Water in oil - 340 with 8.1L

Yes, you had a tough year too!
So, is the elbow double walled at the base so that the raw water only mixes with exhaust at the outlet of the elbow?
Maybe you are saying an internal weld could have failed which would mix raw water close to the manifold rather than on the downhill side of the elbow.
 
Yes very tough year. LOL Gonna take it for a ride after this post. Yes welds fail, Where do you see the water when you lift the elbow? After warm up you should see no water on the turbulator.
 
There was a pool of water on the turbulator. The whole thing was holding water.
It was troubling, but at least things are becoming clearer.

I think the group has me pointed in the right direction; Thank you. I will go with the assumption that the elbow is double walled (water on the outer portion, exhaust on the inner portion) at the connection to the manifold, and the raw water path out is supposed to be through the downhill outlet side only.

I will move the elbow from the other engine just to get this one fired off today and check for water on this engine. That will buy some time to see if the bad elbow can be repaired or replaced.

Still will do a compression test to see if there is any long-term damage. Not out the woods yet.
 
Bad news and good news after being back there last night after work. Bad news is that the elbow may not have been the cause, but the good news is I found something else that was likely the cause.

I took another look at the elbow and could find nothing wrong with it. I would love suggestions on how to pressure test the elbow, but at the boat I was left with plugging the water ports and filling the outer water jacket and looking for leaks. It held. Below is a photo of the inside.
Photo-Mar-22-2023-8-17-54-PM.jpg


So, this did not seem like the obvious culprit to me. So I checked out the rest of the exhaust (I credit the Blackstone report) as the next step. All seemed fine until I got to the last hose. When I pulled apart the small 2.5" exhaust hose that goes from the muffler to the side outlet, this is what I saw:
Photo-Mar-22-2023-8-14-36-PM.jpg

closer:
Photo-Mar-22-2023-8-14-19-PM.jpg

The inner lining has dropped and the resulting size was at best 1/2 of the proper area for at least 2-3 feet! That would cause backpressure.
So I reinstalled the oil cooler, moved the exhaust hose from the other engine, moved the elbow from the other engine (just to be conservative), and threw in clean spark plugs. The engine fired right up and sounded normal to me immediately. Engine warmed up just fine as I put away tools (that really is the best part of some days). I shut it down and called it a night.

So does this hose alone explain why I had sea water pulled in to the engine?
Is this an affect of aging hoses, or is it an effect of the over heat event that started all this? (not sure whether to replace on or both of these exhaust hoses)
 
Tacoma290 said:
Bad news and good news after being back there last night after work. Bad news is that the elbow may not have been the cause, but the good news is I found something else that was likely the cause.

I took another look at the elbow and could find nothing wrong with it. I would love suggestions on how to pressure test the elbow, but at the boat I was left with plugging the water ports and filling the outer water jacket and looking for leaks. It held. Below is a photo of the inside.
Photo-Mar-22-2023-8-17-54-PM.jpg


So, this did not seem like the obvious culprit to me. So I checked out the rest of the exhaust (I credit the Blackstone report) as the next step. All seemed fine until I got to the last hose. When I pulled apart the small 2.5" exhaust hose that goes from the muffler to the side outlet, this is what I saw:
Photo-Mar-22-2023-8-14-36-PM.jpg

closer:
Photo-Mar-22-2023-8-14-19-PM.jpg

The inner lining has dropped and the resulting size was at best 1/2 of the proper area for at least 2-3 feet! That would cause backpressure.
So I reinstalled the oil cooler, moved the exhaust hose from the other engine, moved the elbow from the other engine (just to be conservative), and threw in clean spark plugs. The engine fired right up and sounded normal to me immediately. Engine warmed up just fine as I put away tools (that really is the best part of some days). I shut it down and called it a night.

So does this hose alone explain why I had sea water pulled in to the engine?
Is this an affect of aging hoses, or is it an effect of the over heat event that started all this? (not sure whether to replace on or both of these exhaust hoses)
Click to expand...

It comes down to the sequence of events that created the issue. One possible explanation is that the hose clamp incident created a chain reaction of events. The engine overheated and the exhaust hoses started to melt. Once you repaired the hose clamp....the water in the exhaust hoses was restricted and caused water to back up into the exhaust manifold where it found its way to the combustion chamber.

Most likely this may have caused your blown head gasket since water doesn't compress well and set you on a course to address the heads which probably had little to do with the water intrusion issue.

You are lucky that those exhaust hoses did not catch fire and burn. A friend lost his diesel 40' EC to an impeller failure that set his exhaust hoses on fire. He opened the engine hatch to see what was going on and he couldn't close it because the lift actuators got cooked by the flames. The halon system fired but just blew out the open hatch. Boat burned until it sunk.

I would replace those exhaust hoses......that most likely will solve the water intrusion problem. Hard to tell if there was any other damage but a compression check and oil change will help.
 
