Help - think I might have buggered the engine (drove through a puddle)

[andye30m3]

So popped out to see a customer and whilst heading down one of the local a roads ended up going through a reasonably big puddle, followed a van though and took it slow in first gear, all seamed fine for a few miles and then it started to miss fire.

Had to drive about 10 miles home, still miss firing so took the airfilter box apart to find water in the bottom which obviously wasn't what I wanted to see! beginning to think I may have hydro locked it. Got a friend heading round with a fault code reader to see what it brings up.

has anyone ever hydrolocked a clio and do you know what fault codes it brought up? what the easiest way to confirm the worse?

or is there any other issues people have experienced after driving through big puddles?

 

[Crybert]

I'd be surprised if that's flooded the engine. Did the water come upto the sill?

 

[andye30m3]

don't think so,

I've spoken to my brother in law who's a very good mechanic

his best guess is that water's got into the plug well so keeping fingers crossed.

 

[andye30m3]

I quickly plugged it in this morning before work and it came up with a P0300 fault code, which looks to be ignition related or possibly one or 2 other sensors.

 

[JakeyCUK]

Hey mate, just been linked your thread! We did the same thing lol. I had to replace my AC compressor but just before the job my car started missing with EML flashing. Fault code reader showed P0300, we checked the leads and they were all fine, spark plugs looked fine but after some more digging it looks like injector #2 has died! Hope this helps pal! I thought the onboard diagnostics would have shown this but it never did, make sure you check your injectors before buying anything

 

[Crybert]

That's the beauty of the forum. Maybe your experience can help this guy out

 

[bb55am]

I had similar happen last year and this year after recent floods,
hit a deep puddle and started misfiring, on that occasion it that turned out to be a lambda sensor,
Maybe the lambda was hot and due to the sudden hit of cold water, frazzled it.?
Anyway recently same story, hit puddle, started misfiring, got home dried air filter (quite wet), it didnt go away for a day or two then a bottle of redex and a full tank later it went....

 

[andye30m3]

Thanks for the reply I'll have a look at it. When I took the plenum off to look at the plugs and looked down the manifold there was a clear wash around the injector head in cylinders 1, 2, and 3. But when looking down the furthest from the clutch it looked like the clean area around the injector head was much smaller would this be consistent with the injector failing?

Just come in from checking the plugs all look ok (although pretty old) and all are getting a spark. Now seams to be coming up with a N/A error and sounds like a beatle. I guess this rules out the plugs, leads and coil

 

[TimR26]

I once drove my old Monaco 172 through a stretch of water three foot deep and had no problems so hopefully you get it sorted.

 

[JakeyCUK]

Thanks for the reply I'll have a look at it. When I took the plenum off to look at the plugs and looked down the manifold there was a clear wash around the injector head in cylinders 1, 2, and 3. But when looking down the furthest from the clutch it looked like the clean area around the injector head was much smaller would this be consistent with the injector failing?

Just come in from checking the plugs all look ok (although pretty old) and all are getting a spark. Now seams to be coming up with a N/A error and sounds like a beatle. I guess this rules out the plugs, leads and coil

Quick test for injectors, start the car up and disconnect the power lead from 1 at a time and see if it gets any worse. If it doesn't get any worse then it's a safe bet that injector has failed. Or you take take a reading off each plug.

 

[andye30m3]

Thanks, disconnected one injector at a time and the one furthest from the gearbox made no difference. Just replaced it with one from euro car parts and all seams well, now off for a drive to check all is well


Thanks to all who replied

 

[Goodj]

how deep was that puddle, to fill up your airbox?!?!?!