Do I Have a Bent Rod?

[matysol]

My 5.7 Volvo had salt water in the cylinders (fresh water cooled engine)and I did not know it and when I went to start it the engine turned about a half crank and stopped. This bent the two starter mounting bolts! After removing the spark plugs and cranking to get the water out I was able to start the engine and it ran great. The next day it started right up so I dont think the manifolds or risers are bad or more water would have leaked into the cylindres right? I did not shut down at high speed. I have a 10 minute ride in a 5 mph zone in my harbor to get to my dock and the engine ran fine all the way in and I secured the boat and went home. How did the salt water get in? A friend told me that if the starter mounting bolts are bent then a connecting rod or two will be bent! Is this true? He also said that when I shut the engine off at the dock it may have gulped the water by misfiring. Any thoughts? Thanks

 

[tommays]

Re: Do I Have a Bent Rod?

if you runing as good as before you may have not have damaged anything<br /> <br />hydro lock like you had comes up here all the time and most motors seam to make it through<br /><br />i would change the motor oil and filter ASAP if water got to the pistons it is in the oil in some amount<br /><br />you did not say how old the motor but i would be concerned about trying to find out why the water got in bad exaust shutter / bad exaust manifold or riser/ just one time bad luck <br /><br />other people may have better ideas what to check<br /><br />tommays<br /><br /> http://www.boatfix.com/merc/Bullet/01/01_13.pdf <br /><br />this is a merc link but gives things to check on water in motor

 

[imported_Mike_M2]

Re: Do I Have a Bent Rod?

Yea. i don't understand either. You say you bent the starter bolts but runs fine. Did you change the bolts? If it runs fine now, why is something wrong? What year is it? Late 90's bigblocks were known for sucking water in after the key's turned off, don't hear much about smallblocks. How did the starter get fixed?

 

[CTD]

Re: Do I Have a Bent Rod?

My 2 Cents. I think it would be pretty unlikely you would bend a rod with the starter motor. If the engine had fired while the starter was cranking maybe you could bend a rod with the force of both. sounds like you are ok. You could have a bad manifold and the valve was closed on the cyl with the bad part the last time you had the engine off so the water didn't go in. I guess its possible that if the engine was ideling to fast when you shut it off it could run on a little and pull some water back in.

 

[matysol]

Re: Do I Have a Bent Rod?

Mike_M2, I changed the bent starter bolts. I found out that they were bent only because I removed the starter thinking that it was bad since it did not crank the engine and I have two good batteries. The engine is 2000. Nothing seems to be wrong now I was just worried. Thanks everyone for your input.