Under hood cleaning: Hand wash or spray?

Trying to decide the best way to do this. There's a lot of electronics under the hood of this car, so I'm not sure an engine cleaner and spraying is safe. Get a lot of spots with those cleaners too. Sponge and water will take a very long time though. I'd like to eventually get this thing as detailed as possible without pulling the engine, but for now I just need to get it generally cleaned up good to start with. Just a bit of rust on the upper rad hose where it connects to the pipe that goes to the thermostat. May pull that and paint it when I do the hoses and thermo.

So, spray or sponge?

I pulled each individual piece, degreased em, washed em nice, then painted em and put em back on, andn ow I just give it a little hand wash every week. (people kept buggin me about my dirty engine, )

Anyways, just cover up the elctronics, spray it down with soapy water, then use a wet cloth and wipe over all the dirty parts, and let it dry in the sun. When it is dry, go back and look for dirty parts and wash em by hand again

I think it's CD2 that makes a engine cleaning/detailing kit available in most auto parts stores. It comes in a box with two cans. The cleaner works well, but more importantly the detailer gets rid of those white spots by making black parts look totally black, and gets everything shiny where you spray it.

Thanks guys, and I'll have to look for that kit.