OK,...to make a long story short - those of you who live on LI know that we got pounded with rain tonight...I stopped at an intersection in a dark area of town, and didn't realize that the intersection was flooded almost a foot deep......and then my car just dies. I tried to crank it over and nothing.......I'm running an Injen CAI and I'm hoping that I didn't suck up a massive amount of water. While I was waiting for AAA to arrive, I tried to crank it again and at first there was no sound at all - but now I can at least hear my starter click and it sounds like it wants to turn-over.......had it towed back to my house and it sounds a little better......I'm gonna let it sit overnight and then take the plugs out and turn it over to blow any water out of the cylinders.....is there anything else I should or can do?.........PLEASE HELP GUYS!...give me some hope here...

 

Wow - first - did you have a bypass valve?

Second - don't ever try to restart an engine that dies out because of water intake. If water actually got into the engine you can hydrolock it and ruin it (if it wasn't already).

You're right to take the plugs out and try to blow the water out. But before you crank it, also take off the plate on top of your intake to see if there's water visible in there. Clean your CAI filter and reoil it. After that, do an oil change. If you get it up and running, check the oil again to make sure there's not more water in it. If there is - change it again.

Then drive it for a good long time to heat it up and steam off any water that's left.

 

I wouldnt have tried to start it. That may cause more damage. I would pull the plugs out first thing then try cranking it over. Then change the oil

 

... and if you did dammage your engine warranty or insurance wont do a thing for you because of that intake. hope your engine is okay.

 

Well I took the top-plate off of the manifold and there was indeed a little water in there - not alot, just some drops here and there......I haven't pulled the plugs out yet b/c I've lost the allen wrench needed to loosen the coil packs and now I'm waiting for my buddy to get over here with his tools........I did some research on other forums, however, and have read from moderators that unless your motor was spinning at like 6k RPM's when it sucked in the water then you shouldn't really worry too much about bent rods or valves, and the motor should crank once the water has been blown out with the plugs removed and the oil changed....I was just over idle seeing as though I was coming off a dead stop and thats when it died........more to come later this afternoon...

 

RPM doesnt matter. Water DOES NOT compress. If there was enough to fill the cylinder and cause the motor to stall there was enough to do damage. Hopefully it didnt in your case

 

I guess I got lucky!...I went ahead and changed the oil - when I first loosened the drain plug water started dripping out, and I expected to find water in the crankcase.

So I waited and waited for oil only and finally I just removed the plug completely and a stream of water poured out - probably almost a 1/2 gallon!...At this point I was quite worried..I then poured 3 quarts of oil and a bottle of Marvel Mystery Oil into the engine and allowed all of that to drain out as well.

Next I added 5 quarts of Mobil 1, another bottle of Marvel, and a new oil filter. My buddy finally got here with his hex keys, got the plugs out - and it seems that only cylinders 4, 5, and 6 had the majority of water in them. I turned it over and alot of water got forced out of those cylinders - it shot out about 20 feet. So I continued cranking it intermittintly until only fuel vapor was being forced out of the cylinders.

The plugs were the original NGK's and they looked pretty bad so I replaced them with new Bosch Platinum+4's, and then reinstalled the coil packs.

Reoiled the air filter that I had drying overnight in the house and reinstalled that.

And the moment of truth - I turned it over, about 5 seconds later she fired rite up! There was some white smoke which I'm sure was only vapor from the remaining water that was in the cylinders and crankcase. It was gone after about 5 minutes of idleing.

No knocks, pings, unusual sounds, or oil leaks. Everything looks and sounds normal. Like I said I suppose I just got really lucky.

I hope that this info helps anyone who by some misfortune ever finds themselves in this situation

 

glad to see everything worked out for u....the same thing happened to one of my boys and he bent piston rods

 

Wow, great news!! You are one lucky TL owner!!

 

Update: Drove her about 50 miles since the incident/repair and she's still running great!....I'm going to do another oil change tomorrow just be on the safe side and also do a compression check in each cylinder.

 

that's some good news and i'm glad to see you're taking some preventive measures there. i'll compression test my engine when school's over since i feel my engine is considerable weaker than before.