The other day I dropped my car off at a European specialist shop, and while I was there, a technician was working in the engine bay of a Mk7 Golf R, cleaning out carbon deposits off the intake valves.

Carbon buildup on intake valves is part of life for direct-injected engines, but there are things you can do to slow it down.

What an oil catch can does, how it works, and which cars and engines it might benefit.

Q: I have a 2009 VW with gasoline direct inject and a 2.0-liter turbo engine. It recently needed the intake valves cleaned (a very costly job) after just 54,000 miles. I understand many manufacturers ...

For everyone who is interested in what actually goes on during a special intake valve cleaning, here is some more information along with several other detailed photos of the process. Without further ...

Gasoline direct injection, or GDI, is one of the most crucial bits of technology in the modern internal combustion engine. In engines equipped with GDI, highly pressurized gasoline is sprayed directly ...

Valve gunk is nasty stuff that comes from the toxic vapor of steam, oil, gasoline and hydrocarbons circulating around the inside of your engine. A normal process of combustion in any gas powerplant, ...

Gasoline direct injection (DI) engines have been lurking in the shadows of gasoline-burning, internal combustion engine development for decades but are now becoming mainstream. This is all good, as DI ...