Rotor Arm Burnt Out

[Ahl 4]

Short version of a long story, my car conked out in about 10" of water earlier. It was a flooded backroad, though I didn't know this until I was in it.

 

It seems the water was above the exhaust level and this caused it to struggle and conk out, Even with me trying to keep the car going with the bow wave up. Either that or the electrics got sufficently wet to fuxor things. A flat battery/wet electrics then meant I couldn't restart it.

 

A buddy with a big muckle landrover towed me out and took me back home, and once the battery had been recharged for a bit, I tried to start the car.

Immediately some smoke came up from the distributor area. I checked everything was alright, and tried again. The car would go, but only when revving it, and it made a heavy ticking/misfiring noise.

 

I checked the dizzy for water, but its bone dry, as are the leads etc. The rotor arm however appears to have fried itself, with part of the carbon missing between the centre and end contact.

 

Im getting a new rotor arm tomorrow, but my questions are:

 

Should the rotor arm have electrical continuity between centre and end contact? (or does it have some sort of inbuilt high tension resistance or summint)

and

What are the likely reasons for the rotor arm frying itself?

 

I'd hate to fit a new rotor arm tomorrow, just for it to fry again. The starter motor seemed to be turning ok and nothing seems amiss. The water doesn't seem to have come up very high, except for some splashing.

[Ahl 4]

f*** a duck! I've managed to hyrdolock the f***ing thing, or at least get water in the oil!

 

The first thing I did was to check the oil, which looked normal enough. I guess it was sitting on top of the water!

Earlier, I fitted the new rotorarm and the car started and ran fine, ablight for the loud clattering/ticking noise. It idles fine and has plenty of power.

Its not down to the leads/dizzy or anything, checked all that. The sound is something else, probably mechanical.

 

I checked the dipstick again only to see lighter brown emulsion. Just whipped the rocker cover off and sure enough, emulsion, although its not very thin. The buckets look fine if that tells you anything. The cam lobes are still in A1 condition too, even after 145k!

 

The clattering sounds like bad valve clearances, only 10x as loud.

 

I've got a strange notion in my head that draining the old oil out and popping new stuff in might sort it all, but I'd imagine that in reality i've f***ed something bad.

 

Its a complete c*nt seeing as the water only was 10' high! Just reaching over the tow hook. I didn't drive into any bow waves or anything daft like either...fuxoring car. Oh, and its a 1.9 8v btw...no hydraulic lifters or any of that.

 

I haven't run the car again since, but what would make such a racket with the car still running alright/making good power. Piston skirt? Big end? Small end? Valve? Valve spring?

[trickywoo 0]

I had a very loud clattering turned out that the cambelt was flapping about against the plastic cover.

 

Suppose the water could have knocked the cover loose?