How To: Throttle body cleaning 2005+ V6

Now that was a nasty looking one. Looks much better after that cleaning!

 

Did mine last week as part of the big 60K maintenance plan.

 

Ok just tackled this job. Followed the OPs directions to the T. Total time was about 2 hours, with 30 minutes devoted to cleaning up the driveway. Went through an entire can of throttle body cleaner. What an abomination! Holy shit was it dirty. No wonder it felt sluggish. Getting ready to take it out now and run it good. Did plugs as well is also why it took so long. Started right up. No high idle, no smoke, nothing. Good times folks. OP the next round is on me! Cheers.

 

Well after 211,200 miles I finally did it and wow what difference. I have no pictures but it look like everyone else before and after shots. Thanks OP for your easy instructions.

 

I cleaned the throttle body today and took the mas sensor out and cleaned it as well. I'm assuming it was the 1st time it had been done and was about as dirty as I expected. The truck may be responding to quick accelerations a little better but it's probably in my head.

The front


The back


Opened up

 

sub cant wait to read through this later

 

Just finished this, took 30-45 minutes.
I took the MAF out of the housing and gave it a spray down. I didn't spray though the housing.

Throttle body has 74,500 on it and surprisingly was not that dirty compared to some of the photos. I run regular gas as well.

I didn't removed it from the truck, just unbolted it and cleaned front and back. I wasn't sure how much if any coolant I would lose, and never read how you all dealt with that portion of the project. Being this easy I might remove it all the way if someone reports back.

High idle- had it around 15-1700 as others reported. Truck coughed a little on start up. Let it run about 10 minutes drove out the road and noticed the idle would jump to around 2 when I let of the gas or let off the clutch.

Parked the truck and started about 10 minutes later. No high idle, matter of fact the idle dropped to around 5-6. Maybe from cleaning? Short drive I did I seemed to notice a difference.

Easy project guys and gals, do it if you have any milage on your ride!

 

Good write up. When I bought my 2012, it had a K&N already installed that was definitely over-oiled. I cleaned that up but never got around to the MAF cleaning. I always felt like my mileage and acceleration was a bit off, but I didn't buy a truck for gas mileage so I never thought a lot about it. Well, I cleaned the MAF yesterday and it was coated in brown oily junk. Now my truck idles a bit smoother/lower, the engine heats up quicker, and I don't feel like I struggle going up a hill off speed anymore. It may be all in my head but I feel like I should have done this a long time ago (in fact I know I should have, I just never got around to it between work and parenting and all).

 

Good to hear it helped.

 

You are welcome. I bet it drives like a new truck!

 

Mine was pretty cruddy. I've had the truck for almost a year so I can't say if this was done before. The previous owner kept up with the service faithfully according to the records I have, but I don't see this being done before. I just took her on a test run and can't believe how smooth the acceleration and idle are now, big difference. My local stealership wanted 90 bucks to do this and I'm sure it would not have been cleaned to this degree.
One lesson learned is not too use the Fram air filter, from here out strictly OEM. The Fram was a bear to get the fit right. Thanks OP for this, you saved me some much needed coin. Sorry for no after pictures, I was racing the rain.

 

Just took mine off for the first time after 160 thousand of oiled filters. There wasn't a ton of "gunk" but there was a layer of carbon that needed to be scrubbed heavily. I didn't think it was going to be a huge difference because I was in visioning sludgy stuff, but after looking at your guys' before and after shots I realized how bad mine was. It cleaned it out so much it idled warm at 2k RPMs. After an ECU reset tphrottle response has improved ten fold. Like a whole new truck. Thanks for such a good write up! Huge help!

 

Gonna do this job in a few weeks and I'm researching/scouring threads. Thanks for the write up, and as previously mentioned, love the photoshop annotations with those big red arrows! Good stuff.

 

At the dealership, they wanted $86 to clean the TB, thanks for instructions and savings

 

Dealer was probably gonna dump in a can of BG 44 and call it a day. If you followed the directions here you not only saved money but you got a better cleaning also. I plan on doing mine every time I change the air filter.

 

Been lookin at this thread for years. Had time yesterday to do TB at 55k miles. Wow it's pretty gunked up. I'll be doing this every 30k from now on. Considerable difference in throttle response and smoothness. Great write up OP.

 

Does anyone have the part number for the bolt that holds the MAF box to the engine?
I snapped one of the bolt heads off trying to re-install

thanks

 

Thanks for the write up. Hit 60K miles this month, and decided to tackle this. I've been following the maintenance threads since the free oil changes ended from the dealership. Did it all this weekend, oil, diffs, plugs, (dealership did brake fluid), and TB/MAF cleaning. I think I will clean the MAF during oil changes from now on, and the TB every other oil change. Literally takes 30 min. You can purchase a MAF cleaner, and TB cleaner from Walmart for $7. If you waited until 120K miles to do this then buy another TB cleaner too. I used almost all of the TB cleaner at 60K miles. Spray the MAF cleaner liberally, and it's removal is simple. watch out for the electrical connectors. Which brings up a question, anyone use dielectric grease on any of the electrical connectors? I've seen some videos of people doing that.



I had already sprayed it a few times before I remembered to take a photo. It was dirtier, but around the hinges is where I made my money cleaning.

 

Looks good! I took my rig to the dealership today to have the diff gear oil swapped out, I messed up my back and couldn't get under the truck Anyway the service writer came out with their recommended service, including a cleaning the MAF and throttle body that I already did. They wanted to charge me 95 bucks! Most of what the recommended I already did lol.

 

They did the same to me. I specifically remember torqueing the front diff to it's specified torque as per the guide provided on here. But when I went to take it off it felt like it had 200 lbs. Rather than really mess it up I just opted to pay $85 for them to remove the stuck bolt and get me a new one. But really? $85 for a new plug, and less than 2 quarts of gear oil? Probably took him all of 20 min. Then they offered the induction service for $200. Made it sound all sexy. Going to have to branch out and try my brake lines eventually, and the transmission fluid.