sucked water into my 3.4 swap now it runs horrible
 

So there we were...in this little puddle that happened to come up to my windshield for a second or two, dipped the nose of my truck in and my handy piece of K&N filter which I hate with a passion sucked a bunch of muddy water into and went into the throttle body and air flow meter. The afm threw a p0170 code, cleaned it, came back, replaced it, now its not throwing any codes, on my scanner (modis) its showing misfires on cylinders 1-3-5 steady but not throwing a check engine light, not enough misfires for the ecm to think its a problem. It runs very bad, starts every time now that the afm is good, but bogs hard going down the road. Truck is 89 yota with 3.4 out of a 95 t-100, new fuel pump, filter, knock sensors, synthetic oil, everything looks good but runs bad. What does water do to these engines? Plugs look fine too. Ran great before the dip in the drink. And yes the air filter is clean now and so is the throttle body. Acts like the exhaust is plugged or something (which it isnt). Any ideas?

You could have done all sorts of damage to the engine. Sand could have gotten into the cylinder walls. Water in the cylinder will bend rods, or throw them through the side of the block if there is enough in there. Did you take out the spark plugs and turn the engine over to flush out the water first?

It never quit or even slowed down, kept running the whole day, it just got sluggish and threw the check engine light, I did not stop in the water, there was only a small bit of mud in the throttle body, most was in the air filter and air flow meter. It did not fill any cylinders, all the plugs are dry and normal looking. No signs of water in the cylinders.

yeah one time i went wheeling with no air filter!!!
22re still ran but never the same.. no its gonna get pulled as a rebuild project!

might wanna hookup even a cheap pvc snorkel it could save your engine!

little puddle up to your windshield? sorry but why do some peope think water doesnt hurt engines??

Clean your o2 sensor connector with some electric parts cleaner. It fixed mine when the same thing happened.

that is a good idea!!!!!!

it only splashed the windshield for a second, after the nose went in it leveled out, I wasnt all the way under water or sitting in the middle of it, I know what water does, ive been in the same hole before, somebody in a truck like my big chevy went out there and dug the hell out of it last week and caught me off guard. I need to find the video of it, if it sank I would have shut her down and cleaned her out before moving on. Im dumb, but not retarded.

Was gonna try that tonight after I get her racked up at the shop, keep the ideas coming guys!!! also gonna check the timing belt and compression. It never hydrolocked or anything awesome like that, I know better than that.

i like your avatar!

I'd pull the sparkplugs and upper intake and flush everything out the plug holes, rotating the engine by hand to get to the next cylinder... and yeah, I'd use water but leave the thing apart for a day or two to dry. Also, washing out the rest of the intake including all the vacuum ports isn't a bad idea either. Dirt can obviously affect the cylinders but even a small amount of dirt can muck with the valves and seats.

Disconnecting and cleaning all the electrical plugs under the hood wouldn't be a bad idea either, particularly those for the distributor, etc.

Does the 95 T-100 5VZFE have a AFM or a MAF? Also did that year have a distributor?

Make sure all the plug wires and caps are dry, especially on cyl 1 3 5.

no dist, has wire type afm, normal 3.4 stuff, stayed the same for most years of 3.4, has three coils on passenger side, 3 wires running to drivers side, gonna pull the belt cover and check for mud in there. Never planned on dunking it, that hole changed a lot in a week...its all part of the fun...if you dont want to break it...leave it in the driveway!!

For the record, it's a distributorless, wasted-spark ignition, and you don't have an AFM... you have a MAF.

Yes sir, you are correct, my bad, typing fast at work, gonna tear the cover off in a few.

All righty...I just got the cover off, got the crank at tdc....the top two pulleys are sitting like \ / instead of straight up and down, time to yank the belt and set it straight....I think it was actually caused by a backfire from the maf being full of mud, not water in the engine.

I put the belt back in, it wasnt very old, runs great now, gonna take it out next saturday, if it grenades, the heck with it, this engine has about 300k on it, been knocking for two years, still has lots of power and dont smoke and I have a spare for when it does, I just wanted an answer for wtf happened, and the K&N is going in the trash, getting an AEM and building a box for it so this wont happen again. Im pretty sure the backfiring caused the belt to jump.

I've heard of the belt slipping from getting wet, like from a leaking water pump. Glad you figured it out. :great: