Need advice

[SHOdude03]

Well, about 2 months during an engine swap I had the hood off, the new engine in, and I left with some friends for a while. During which time it rained like ****. I didn't have the intake on at the time so I would imagine atleast some water got into the intake. At the time I figured I would deal with it later. Well now its December and its cold outside, and when I look down in the intake I can see a little bit of ice.

I would imagine the potential damage I could cause if I tried to start the engine like this would be pretty bad? So does anyone know how I could get the ice out of there safely? I was thinking possibly using a propane hand torch to melt the ice, but I don't know if thats safe for the engine? Only other alternative would be to make use of a friends garage for a day or two, but its not heated so I would have to use a propane space heater, which costs about 20$ for 4 or 5 hours of heat. I would rather not spend the money on a days worth of heat but if thats what I have to do I'll do it I guess. Just wanted your guys opinion/advice.

 

[CheckerSHO]

Personally, what i'd do in this situation, is take all the spark plugs out, find a way to melt the ice, then turn the motor over. should squirt the water out the spark plug holes. This is also the only way i can think of to get the water out of the cylinders that the intake valves happen to be open on and the water went straight into thumb

 

[SHOtimer]

Well, first of all it was not a wise choice to leave an open engine and engine bay electronics so openly exposed to the elements like that. I don't know how to get that ice out. But, you might have a more serious issue. If one of the intake valves was open allowing rain water into the combustion chamber you could possible have internal rust on the cylinder walls, which is not good at all. That is just a thought that came to mind.
Doug

 

[silversho89]

Depending on how much water got down in there, make sure you check for cracks too. B/C as you know water expands when it freezes. BTW, make sure you cover up any of your future projects.

 

[shojuan]

silversho89:
Depending on how much water got down in there, make sure you check for cracks too. B/C as you know water expands when it freezes. BTW, make sure you cover up any of your future projects.

Since it was open the ice had a place to expand. There would be no cracks.

Yes you might have some rust on the cylinder walls. About the only thing you can do about it is let the rings scape it off. I would follow CheckerSHO's advice. Make sure all that ice is melted. Maybe spray some kind of lubricate through the spark plug holes to coat the walls (again, cranking with the spark plugs out to force out the excess). I don't know if that would make any difference or not. Just something to do if the motor sounds really bad when you're cranking it dry.

 

[91taurisho]

shojuan:

silversho89:
Depending on how much water got down in there, make sure you check for cracks too. B/C as you know water expands when it freezes. BTW, make sure you cover up any of your future projects.

Since it was open the ice had a place to expand. There would be no cracks.

Yes you might have some rust on the cylinder walls. About the only thing you can do about it is let the rings scape it off. I would follow CheckerSHO's advice. Make sure all that ice is melted. Maybe spray some kind of lubricate through the spark plug holes to coat the walls (again, cranking with the spark plugs out to force out the excess). I don't know if that would make any difference or not. Just something to do if the motor sounds really bad when you're cranking it dry.

Also once you turn it over and get all the excess that you can, you should take a vacuum pump and suck it as dry as possible! That will get a little more out. Once you do this you should start it after a while. Plan on replacing your spark plugs again pretty soon(not neccessarily) because the water that you did miss might(keyword: might) foul them.

Good luck!

 

[AutoSHO]

Rust on the cylinder walls is bad juju. Spray a bunch of WD-40 down the open ports and pull the plugs and spray a bunch more down in there.