We had a VW LT35 recovered today - flood damage. The driver said that the van just stopped, and that the water was at headlamp (air intake) level.
Apparently he was able to move the van from the flood water by using the starter motor whilst in gear. Someone offered him a tow start, and eventually the rear wheels locked.
The engine is now 'solid' and in the process of being stripped down.
My best guess so far is that the initial flood of water into the air filter totally blocked it, causing the engine to stall through lack of air, and that subsequent attempts to move and restart it have caused terminal damage. It might be worth bearing this in mind if you encounter floods.
{originally posted in Tech Matters, but has now become more of a general discussion, so moved across - DD}
|
i assume you are self insuring on your fleet
if these people stopped and thought before driving through water that these vehicles were never designed for then maybe the salvage yards across the country wouldnt be bulging with sewage affected vehicles that people thought would make it through the floods,maybe if they personally had to pay for the damage rather than the insurance companies then they might think twice with their gucci trainers and failex watches
i hate to think how much motor reinsurance is going to cost us in the next 12 months
just a personal observation obviously the names have been changed to protect the guilty
|
|
A family friend's husband managed to start their Laguna Mk1 diesel after she abandoned it in Sheffield. Water had covered it completely but after a couple of turns it fired up.
|
>>A family friend's husband managed to start their Laguna Mk1 diesel after she abandoned it in
>>Sheffield. Water had covered it completely but after a couple of turns it fired up.
Yes, if the vehicle wasn't running at the time it got submerged them most of them will fire back up once the water has drained away. What kills them off (insurance wise) is the damage done by the floodwater to the interior/electrics/brakes etc.
|
|
|
A family friend's husband managed to start their Laguna Mk1 diesel after she abandoned it in Sheffield. Water had covered it completely but after a couple of turns it fired up.
Amazing! BR legend has it that Laguna electrics are dodgy enough without any aqueous assistance.
|
|
|
|
|
One fleet manager gave any driver he considered responsible for any damage a Reliant for the next six months!!
|
I've done it to a Citreon ZX TD a few years ago.
The resultant damage included
Bent Crankshaft and con rods
Turbo
Alternator
Brakes
Exhaust
and numerous other bits that I've forgotten. Its an expensive mistake to make and diesels are more vulnerable due to their higher compression ratio.
--
I read often, only post occasionally
|
|
|
|
>i hate to think how much motor reinsurance is going to cost us in the next 12 months
Is engine damage caused by water ingestion actually covered by insurance?
It sure isn't an accident.
Kevin...
|
as the dog himself says
oh yerrs
tinyurl.com/2z4bmy
be alert ..........cos im not payin for these iduits;-)
|
|
|
|
Isn't driving into a flood just as avoidable as driving into the car in front as long as you are paying attention? Why shouldn't your insurance pay if it is accidental?
|
thats my point cm it is in the main avoidable, if it is in error fair does, but all these cars with locked engines are driver error or really dont care error,i pay for my insurance and thats what it is, insurance ,but i know for a fact even with my good record i will be penalised for the morons come renewal,with the backing of gordon brown and his chronies obviously due to this wet fiscal year
floods gone, reporting from a wet but now non flooded yorkshire.
|
If the engine was still capable of being turned on the starter motor after it had run into the flood, then at that point it was undamaged.
The damage was done by persistently turning over a flooded engine to the point where hydraulic locking destroyed it. I hope the insurance company refuses to pay up for deliberate self-inflicted damage.
|
|
|
Locally, cars have been damaged by flood water parked, with flood warnings out, slow water level rises, but no attempt to move them to high ground 1/4 mile away.
Almost as though it doesnt matter, or that the concept of high ground as a solution for a £12,000 *movable* asset does not exist.
|
|
You could be driving through some perfectly passable large puddle only to be swamped by a larger vehicle coming the other way - we've seen that on TV plenty of times in the last few days.
|
|
Why on earth some normally minded person sees a Discovery up to it's windows left in the middle of the water but the normal saloon car driver continues to drive through the same water beggers belief. The insurance companies are going to need a common policy to deal with all the lock engined and burnt out ECU's and the like. Regards Peter
|
|
There was a photo in the paper. Someone had turned his vehicle in to a submarine, right next to the water marker which showed the water at the 6 foot mark. How stupid do you have to be? The whole point of car insurance is to cover mistakes, even negligence, but there has to be a line drawn somewhere.
|
As Cliff pope says, the initial swamping forced water into the air filter housing, stalling the engine, the damage was done by trying to restart it. I suppose the driver did what he thought was best at the time.
