Another EGR blockoff question

[OzzmosisDSM]

I was reading up on the egr blockoff idea and in a couple of posts I read that some people said blocking off the egr valve can help cure some idle problems. I want to try to block this off just to see if it helps. I have some ceramic gasket material that I got from autozone a while back to make a new gasket for my n/t header. Can I use this material to create the blockoff plate? I know that I could just use a soda can but some people have said that over time this can blow through. The ceramic gasket material seems pretty strong and has held up just fine as my header gasket. Plus, when the emissions nazis look at my car every year it will look just like another gasket, not a blockoff plate. Will this material work?

On a side note, if the egr valve does not affect idle in any way, shape or form, let me know and I'll keep searching for my idle problem. Thanks.

 

[chris90gsx]

sounds like the ceramic material will work just fine. how thick is it? another cheap alternative is to find a 1.8 eclipse DL in a local junkyard and remove the factory block off plate that is installed on those motors. The intake manifold was casted with the egr valve mounting point but blocked off with a thick metal plate on those 1.8L motors since they did not run with an egr valve.

To answer your idle question, yes the EGR valve, if it has gone bad, can effect your idle. I blocked mine off, not on the premise of eliminating a source of idle problems, but because it is recirculating hot exhaust gases into the intake manifold where you want cool, dense air to be dumped into the cumbustion chambers. On top of that, the pcv opens up when crankcase pressure builds up and contaminates the manifold with oil deposits. Now you have hot exhaust gases basically caking the oil to your manifold. Not good for flow and performance but great for emissions This is why I ran the pcv and valve cover breather line to a catch can as well. Purely preference but not a bad idea at all. Hope this helps.

By the way, if you are still having idle problems check out http://www.dsm.org/how-tos/tttt/tttt3.html

For more info on EGR block off check out www.vfaq.com under the engine section.

 

[OzzmosisDSM]

Not exactly sure how thick the material is but it's about as thick as 3-4 flatened soda cans put together. I think the valve may be bad, it was blocked off when I bought the car a few months ago but I took out the blockoff plate and tossed it for emmisions purposes.

When I had the valve off I could see the amount of gunk that had built up previous to putting the block off plate in, and let me say it was pretty nasty. What you said about the PCV valve dumping oil in the intake and then the egr valve gunking it up makes sense. I think I may do the PCV thing too, although I think I would have to put it back to stock to pass emissions. Anyway thanks for the input, I'll check out that link if I still have idle issues afterwards.

 

[OzzmosisDSM]

One more question. I'm made another blockoff plate for the EGR valve but I want to know if I can still leave the vac hose plugged into it even with the valve blocked? I want it to still look like it's hooked up and working so I can pass the visual emmisions test each year.