Saving a flood damaged engine and tranny

[darkhawk]

Anybody have any ideas what to with water flooded engines and tranny's.  My brother in law and I have to figure out how to try and save 20 engines and trannys that are flooded with water.  They are all in cars.  We know they will need to be rebuilt before use but what can we do in the meantime. 

Here is what we've come up with:

For Engines, Drain coolant and oil from each engine, fill with new oil and coolant and shoot oil in the plug holes. Manually turn over engine.

For trannys, drop pan, drain and fill with new fluid and manually rotate.

Anybody have any other ideas?  We are just trying to minimize damage since some of these units may not be rebuilt for years.  On the good side they weren't flooded with sewage just river water that was really high with snow melting runoff.

[426HEMI]

Get the water out as fast as possible.  I really think I would just about pull the heads but that is up to you dont crank them for sure or pistons and rods will be damaged. I would pull the valve covers at least to help get the water out.  After working on several of them myself it was best to pull the engines apart to get all of the water out.  Were the completely under water?  If so it is hard to get all of the water out. 

[darkhawk]

Yep, completely submerged.  Thought about overfilling with oil.  I don't want to get the water out until we can put something else in to keep it from rusting.

[426HEMI]

If you are going to do that I would use trany fluid to do that with.  Just my  .  I would drain the water out then put the oil in.  The tranny fluid would go where engine oil would not also.  And it would not hurt anything either.

[darkhawk]

A buddy of mine suggested doing that with diesel.  Not sure about that. 

When you say it would go where oil doesn't go what do you mean?  I'm not that knowledgeable in engines and trannys.  Are you referring to the heads and cylinders?

[426HEMI]

Tranny oil goes more places than the oil will is what I am saying.  If you are not pulling the heads I would fill each cylinder with tranny fluid also.  I think I would pull the heads to get all of the water out of there.  Water will go by rings and rust the cylinders have seen that several times.  Been trying to figure out how to heat the engines up easily but can not think of anything simple to do which would get the water out also.  On the transmissions I would drain them also and put new fluid back in.  After you get the engines running and the trans working I would change the oil pretty soon after you get them running to get the water all out.  Make sure they are hot when you drain the oil again. 

[Bluemonster71RT]

We have had flooder cars at work and if your going to shelf them then they must be pickeled.  We have used both trans fluid and kerocene (sp).  Only one engine came back because it locked up after a few weeks because the guy didn't want to change the bearings. I suppose the most important thing is not to let the rings rust to the bore.

[darkhawk]

I suppose the most important thing is not to let the rings rust to the bore.

That is exactly what we are trying to do.  Most of these engines are mopars, 440's, 383's, 318 and some /6.

[JH27N0B]

I used to know a guy who bought a nice boat that was recovered after sinking.  He was able to save the engines, I believe he did multiple oil changes, then ran it, then changed the oil again, went through that cycle a few times and it worked, he never had any trouble with his engines afterwards.
If you know any boat repair shops or even snowmobile shops you might talk to them for advice, boats and snowmobiles get submerged on a regular basis and shops that deal with them have most certainly dealt with that issue before.

[willard]

W had such problems with offroadcars which sometimes just sank in a river or lake. We were even able to start a drowned car within 30 minutes (remove plugs, valve cover, oil pan) but this was 1970 russian 4 cyl motor
Th bigest concern was always not water but the sediments and mud that was forced into engine with water. In fact a complete disassembly was the only cure.

[lemming303]

Diesel won't work because water can mix with it. We use stuff at work called Diesel 911 for our equipment, it bonds with water somehow and allows it to burn off in the exhaust. I don't know if that will help but it's something else you can use to try and clean it, although I don't know if it will work on gas.

[darkhawk]

Great idea on looking at the boats.  I found this  http://www.boatus.com/hurricanes/pickle.asp

[tactransman]

The transmissions will be no good unless you take them all apart and get the water out. the water will be in places that you cannot get it out and it will ruin the machined surfaces. I have taken ALOT of cores apart that had water in them at one time. 

[426HEMI]

The transmissions will be no good unless you take them all apart and get the water out. the water will be in places that you cannot get it out and it will ruin the machined surfaces. I have taken ALOT of cores apart that had water in them at one time. 

I agree with that with transmissions seen a lot of damage because of water seems the things will rust really fast in the transmissions.

[Aussie Challenger]

The transmissions will be no good unless you take them all apart and get the water out. the water will be in places that you cannot get it out and it will ruin the machined surfaces. I have taken ALOT of cores apart that had water in them at one time. 

     Back in the early '70's fraud Australia had a radiator/heat exchanger problem and filled up a lot of FMX trans with coolant, being the cheap company they are they only flushed the trans, fitted reco'd radiators ( these were new cars too ) and sold them, everyone came back burnt out. We had at least 30 through our workshop.

  The engines will need the rocker covers removed, oil drained, flushing, and a good run, flush again at least once more to remove water from around pistons. Personally I would then remove the sumps if the motors are to be moth balled and remove the rest of the sludge.