Bell Boy mentioned the insurance side of things, as far as I know, the job is covered by company insurance, but the driver / hirer is responsible for the first £1000.
|
|
|
|
Here in flood hit Gloucester there are STILL muppets who think their cars are also boats. Presumably the same people who cleared the shelves of bottled water in Tescos within an hour of the water stopping coming from our taps.
I was in London last Friday and watched a guy in a very in 56 reg Merc plough into a puddle under a railway bridge and grind to a halt. That is going to cost someone (probably not him) a LOT of money ; o )
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
on last nights evening news from tewsksbury a police transit van drove into the floods all lights blazing, 20 meters in it stalls and 5 burly coppers get out and push it, then cameras redirect. noway would a self employed owner driver be so stupid,. i like to see the cost of repair taken from his wages.
|
That video of the Police Transit van was a bit of a con - it had occurred in flooding two or three weeks back and was/is featured on YouTube.
Those that filmed it captured a number of other similar incidents at the same spot.
See:
www.youtube.com/watch?v=MvdpYgX4f7Q (posted June 25th)
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
What's for you won't pass you by
|
It boggles me why people even attempt it :(
You'd think they already faced a raft of problems without self-inflicting the financial strain of increased insurance premiums.
|
Hindsight is a wonderfull thing.
The alternative headline could have been - "Old lady washed away in floods because Police wouldn't drive through puddle"
|
Instead it's "Old lady washed away in floods because Police drove into a puddle"!
|
Complete prats. The water wasn't very deep, for a van, but the driver made it so by creating that enormous bow wave.
Aren't they supposed to stop and do a Health & Safety risk analysis before spoiling their shiny toecaps?
|
I can just see the autotrader adverts now:-
Wizbang 3.0 Turbo, 2003, One Lady Owner, Non-Smoker, E/W, C/L, A/C Never Flooded.
Anyone want to take a stab at how many cars will be written off/damaged by these floods????
Would you buy a car from the P J Nicholls dealership in Evesham that had a lot of coverage on the news?? It was right on the water front......
|
OK OK I know I'm going to get some stick for this, but.... I've just pink fluffy diced my car.
Stuck on top of a small bridge watching the water rise in both directions I had no choice but to drive through it.. one 330d without an aqualung!
so is there anyone here as i HAD to drive it through that knows the damage that has gone on in there? it doesnt sound heallthy....
what should i expect to see from the garage?
Cheers
~g
|
Stuck on top of a small bridge watching the water rise in both directions I had no choice but to drive through it.. one 330d without an aqualung!
Couldn't you have just left the thing there and waded over, recovering it later?
what should i expect to see from the garage?
If it went "brm brm clunk halt" a big fat bill.
|
{some comments removed - DD}
I'd have pushed it if possible or left it and claimed on the insurance.
|
I'd have pushed it if possible or left it and claimed on the insurance.
Hang on a minute - he got *onto* the bridge - I can't imagine he stayed there for 1/2 an hour watching the waters swell to lap at his tyres - so why not reverse back out the way he came? Come to that, might reversing through such a flood be better than going through forwards? Erm...
|
|
~g
Don't bother with your garage - ring your insurers. Unless it's very new, they'll just write it off.
As well as the engine; [£7000+] the unknowable damage to the electronics will be one can of worms that they won't want to go near.
|
But if car was driven through water will insurers want to help? Had it been stuck and flooded yes but the engine may be messed up because it was driven. Then again if you'd left it I am assuming it would have got flooded and therefore written off.
I too would have tried pushing it through the water if not too deep though so no danger of damaging the engine from water getting into the cylinders.
|
rtj
They're getting so many claims for exactly this in recent years; [due to low-mounted air intakes] that they won't bat an eyelid.
|
Claim on the insurance, it'll be covered under accidental damage!
