After 140K miles of running perfect my car and I got incredibly unlucky. On the way to school this morning traveling through downtown charleston SC, i had to travel through a nice size puddle that i had traveled through before numerous times without problems. So i drive through it nice and slow like always. Get through the puddle slowly and start to accelerate, then it happens, the most God awful noise i have ever heard from my car. Just one noise, thats all it took. Waited in the rain for assistance shortly for a really nice charleston police officer.

I was then towed to school. The reason for this is because i attend Trident Tech, and i am in the Automotive Tech program and , well this is what we do. Keep in mind i had a good idea what was wrong but couldnt see what the prob was. Once i got her off the tow truck =, which ripped me a new *** on the bill i noticed a huge oil spill on the truck and engine fragments on the bed. I then push the car inside on of the bays, put her up on the lift and get to finally see the damage on the back side. She has about a 3-4 finger hole on the back side (intake side) of #1 cylinder with from what im assuming the connecting rod either being bent or just broken. From what i learned in class rods tend to bend before braking off. no other cylinders broken. Upon further inspection on the ground with valve cover off i found that the valve train was in great shape! Everying looked good. All cams, valves and retainers looked great. There was no burnell present on the cam lobes and all was well. The instructor even mentioned what great shape the head was in.

I pulled the plugs to discover #1 was in the compression stroke, which i figured because the damage was there, or maybe just coinsidence. That plug was dripping and fouled out. Other plugs were fine, however some water..very little was present.

used compressed air nozzle to force some water out, opened intake manifold and shot air down spark plug opening and out comes water....nice huh.

Well, it probably was the Iceman that caused it. Just weird and bad luck i guess. I had traveled through deeper and faster puddles before time after time. Even been through this one many times before, just happen to get unlucky this time.

So granted i need some help. I need to replace the engine. Where should i start? Before everyone starts telling me that nows the time to drop a b18c5 or go LS/vtec im not interested. IM a student, dont have money and i loved my car before and just want it back. Any names of good reputable sources for motors would be appriciated.

Best of all, and this is serious...no one is hurt. Today could have been much much worse. I could have been hurt, someone else could have been hurt or worse....killed. Cars are replaceable....hard, but replaceable. People arnt.

On a final note, im not telling anyone or incourageing you guys and gals to ditch our nice iceman, aEM, or other tru cold air systems. I love them and will do it again. I am just saying, use CAUTION and common since. They are great mods, but also easy killers. Ask me, i 99% of the time never get my car above 65mph and granny shift at around 3500. I baby the hell out of my car and she dies.

Drive well, and keep it safe.

Thanks for the help guys, and some love would help to tonight.

 

that sucks man, sorry to hear about your loss..well look at it this way, ur still here and someone was looking out for you..

 

Sorry to hear it man...I actually hydrolocked my GSR downtown charleston(evil place when it rains) on Aug 27th...still don't have my car back yet, I bent a rod and the insurance left it sitting so long I have lots of rust in my cylinders...Good luck with it all...and good luck finding a new engine...

 

that sux man... I hope everything works out for you and you get your car up and running again!!!...terrible for anyone to go through...

I have a generic cold air intake....but was wondering if a diy icebox would have the possibility to hydrolock??

 

Sorry to hear about your car I would check the classified's if I where you. Alot of good deals, just make sure the seller is legit. You might be able to get a ls-vtec setup for the same price as stock from acura. But if you just want it back to the way it was get one from the factory with the warranty.

 

B20 block !!!!! now's the time.

there is no replacement for displacement!!!

 

bump

 

Did you have collision on your car? If so report it to the insurance company and they'll take care of it...of course they'll probably total it...but hell...it won't be coming out of pocket to fix the engine. My insurance company checked nationaly for a GSR longblock and couldn't find ANYTHING except a 94 longblock w/ 100k miles on it. So I decided to rebuild mine after they totaled it.
Edit: http://www.jdmhondaparts.com had GSR longblocks in stock last month


[Modified by Spyderwebab, 10:32 PM 10/9/2002]

 

anything is possible, but probably safer.

