my opinion. I have the pleasure of maintaining two Auris 2000 D-4D's both in driving school use and both use the same EGR valve pictured above. I clean them out at every service. This keeps the performance up and the fuel consumption down. I would disagree though on the 15 minute time estimate more like 1 hour in total including shutting the bonnet when done.

Just one additional tip as well. It is possible to lightly grind in the valves and seats on this EGR valve while it is dismantled. It does however involve removing the solenoid valve to access the valve stem. Once removed you can then remove the cap and return spring from the stem and using mole grips or equilvilant you can turn the valve against the seats. Be sure to grind both valves at the same time though as they are designed to seat with equal pressure. This ensures that material removal will be equal on both.

I don't grind the valves on every service, just when I notice that the carbon build-up is getting greater over the service interval. Incidentally I service both cars between 7 and 10 thousand miles. I know this is well below the recommended interval but these cars have to work long days and run at high temperatures while slow manoeuvring etc, so I like to be on the safe side.

All the above is based on my own experience and is to be taken as such. No guarantees it will give the reader similar results is implied.

Steve Swinton ADI

[Steve Swinton]

Thanks for the guide, very helpful. Think I will try this as my fuel consumption is poor. Are any gaskets or seals required and does anyone know the torque settings for the bolts?

Thanks

Gaskets are metal and reusable, I usually turn them over though so as to equalise the wear on them. I don't know the torque setting but keep it light as you are dealing with steel in aluminium.

Steve Swinton ADI

[Aycee]

Cleaned everything but to be honest it wasn't that dirty. I also changed the air filter which was pretty clogged up. Probably never been changed as the car has only done 29, 000 miless.

I'm very disappointed with the fuel consumption. Computer shows an average of 28 mpg which is way below what I expected and that's driving in a rural environment and on motorways, no long spells in traffic. Before this I had a Mercedes C220 which never dropped below 40 mpg and averaged over 50 mpg!

I will keep an eye on it using the brim to brim method as I know that fuel consumption quoted by the computer can be unreliable.

Is there anything else I should check or is it worth getting Toyota to have a look?

Thanks for the comments

[northernlite]

i cleaned my egr yesterday.

it was the second time, first i did 5 weeks ago at a car wash station,because there are vacuum cleaners.

yesterday i was at my grandma, there i had electricity and a garage.

i also did resetting of the ecu,hope to save diesel.

before i always need at least 8 till 9 liters per 100km in the city with my dcat.

PS: such clean,you did your egr,i couldnt. although i used brake cleaner, a last little black layer couldnt be removed.

also it takes for everything round about one hour. 15 minutes are very fast.

[AurisFinn]

cleaning done yesterday. I think it´s the first time for this vehicle. the car has seen some 130000km/81000miles during the last 6 years.

[bonwitco]

Hi Rick

Is this the same for a 2006 D4D (RAV4.3)?

Do I need to buy new gaskets or anything else to do this job? 60k on mine so think it would benefit from a clean!

[SMH13]

Hi

Can I just say, what fantasticinstructions ! I have just followed them and it seems my poorly Rav is okay again !

Just need to get rid of the warning lights now !

A Huge Thank You

[AurisFinn]

Hi

Can I just say, what fantasticinstructions ! I have just followed them and it seems my poorly Rav is okay again !

Just need to get rid of the warning lights now !

A Huge Thank You

If it is engine-light and VSC-light that gives you the trouble try to take battery´s negative terminal off for a few seconds.

[voyager t180]

Well after what I thought was cleaning the EGR last week and seeing no change in the 28mpg I was getting I decide to have another try today.
I followed Aycee's advice.. completely stripped it down and 'lightly'ground in the valves..gave it a 10min soak in carb cleaner, getting everything clean and shiny using a thin 3" hard bristled bottle brush,making sure the valve moved nice and freely.
Fuelled up with 40lts of Vpower and added 200ml of BG244 for good measure.
Then did a 20ml M'way run with cruise set at 65mph.
The result was a non to shabby 36.7avg mpg which considering the 28 previously is fairly acceptable.
I'm hoping to see an improvement on that on a 200ml trip next week.
The lesson I've learnt is do the job right first time.ha
Hope nobodys nodded off ;~) Paulus

[pip_j]

thanks Rick d4d

just cleaned my rav 4 T180 with 61,000

and it was like the pic in your page 1 post blocked,

one small 3mm hole in the middle and the two sides blocked.

two tins of carb cleaner £1 each at the cheap shop and its sparks

went for a quick spin and its so much smother and quicker

just see how it is on the mpg side

thanks for the help

Phil

[Markham90]

Firstly. Brilliant thread, thanks for uploading.