Had a similar problem on a PD Passat about a month ago......unbelievably it started the next day and drives better than ever after an oil/filters change!!
|
|
That's good to know. In this instance though he was moving it to stop it getting damaged so that would hopefully be a further mitigating circumstance, i.e. not moving = righting the car off.
|
Why, when the air filter is just under the bonnet the air intake in practicaly on the floor.
My 206 2 ltr hdi stopped whilst going through a flooded road and the engine was locked, but only by good fortune and £90 at the dealership it is now fine.
|
|
|
|
FiL drove into a flood at the bottom of our lane a few years ago. The car was floating, he reckoned. Next day RAC man removed air filter and wrung it out(!) then removed spark plugs and turned the engine over. There were little fountains of water spurting out of the cylinders.
The advice was oil & filter change and new air filter.
About a month later a large lump of engine dropped off and the engine oil was suddenly on the road instead of tucked up in the engine. Sorry about the lack of details but it was rather garbled with MiL adding drama and interruptions during the telling. He insists it was nothing to do with flooding it. Maybe.
And it was a Daewoo. They were busy going bust so he ended up walking away from it. So that Passat that's been going nicely for a month...
JH
|
The Insurance assor came around last night and was about to write it off but said for my local garage to take the head off first to have a look as it does still "run" just about....
Erm but in my defense, it was too deep to wade through, and had a real current coming from the side. I couldn?t have reversed as it was only just passable going forward. I did however detach the air box from the down pipe which gave me another 3 inches before it went in...
It was just like a scene from raiders of the lost arc!
The saga goes on....
|
Peugeot 307 is particularly vulnerable with air intake sited very low.
As for being insured for flood damage I am curious to see what the uninsured will get from the government. Will they get a new flat screen TV for the one they bought with the money they could have bought insurance with but didn't?
|
A mate of mine lives near a ford, complete with depth measuring posts. Most of the time, the water is maybe 3 inches deep. I've ridden through it on the ZZR before with no problems, but it does go up quickly when the rain falls.
One of his neighbours regularly earns a bit on the side with his snorkel equipped Series 2 diesel Landie, pulling people out of it who clearly can't read the measuring posts, or think that their vehicle is impervious to water.
They've had all sorts in there. Last year there was a 54 registered BMW M3 with just the roof visible. The owner had abandoned it on a Saturday evening, and by the time the recovery turned up Sunday morning, the water had risen by a good 2ft, pushed it off the shallow part, and swept it into the river, via a concrete bollard which stoved the side in. £,000's worth of damage.
Lots of 4x4's get stuck in there as well, particularly the "soft roaders".
Cheers
DP
--
04 Grand Scenic 1.9 dCi Dynamique
00 Mondeo 1.8TD LX
|
Had the "cheeks" of the bike last night whilst securing the BMW badges on (BMW never thought to do that on early 1200GSs) - I noticed the air-intake was "well high" on it, which re-assures one a bit when and where to go paddling in it...
Oh MrsP came home with a snorkel kit (2nd hand of course) for the Landie last week, noticed quite a few around here that have sprouted them. Amazingly we were not touched by the "waters" despite several near misses and a very flooded lane in recent years.
|
whilst securing the BMW badges on (BMW never thought to do that on early 1200GSs) - I noticed the air-intake was "well high" on it which re-assures one a bit when and where to go paddling in it...
If it is an air-cooled model, then "going paddling" is a very poor idea indeed!
|
|
It's oil cooled. (two sub types of boxer and airhead and an oilhead.) Not that I'm going paddling.
|
Not that I'm going paddling.
On TV a long time ago there was a TV programme, frightfully wet (NPI), which involved a gormless person losing control of a small (175cc?) motorbike on a beach IIRC, driving along in the sea with his head/upper body showing, and then driving out. This was supposed to be funny. It had a schnorchel tube, of course. They had frightful trouble getting it right, and had to bore the thing out to about to about a mil oversize with a standard piston to get it to run.
|
|
Long Way Round proves you can't drown a properly prepared beemer, the crossed some very deep rivers !
|
The insurance have just settled up.. straight off....
Offered me the car back at 23% of the value they put on it .. erm which I did, now all I need is some luck to get the engine rebuilt...
|
|
