Help...stalled motor in a flood

[RTZ]

I was unfortunate to suck up water thru the exhaust in a flood. The motor starts up so it didn't hydrolock on me.

The plugs where dry when I took them out, and I was able to replace 5 out of the 6 spark plugs. I have no garage and tried repairing the car in the rain...so give me a break lol.

The truck starts but it sputters and is smoking white badly....then dies. Check engine light turns on every now and then. It seems to be running rich.

I am assuming that my o2 sensor needs to be replaced? Any other ideas?

 

[IZwack]

If you're absolutely positive that theres no more water in the engine, then it just sounds like the smoke is from water in the exhaust (muffler, resonator, pipes).

Again, if you're absolutely positive that the engine is free of water (did you replace the oil), then you should be able to start truck the truck up and keep it alive by the gas pedal until all of the water is gone from the exhaust.

 

[RTZ]

I have yet to replace the oil. Will that cause the sputtering and smoking? The truck seems to be running on less than 6 cylinders since it revs sluggishly when you give it gas.

What happens if I try to keep the motor running if there is water in the engine? I assume it will lock up the motor right?

I'd like to give another shot at just trying to run the truck until the water dissappears...and it could save me a trip to the local mechanic.

 

[IZwack]

Before you start the truck again, change the oil. Even if its the cheapest non-synthetic brand you can find, thats better than having water in the system.

 

[RTZ]

I'll do that this afternoon after work...atleast I'll be under the truck and out of the rain this time haha!

Thanks for the help.

 

[marragtop]

IF it's still not running right, I suggest doing a compression check.

 

[RTZ]

I got the truck running better, but a vacuum check valve seems to be in need of replacement since it popped off the hose attached to it.

The smoke was definitely water. I let the motor run till the smoke was gone.

Hopefully the truck will be up and running soon without any significant damage.

 

[mikeinri]

You should also change the tranny and diff fluids, they have breather tubes that are fairly low to the ground. I don't know how high the water was, so this may just be a precaution.

Mike

 

[rustbucketMI]

Me and my buddies decided that it would be fun to run our trucks thru a big puddle in a locial parking lot. This puddle was about a foot and a half deep for most of it. Me having no lift made it thru but got water in the intake. It stalled but i was able to get it back started. I was having similiar problems with the white smoke and slugishness.

Changing the oil, air filter, and letting the engine run without and air intake system (open throttle body) got a lot more air in the engine and after a while all the water was cleared out.

If it sat in the water for a while you might have some rust issues as well as the breather hoses. If the water even touched your hubs, which im assuming it did because it got into the exhaust, then you are going to want to take off the wheels and inspect the greese in the bearings. If any water at all gets in there then you will start to burn greese. If the water touched the hubs at all i recomend cleaning out the hubs completely, yes this means repacking both bearings, replacing the rear greese seal, and completely regreesing all the components. All that, depending on how well you clean the components, can take anywhere from 45min per wheel to all day to get everything perfectly clean.

Those engines are tough to kill so you are probably fine. As indicated before the engine is probably the least of your problems