I Can't really tell from the pictures, the first to bolts I need to undo. I want to try this tomorrow. Forgive me for seeming stupid but could you talk through the steps, exactly where the bolts are.

Cheers mate.

[rufnek2kx]

After reading through all 25 pages of this thread last night, finally had the confidence to give this a shot today. Car has done 91k (57 plate) mainly motorway so as you'd expect, soot baked into the valve and surrounding areas. Took a good hour to clean with a flat screwdriver, Holts brake cleaner and some elbow grease and even then there was still a thin layer left. Got fed up and it was getting cold again so decided to call it a day, will probably give it a better clean out after another 10k miles.

Two points I thought I should make:

1- When cleaning the side blowholes in the manifold, after cleaning the area you can see in the pics above, use a thin wire (I used a bit of bicycle brake cable) to clean through the blowholes. When I cleaned the area of the blowholes in the pics posted, I realised there was thick sludge blocking the blowholes further in the manifold which wasn't visible. Poking this with the brake cable pushed it through, clearing the hole.

2- The actual EGR valve is in a closed position when you remove it. It is also worth priming the valve open using a flat screwdriver (you can push a part of it down to open it and then position the screwdriver in such a way to keep it open). Once in an open position, clean out the area where the valve sits. Again here I had a thick layer of soot that wouldn't easily be cleaned had the valve remained shut. (Forgive me for sounding patronising on this one but I completely missed this until my neighbour saw what I was doing and told me).

I didn't take any pics at the time, and haven't annotated Rick D4Ds pics to show what Im talking about as Im currently watching Bayern thump Barcelona, but if anyone needs me to explain anything further just give us a shout.

Thanks again to Rick D4D for posting the pics in this thread and everyone else who has helped make this a relatively straight forward task for an amateur such as myself.

[rufnek2kx]

Firstly. Brilliant thread, thanks for uploading.

I Can't really tell from the pictures, the first to bolts I need to undo. I want to try this tomorrow. Forgive me for seeming stupid but could you talk through the steps, exactly where the bolts are.

Cheers mate.

The first ones I undid were the two on the pipe that are furthest from the EGR valve. They connect the pipe to the engine.

[DOG7]

EGR. I clean mine with forte Diesel engine treatment every service. One thing to remember is when you add the treatment only add the bottle to a quarter of a tank of diesel . I had the same problem at 98,0000 miles eg into limp mode etc., and black smoke . Now the c'locks reading 145.000 and no problems.

[Mistermena]

After reading through all 25 pages of this thread last night, finally had the confidence to give this a shot today. Car has done 91k (57 plate) mainly motorway so as you'd expect, soot baked into the valve and surrounding areas. Took a good hour to clean with a flat screwdriver, Holts brake cleaner and some elbow grease and even then there was still a thin layer left. Got fed up and it was getting cold again so decided to call it a day, will probably give it a better clean out after another 10k miles.

Two points I thought I should make:

1- When cleaning the side blowholes in the manifold, after cleaning the area you can see in the pics above, use a thin wire (I used a bit of bicycle brake cable) to clean through the blowholes. When I cleaned the area of the blowholes in the pics posted, I realised there was thick sludge blocking the blowholes further in the manifold which wasn't visible. Poking this with the brake cable pushed it through, clearing the hole.

2- The actual EGR valve is in a closed position when you remove it. It is also worth priming the valve open using a flat screwdriver (you can push a part of it down to open it and then position the screwdriver in such a way to keep it open). Once in an open position, clean out the area where the valve sits. Again here I had a thick layer of soot that wouldn't easily be cleaned had the valve remained shut. (Forgive me for sounding patronising on this one but I completely missed this until my neighbour saw what I was doing and told me).

I didn't take any pics at the time, and haven't annotated Rick D4Ds pics to show what Im talking about as Im currently watching Bayern thump Barcelona, but if anyone needs me to explain anything further just give us a shout.

Thanks again to Rick D4D for posting the pics in this thread and everyone else who has helped make this a relatively straight forward task for an amateur such as myself.

Some very good points there mate.

This is where fuels like V-Power derv helps to clean the parts that we can't see. BG244 and the Archoil products do a great job of keeping the whole fuel/exhaust system running sweet,

[rufnek2kx]

After reading through all 25 pages of this thread last night, finally had the confidence to give this a shot today. Car has done 91k (57 plate) mainly motorway so as you'd expect, soot baked into the valve and surrounding areas. Took a good hour to clean with a flat screwdriver, Holts brake cleaner and some elbow grease and even then there was still a thin layer left. Got fed up and it was getting cold again so decided to call it a day, will probably give it a better clean out after another 10k miles.