 

Sucks to hear what happened... ... But maybe some good would come of it. When the thieves stole my car and blew the motor, I went w/ an LS/VTEC setup. It was suppose to be cheaper cause parts from my old motor were used. Just a thought though. Fresh rebuilt too. Like new, if not better.

 

**** man sorry to hear that your motor died!

But, can i ask you this, you said that you had previously gone thru this same puddle many times before without any problem. So i'm assuming that it wasnt too deep otherwise you would possibly have taken an alternative route, so i'm asking what was the difference this time? Could it have been, that previously you may have sucked water up a certain amount of the way, but werent accelerating enough to draw it all the way up and had then exited the water before it got up too far and it just fell back out again, seeing as water is heavier than air, and this time you may have accelerated a little too soon, and sucked the water all the way up to the T/b and into the engine?

 

Just went through the same thing, only i purchased the car in that conditon already. Here's what your bottom end is going to look like, or similar to:



And heres what the others looked like:



The cylinder head is 99% likely undamaged. I've done probably 20-25 GSR hydro locks in the past few years, and I've never seen one damaged from hydrolock.

Your best bet is to call your insurance company, they will likely reimburse you for your damages (they cut my brother 5k for his on the block above) if you have proper coverage. If you don't, begin scouring the locals and tell them for your needs. You may find that a LS block is much cheaper than a GSR. For mine, I purchased a used low milage GSR block from a friend for 800 bucks, and rebuilt it with ITR pistons and all new OEM parts for another 650. Good luck.

 

ouch sorry for the bad luck i guess it is time to up grade to a swap!

 

WEll, it could have been a number of things. It could have been the cars speeding past me thrwing waves out. It could have been the acceleratiing out of ther puddle that drew the water up. Who knows really.

 

 

dang sorry to hear, this is exactly why i just bought a generic short ram intake on ebay for. as soon as it gets here the aem is be taken off and replaced with the ebay short ram, just for the winter though. i guess you could call it my beater intake

 

Great that makes me worry because I have the ice box as do you I believe and they stated in the packet you get when you buy the ice box as follows:

The Comptech Icebox has been tested with a vacuum 4 times greater than the engine creates at wide open throttle during peak RPM. At these levels the icebox will not suck up water. You can, however, force water into the airhorn and possibly the engine by the velocity of the wehicle traveling through standing water deep enough to cover the airhorn.

So I don't know.

 

whoa..that scares me...gonna cut my aem cai and make a short ram this winter then!!! thanks for the reality check!!!

 

That is what I do, and I live in cali. AEM HAI mode

How does the comptech avoid sucking water when submerged? It does not look that water resistant.

 

if u have full coverage, will they cover it if u have cold air intake? or should u just throw a stock system on there?

 

Sucks man, I feel for ya, I hope it will never happen to me, and I live here in central FL where it rains all the time, but this is why I am using a short-ram setup, good luck

 

i pulled two rods on my ls motor and busted two holes on my block. Just like you i'm a student w/ no money! i recomend getting a b20b from hondamotoronline.com. they used to be $800 but i think the price actually went down surprisingly! my b20b runs strong. can't wait til i boost it! best of luck and don't let a blown motor kill you! stay strong!

 

Geez, that sucks about your loss man. At least you're in tech school and have a few resources at hand if the insurance won't cover you. For the money that you spend on them, the cold air intakes aren't worth the risk of hydrolocking. Instead of getting a short ram that sucks in hot engine air, why not use the stock box minus the resonator? It will be more effective, and you'll have both more top end as well as low end torque. I am using my stock box and intake arm with a Spoon Sports drop in. Works great, and is safe.

 

That sucks man. Sorry to hear it.

 

that sucks man. just replace the block and send out your old one later for a rebuild when u do have the money.