I put a catch can on my prius at 60k 3 years ago. I'm at 100k now.. 3 years ago my intake ports were quite nasty ...believe it or not.. this time they were alot cleaner..I didn't take pics because I was focused on alot of maintaining. But I remember my intake manifold had quite a bit of wet oil st the bottom at that wet oil was on the inside of the ports... this time it was barely wet. I am impressed.. the egr cooler was pretty plugged after 60k and 40k. It wasn't blocked just plugged took alot of relay purple and carb cleaner to get it pretty clean.
Revisiting the intake manifold, that was my impression too, that it helped. It’s not an on/off switch though, catches some but not all. Oil catch can effectiveness can vary too. and thanks for the EGR condition report. I’ve suspected carbon clogging is not going to stop with oil catch can install. Might help a little though.
I have a baffled version. It wasn't the cheapest nor the most expensive. But it saves that blow by from getting in the intake... to mix with the egr soot. I also upgraded my spark plugs to the hotter plug.
Conclusion...catch can doesn't really help egr cooler from getting plugged... edr cooler cleaning is needed i would say every 60k...don't wait 100k. Catch can does help prevent wet blow bye from entering the intake and prevents condensation from cold start causing knock. That can lead to gasket failure... I recommend one.
I ve been using an OCC about a year. So far, I saw a light-yellowish mixture, water-gas solution in cold days. And today, when I checked it after a 280miles trip right after oil change, found black oil in it ever. Does this refer to a good signal? Meaning it catches carbon going to intake or highway trip cleared up some carbon and got caught by OCC?
You're getting less water in your catch can during warm weather simply because more of the water vapor that's inevitably in blowby gas passes as a vapor to the manifold, vs. condensing to liquid state in the can as it does in cold weather.