Two points I thought I should make:

1- When cleaning the side blowholes in the manifold, after cleaning the area you can see in the pics above, use a thin wire (I used a bit of bicycle brake cable) to clean through the blowholes. When I cleaned the area of the blowholes in the pics posted, I realised there was thick sludge blocking the blowholes further in the manifold which wasn't visible. Poking this with the brake cable pushed it through, clearing the hole.

2- The actual EGR valve is in a closed position when you remove it. It is also worth priming the valve open using a flat screwdriver (you can push a part of it down to open it and then position the screwdriver in such a way to keep it open). Once in an open position, clean out the area where the valve sits. Again here I had a thick layer of soot that wouldn't easily be cleaned had the valve remained shut. (Forgive me for sounding patronising on this one but I completely missed this until my neighbour saw what I was doing and told me).

I didn't take any pics at the time, and haven't annotated Rick D4Ds pics to show what Im talking about as Im currently watching Bayern thump Barcelona, but if anyone needs me to explain anything further just give us a shout.

Thanks again to Rick D4D for posting the pics in this thread and everyone else who has helped make this a relatively straight forward task for an amateur such as myself.

Some very good points there mate.

This is where fuels like V-Power derv helps to clean the parts that we can't see. BG244 and the Archoil products do a great job of keeping the whole fuel/exhaust system running sweet,

Happy to help. As I said I almost missed the valve point had my neighbour not spotted me, so hopefully it'll help someone else out too. Not used Archoil or BG244 yet but will probably get a can ready to use before the next long trip I do.

After clearing out the EGR, I've notice economy has increased from 420miles to what I expect will be 480-500miles to the tank. Not bad imo. Will be interested to see what difference the BG244/Archoil can make.

[atex]

It's very helpful article about the EGR cleaning. Many thanks to Rick D4D and other TOC users for posting in here!

Just wondered how dirty it is inside the intake manifold. If somebody had possibility to use fibre scope and made pictures/videos inside the manifold before cleaning and after, it would be good to see them here in this post.

Also maybe it is possible to se a drawing/sketch showing a cut view of the manifold. This is just to get better understanding about the internal surfaces of the manifold etc.

Cheers
Atex

[Mistermena]

After reading through all 25 pages of this thread last night, finally had the confidence to give this a shot today. Car has done 91k (57 plate) mainly motorway so as you'd expect, soot baked into the valve and surrounding areas. Took a good hour to clean with a flat screwdriver, Holts brake cleaner and some elbow grease and even then there was still a thin layer left. Got fed up and it was getting cold again so decided to call it a day, will probably give it a better clean out after another 10k miles.

Two points I thought I should make:

1- When cleaning the side blowholes in the manifold, after cleaning the area you can see in the pics above, use a thin wire (I used a bit of bicycle brake cable) to clean through the blowholes. When I cleaned the area of the blowholes in the pics posted, I realised there was thick sludge blocking the blowholes further in the manifold which wasn't visible. Poking this with the brake cable pushed it through, clearing the hole.

2- The actual EGR valve is in a closed position when you remove it. It is also worth priming the valve open using a flat screwdriver (you can push a part of it down to open it and then position the screwdriver in such a way to keep it open). Once in an open position, clean out the area where the valve sits. Again here I had a thick layer of soot that wouldn't easily be cleaned had the valve remained shut. (Forgive me for sounding patronising on this one but I completely missed this until my neighbour saw what I was doing and told me).

I didn't take any pics at the time, and haven't annotated Rick D4Ds pics to show what Im talking about as Im currently watching Bayern thump Barcelona, but if anyone needs me to explain anything further just give us a shout.

Thanks again to Rick D4D for posting the pics in this thread and everyone else who has helped make this a relatively straight forward task for an amateur such as myself.

Some very good points there mate.

This is where fuels like V-Power derv helps to clean the parts that we can't see. BG244 and the Archoil products do a great job of keeping the whole fuel/exhaust system running sweet,

Happy to help. As I said I almost missed the valve point had my neighbour not spotted me, so hopefully it'll help someone else out too. Not used Archoil or BG244 yet but will probably get a can ready to use before the next long trip I do.

After clearing out the EGR, I've notice economy has increased from 420miles to what I expect will be 480-500miles to the tank. Not bad imo. Will be interested to see what difference the BG244/Archoil can make.

Hopefully the BG gear will give you a little more mpg! But best is that you are lubricating the fuel pump and injectors and conditioning the fuel lines as this low sulphur derv doesn't do the pump any favors! A Tunit box will bring up the mph to...

Let us know how you get on