Fine dirt in engine after hydrolocking bike?

[Colorado^]

7 hours ago, ASP1227 said:

That's pretty neat, seems like a great idea. In these new bikes it seems like they don't really do much to protect the air box from water, it would be nice though, just to have the peace of mind when making a deep crossing. I was watching a video on YouTube a few days ago, a guy was on a new Husky 300 in the rain and he dropped it in a puddle, and it wouldn't run after that. It's not like he was crossing a river, he literally dropped in a puddle and hydrolocked it. I thought it was kinda ridiculous, but I guess there's a reason we call em dirtbikes and not waterbikes lol.

A puddle!!??  Well now I don't feel so bad lol.

 

 

[Colorado^]

52 minutes ago, cjjeepercreeper said:

If it were my bike I'd completely disassemble the engine after finding gritty water.  Not that big a deal on a 2t.  I'd be checking every bearing closely.

I've done a top end, but not a bottom end.  So I'll see what I can see/get to when I get it apart.

 

[bldmtnrider]

That water crossing looks familiar.  Feel like I have been through it but don't recall it being that deep except at high runoff.

Gotta ask, how did you get it home?  Did you tow it out, ride it out or come in and retrieve it.  

If you rode it out you probably don't need to worry about corrosion.

 

[Thump_Stump]

Just now, bldmtnrider said:

That water crossing looks familiar.  Feel like I have been through it but don't recall it being that deep except at high runoff.

 

I agree - then again almost everything can "look familiar" in the trails sometimes ?  And he said he walked it the 3 miles out. 

OP: Where was this abouts?  Just as a 'heads up' to other CO riders to know water may be higher then usual.

[bldmtnrider]

Ah, missed that he walked it out.

[Colorado^]

17 minutes ago, bldmtnrider said:

That water crossing looks familiar.  Feel like I have been through it but don't recall it being that deep except at high runoff.

Gotta ask, how did you get it home?  Did you tow it out, ride it out or come in and retrieve it.  

If you rode it out you probably don't need to worry about corrosion.

 

It's just west of Lininger Lake or ~3 miles south of Hall Valley road (trail head to Webster & Red Cone).

I ride with a InReach tracking device, so I just sent a message to my wife to meet me at Hall Valley Rd (pushed the bike out).  I live in the area, so it wasn't too big of a deal.  BUT, she doesn't drive my truck so I had to drive her car back home and come back with my truck while she waited with the bike.  There is zero cell reception anywhere in the area.

[wielywilly-g]

My cousin from Boulder CO took me trail riding near Boulder and we came to a crossing that looked just like this. While my cousin went downstream looking for a better place to cross, I wadded this place and found the shallowest line and made it through on my XR650. My cousin came back and before I could tell him my line, went straight thru the middle and drowned out. He was a clever sort and had some tools stashed in his frame and we got it going after about 2 hours.

Don't ask me where near boulder, I was lost most of the day.

[bldmtnrider]

I'd be willing to bet that was a trail up by Camp Dick. That is really the only deep water crossing in boulder county. Been through that many times on my old xr650r. Nervous to take my new 500 through it as I still don't know it's deep water capabilities.

I'm not sure if I would split the case. I'd make that determination after I got an idea of how well the crank bearings cleaned up. You may want to find a way to flush those bearings, maybe diesel in a lawn pump sprayer.

[motoxvet]

7 minutes ago, bldmtnrider said:

I'd be willing to bet that was a trail up by Camp Dick. That is really the only deep water crossing in boulder county. Been through that many times on my old xr650r. Nervous to take my new 500 through it as I still don't know it's deep water capabilities.

I'm not sure if I would split the case. I'd make that determination after I got an idea of how well the crank bearings cleaned up. You may want to find a way to flush those bearings, maybe diesel in a lawn pump sprayer.

I was thinking that too.  It would be nice to FLUSH out the mains with a flow of diesel and maybe rotate the crank at the same time.

[ASP1227]

Diesel is great for cleaning water. Completely irrelevant example, but we had a Caterpillar crawler with water in the transmission from a filler boot leaking. We flushed about 5 gallons of diesel through it. Works great now

[dmac1]

On 7/18/2017 at 0:57 AM, ASP1227 said:

I was watching a video on YouTube a few days ago, a guy was on a new Husky 300 in the rain and he dropped it in a puddle, and it wouldn't run after that. It's not like he was crossing a river, he literally dropped in a puddle and hydrolocked it. I thought it was kinda ridiculous, but I guess there's a reason we call em dirtbikes and not waterbikes lol.

Hydrolocked or wouldn't start?  If the former, it musta been just deep enough to submerge the airbox and suck in the water. That would suck.

If the latter, then possibly the air filter got soaked and gummed up. I drowned a CRF 250X once in a cold mountain river and after towing back to camp and getting out the water out and flushing the crankcase a few times it would NOT start. Finally I was like, ok...lets crack the air filter and try it. VROOM!  That was the end of NoToil filter oil for me.

