Engine full of water

retroedaddy

retroedaddy

Infidel
Joined
Apr 7, 2010
Location
Bahama NC
So I parked my car without a hood under a tree for about a month. It's a 66 Chevelle with a SBC. I put two tarps over the motor but somehow it became full of water. I drained it yesterday, literally probably 2 gallons of it, the water was crystal clear and the motor was a fresh rebuild when I parked it. After the clear water came out, globs of nasty oil followed. Any ideas on how to save the motor or is it full pull down time ? I realize I probably only have a day or two at this point if there was ever any chance at all.
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If its stuck...keep squirting marvel mystery oil in the spark plug holes. Let it set a bit, and try turning it back and forth by hand (keep the plugs out of it!). I have had to do this before and it took three days of oiling and trying to turn it by hand before it broke free. Motor ran fine... no smoke. I was lucky!

Other wise put oil in it. Oil the cylinders as above and let it set a bit. And start it. Run til warms up. Drain and refill it like Mike said

Shouldn't be hurt if it didn't set and rust for a long time
 
May want to think about disabling the ignition (pull coil wire) and spin motor over a lot to circulate the oil without stressing it too much right off the bat.
 
strange1 said:
May want to think about disabling the ignition (pull coil wire) and spin motor over a lot to circulate the oil without stressing it too much right off the bat.
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I was going to suggest this, but thought better of it. The engine hasn't been run since the water entered, so there isn't any in the oil galley. I would say to pull the pan and investigate if you want to be real sure, otherwise a flush should get you most of the way there.
 
I wish I knew, I was really really surprised to see all that water pouring out of the engine. I filled the cylinders with Marvel Oil the other day, took off the valve covers and sprayed everything else I could get to down with a generous coating of WD40. I am going to spin it over tonight with the coil disconnected, then spary everything down again and fill it with oil. If all goes well I might start it this weekend, run it for 3 minutes then drain the oil and see how it all looks. I will have an oil gauge hooked up and sitting beside me to make sure it never drops.
 
Make sure you take the plugs out and turn it slowly. Just to be sure there is no water in there, give it an escape route if there is water in the cylinders. I'm guessing you already have since you MM'd the cylinders, but just to be sure.
 
Well I tried to spin it by hand and it was having no part of it. So I worked it counter clockwise, then clockwise with a 24" breaker bar on the harmonic balancer. I finally got it to move an inch counter clockwise, then got two inches clockwise and so on and so forth. It literally probably took an hour of tiny gains like that to get a full turn out of it as it puked rusty water out of the cylinders. My Snap On impact couldn't even turn it over, so as you can imagine, I was skeptical about hooking a battery up to the starter and trying it that way. Once I did though it spun over like a champ, with new oil coming up the lifter rods that wasn't too terrible .I did that off and on for 30 minutes, then changed the oil. Next I put in new plugs, did what I could to the carb and re energized the HEI. I took a video of the first try with everything hooked back up. I was rewarded with strong oil pressure and clean oil coming up to the heads. I eventually got it to idle, good oil pressure, good water temp with clean oil in the pan. I think I beat it, but we will see.I tried to upload the video, but it never shows up
 
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