About three weeks ago, I noticed my car wanting to stall out while driving in a really bad rain storm. It was wierd, but the car never shut off and I made it home safely. The next day was a beautiful sunny day and my car was 100% back to normal and has been since yesterday.
Well, yesderday after driving through a good size puddle (couple inches of water), my car completely stalled out. I waited for about 30 minutes for the storm to pass and re-started my car with no problems. I drove for another 8 miles or so and hit the rain storm again and sure enough the car stalled out again. I again waited for the storm to pass (about 30 minutes later) and was able to get the car started again then drove to work with no problems.
Does anyone have any idea what it could be? I think it may be wires or something electrical getting wet because IMO, if it was my AEM V2 CAI sucking up water into the engine, my motor would be f**ked up immediately without re-started capabilities right? Has anyone ever had this problem before? Also, what's wierd is that this just started happening and I live in south florida where it rains a whole damn lot! Any help or guidance would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

 

Oh jeez..... be careful Lex or you could be looking at a 4-6g bill.

Here's what happens with hydrolock on CAI's.

Your engine will stall after you suck up too much water. Normally how you F$%k something up is by turning the car back on and continuing to suck up water. Since water doesn't compress your oil pan might end up with a hole in it (don't ask me how i know). It seems to me if this is just happening with rain then you need to be careful and look into a new intake.

It may indeed be something else. But and engine with a CAI will normally stall before throwing something. Unless you just consume a bucketload of water right away.

This is from a past hydrolock victim.

 

So do you think it was the intake? Im really stunned as to why it's never happened before though since I've had the intake for atleast 4-5 yrs now on the car and I always drive through some serious rain storms down here in FL? Also, what exactly is hyrdolock?

 

Hydrolock (short for either hydraulic lock or hydrostatic lock) is a condition of an internal combustion engine in which an incompressible liquid has been introduced into its cylinder(s), resulting in the immobilization of the engine's pistons (which in return stalls the car). The liquid causing this malfunction is often water, hence the prefix "hydro-". Internal combustion engines must compress air to work efficently and this works because gases can be compressed. Liquids do not compress so if a volume of liquid greater than the volume of the combustion chamber at it's minimum (top of the piston's stroke) enters the combustion chamber then the piston cannot complete it's travel. Either the engine must stop rotating or something must give (in your case the engine simply stopped rotating). The result is often a bent connecting rod or sometimes a cracked cylinder head or block.

If you ran through puddles and the car stalled it is a very big possibility that water entered into the intake. Water entering the intake is not a guarantee that the car will throw something.

 

Interesting..Thanks, So now what if water did get sucked in by the intake. What could I do now to prevent any damage or futher damage if any?

 

There's really not much you can do after the fact. Whatever damage is there has already occurred. When a car stalls due to hydrolock, you can pull the plugs and turn it over to blow the water out, that's about it. Check your oil, see if there's any water in it...other than that, just cross your fingers and hope you didn't bend anything in the engine when it shut off.

 

Ok, I'll go ahead and change the oil, check the filter and remove any water if it has some, check the plugs and see what happens. I hope nothing major occurred but I'll soon find out..Also, hope this isn't a dumb question but if something major did happen to break or bend, wouldn't I know this by now since the car is driving fine? Also, any other tips on what I can do to remove any water from any areas if that's what it is?

 

Hard to say. I know someone who drove a Mercedes through water and it shut off. It restarted without issue, and they drove off. About a month later, a rod failed catastrophically and the car needed a new engine (~60k miles on the odometer). Hard to say with 100% certainty, but it seems likely the hydrolock was a factor.

 

Get a non-CAI intake.

 

How about just the bypass valve that AEM sells for $50? Would that keep water from getting sucked up?