[motoxvet]

1 hour ago, dmac1 said:

Hydrolocked or wouldn't start?  If the former, it musta been just deep enough to submerge the airbox and suck in the water. That would suck.

If the latter, then possibly the air filter got soaked and gummed up. I drowned a CRF 250X once in a cold mountain river and after towing back to camp and getting out the water out and flushing the crankcase a few times it would NOT start. Finally I was like, ok...lets crack the air filter and try it. VROOM!  That was the end of NoToil filter oil for me.

Yes, some air filters TOTALLY plug up when they soak up water.

[Colorado^]

Got the engine out and the head, cylinder and piston are off.

I felt some grit on the cylinder wall an piston and the wrist pin felt a little gritty with the piston on.  That's easy to get to though, so I will give it a good clean.

Good idea with the lawn sprayer to get to the crank bearings, I'll try that soon.

 

Man, I'm so happy that I ordered a top end rebuild kit when I sent out my engine to Eric Gorr.  Having all the gaskets and the wrist pin c-clips etc on hand is making the job a little easier/smoother.

Anyway, I've got about 30-40 hours on the rebuild.  Since it's all apart, should I replace the rings while I'm in there? Maybe even the piston?  I don't have new wrist pin bearings, but I do have a new sleeve (I think that's what it's called).  Historically, I've usually gotten about 100 hours before I've noticed a drop in compression, and about 150 hours before I actually get around to replacing the piston.

Oh and I must have got water in the gear box.  The oil looked like milky coffee.

Thanks for the help guys!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[ASP1227]

Yup milky oil is watery oil. I'd clean it

[Colorado^]

4 minutes ago, ASP1227 said:

Yup milky oil is watery oil. I'd clean it

Yeah I will change it out a few times.  Just bought a 2.5gal container of Rotella T4.

[motoxvet]

OP, after you get all done with your cleaning/flushing procedure, however you decide to do it you can do a rough check of main bearing health.  If you look at bearing spec's for a C3 bearing, commonly used for mains, you can see what designed in clearances they have.  If I remember correctly (and you better do your own research), the clearance in a radial direction (up and down) is about .001".  So, you  could check by putting a little force up and down on the crank end and with a dial indicator, check the slop.  I found it easier to do this with the rotor removed. I think I just pushed up and down with a piece of 2x2 wood.

[Colorado^]

3 hours ago, motoxvet said:

OP, after you get all done with your cleaning/flushing procedure, however you decide to do it you can do a rough check of main bearing health.  If you look at bearing spec's for a C3 bearing, commonly used for mains, you can see what designed in clearances they have.  If I remember correctly (and you better do your own research), the clearance in a radial direction (up and down) is about .001".  So, you  could check by putting a little force up and down on the crank end and with a dial indicator, check the slop.  I found it easier to do this with the rotor removed. I think I just pushed up and down with a piece of 2x2 wood.

That would be a good idea, but I don't own a dial indicator.  Do you think the bearing might have been damaged when the bike locked up with water?  I felt it and it seemed smooth with no radial play, but I guess you can't tell properly by hand.

 

Anyway, the engine is back together with new rings.  I had to use a thinner base gasket (~0.2mm) than the one that my engine builder put on there. Hope that doesn't cause problems, but I don't have any way to measure the z dimension or whatever I'm supposed to do to make sure the compression is correct.

[motoxvet]

Borrow a dial indicator.  You can use mine for a few days!  Chinese ones are cheap.  Check Harbor Freight!  I wasn't necessarily thinking the bearing was damaged from the water lock but running for that short time with the dirty water.

Edited July 19, 2017 by motoxvet

[Colorado^]

14 minutes ago, motoxvet said:

Borrow a dial indicator.  You can use mine for a few days!  Chinese ones are cheap.  Check Harbor Freight!  I wasn't necessarily thinking the bearing was damaged from the water lock but running for that short time with the dirty water.

I'll have to get one for next time.  That's about the only thing that sux about living in the middle of no-where:  have to order most things or go for a 4 hour round trip.

 

[Wild Alaskan]

9 hours ago, motoxvet said:

OP, after you get all done with your cleaning/flushing procedure, however you decide to do it you can do a rough check of main bearing health.  If you look at bearing spec's for a C3 bearing, commonly used for mains, you can see what designed in clearances they have.  If I remember correctly (and you better do your own research), the clearance in a radial direction (up and down) is about .001".  So, you  could check by putting a little force up and down on the crank end and with a dial indicator, check the slop.  I found it easier to do this with the rotor removed. I think I just pushed up and down with a piece of 2x2 wood.

One note on this. The bearings use a c3 or c4 clearance mostly due to the fact the have a compression load on the inner AND the outer race. A CN clearance (or standard clearance) bearing is designed for compression on just one race. So in theory the C3 bearing would measure out tighter than its original specified clearance once installed. 

Again I wouldn't worry about it much, just cleck for anything abnormal with the crank as you swap through top ends. The filter should have kept anything substantial out.