Thanks to all who have weighed in. I love brief and to the point comments by @scoflaw and the great explanations from @PlayDate and @KevinC. Such completely different ways of sharing knowledge, but that is what makes this site so great!

Yup, the hoses will be replaced, hopefully this weekend. Then run it and pull the elbow to inspect the manifold (hoping for no moisture), then compression check and oil change.

Funny what you say, @PlayDate about a fire. When we overheated, we saw smoke through the exhaust and I shut everything down and kept the engine hatch closed in case there was a fire, watching for signs that the fire extinguisher had actuated. Meanwhile, my wife Simone quickly sprang into action and grabbed two life vests immediately: one for her and one for the dog! When we talked about it later, she asked me 'Well doesn't the captain go down with the ship?' Well played, Simone.
 
Tacoma290 said:
Thanks to all who have weighed in. I love brief and to the point comments by @scoflaw and the great explanations from @PlayDate and @KevinC. Such completely different ways of sharing knowledge, but that is what makes this site so great!

Yup, the hoses will be replaced, hopefully this weekend. Then run it and pull the elbow to inspect the manifold (hoping for no moisture), then compression check and oil change.

Funny what you say, @PlayDate about a fire. When we overheated, we saw smoke through the exhaust and I shut everything down and kept the engine hatch closed in case there was a fire, watching for signs that the fire extinguisher had actuated. Meanwhile, my wife Simone quickly sprang into action and grabbed two life vests immediately: one for her and one for the dog! When we talked about it later, she asked me 'Well doesn't the captain go down with the ship?' Well played, Simone.
Click to expand...

Smart thinking on you and your wife's part. This is my friend's boat that had an exhaust hose fire caused by a bad impeller while the boat was on plane. The alarm sounded, he stopped the boat and opened a ER hatch (electrically actuated) and flames came out. He tried to close the hatch and the wires fried. The halon system discharged and just went out the open hatch.

With the fire raging he had to make a fast decision to get off the boat in frigid February Chesapeake waters or burn up on the boat. He described it as the most terrifying minutes of his life. He got into the water and hoped someone would see the black smoke and come to his rescue. Fortunately.....lots of fisherman on the Chesapeake and one got to him before the cold water did.

upload_2023-3-24_15-8-54.jpeg
 
Update: I replaced the exhaust hoses on both sides this weekend, then started the engine. Ran smooth on startup, while I checked for leaks and let it warm up and idled for 20 minutes. Then I shut the engine down, and pulled the elbow to visually inspect the top of the manifold. Below is what I saw. The manifold was dry, which is what I was looking for. While it showed the past signs of water, it was good to see no moisture. Closed it up.
I was on the fence about whether to just dump the oil that is in the engine now or get some run time. So, I spoke with Blackstone this morning, and they suggested that since this oil only saw one start with the 'wet condition' and had only 20 minutes of run time in that condition, I should leave it in and run the engine to get at least 5 hours of run time on the oil, then send them a sample from that oil and change then. I was surprised they were not saying to dump what I have, then change and get a sample after 5 hours of fresh clean oil. Let me know your thoughts.
Still need to get time to do a compression test...
Photo-Apr-01-2023-2-43-30-PM.jpg
 
Great news!

On the oil change it is a coin toss... I would do it just because it isn't that hard to pump the oil out and put new oil in. It would also give you piece of mind which at this point is a good thing. :)
 
Same, I do love Blackstone, but I would replace the oil.

That fire story, and pic, turned my stomach. Ugh.
 
That is the perfect shove off the fence for me. I now have new oil and a new filter, so I will dump what is in there and put in fresh.
 
Glad you found it
 
Quick update, no photos. Changed the oil/filter earlier this week. Glad I did, for the most part. The oil looked how I had hoped, a little darker than fresh oil and no visible signs of water. Next, I want to run the boat in the bay to get up to a reasonable rpm and temperature, and do a compression check. Fingers crossed. Will not be surprised if I am down on compression on the two cylinders that center on the manifold, based on the elevated metals from the last Blackstone sample (372ppm iron at 2.25gallons of oil would equal 0.8oz of iron that was lost). The question is how much down on compression.

And it still bothers me that there was 3% antifreeze detected in the oil after changing the head gasket. It is possible some was left since I could not empty all of the oil when pumping from the dipstick tube. Hoping I don't have to replace the head gasket again, or worse.
 
Think positive. You found the problem and hopefully it did not cause any other collateral damage. I am also hopeful for the compression test. Yes the iron is probably from the cylinder walls but it could also be contamination from the head work you had done. Older engines seem to tolerate water intrusion events better.

Do recheck the intake manifold bolt torque. That is a source for antifreeze leakage. The easiest way to test for an antifreeze problem is to pressure test the system.

Take the boat out and have fun.
 
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