i want to clean the engine out of my golf up like new, its caked in grease and oil at the moment and is going to need some heavy duty stuff to get it mint again. can anyone point me in the right direction?

Try Megs Super Degreaser it can also be diluted.

Auto Glym Engine and machine cleaner is also very good and then finish the plastics off with Auto Glym Vinyl and rubber care.

Take care not to get water were you dont want. A roll of cling film helps protect delicate parts and induction filters ect.

Gunk also works pretty effectively on hard built up grime, but I think all of the options will need a bit of elbow grease if it's been baked onto the engine for a while.

Second vote for Gunk (3rd if I can vote a marine engineer friend by proxy).

Yup! It's Gunk for me every time - it's been around for ages. 'If it ain't broke, don't fix it!'

i guess gunk it is then for the first try

i looked at oxalic acid for rust remover, its supposed to be good stuff.

for the sump i used a 7" grinder with a wire wheel and it come out spangly ready to be sprayed! the pictures will be up in the projects forum in a minute

that is one of the beautifully ironic things about vw's, the reason they dont go rusty is because the engine leaks like a sieve and covers it all in nice oil

thats just about bang on.

the engine on this was caked in it, well it still is for now.

even all over the top on the inlet manifold i couldn't understand that and the head gasket had gone badly and oil was running down the back of the block constantly.

just hope it dont leak that when its back together and running

pictures are in the projects section

I have found nothing as good as trike (trichloroethylene) however as i believe it is banned and for pretty good reasons Gunk would also get my vote

Apart from being very toxic, trike can disolve most things oil-based, like plastics for example!

i guess gunk it is then for the first try

i looked at oxalic acid for rust remover, its supposed to be good stuff.

for the sump i used a 7" grinder with a wire wheel and it come out spangly ready to be sprayed! the pictures will be up in the projects forum in a minute

For rust removal go onto detailing world and have a chat with the guys from bilt hamber.

Kurust is really good, but the BH stuff is the mutts nuts for getting into hard to reach places and long term correction of non trivially sized rust spots.

FWIW with the gunk, don't do it over a tarmac drive or you will get a nice large soft bit.

I thought Kurust converted iron oxide from the unstable crumbly form you normally get to a stable form?

You get stable compounds that are no longer porus with kurust, which is usually what you want for most car parts.

As I said the Bilt Hamber stuff is excellent for actually removing the stuff and taking it back to metal to be prepared and protected by other products (they do a range of these too)