Well heres the pictures that i got, sorry for the delay...


This is where it all started, me wanting to climb the hill


So we decided that ricky would go on the other side and test out the waters, and here he is after he makes it through the waist deep water at the bottom of the otherside of the hill (keep in mind, the tow rope he has hooked up was intended to be used to pull me out if i got stuck testing the mud weve never been through.)

So i climb the hill, which is A LOT steeper and taller and narrower than it looks in the pics.


now ricky has to reverse back through the waist deep water at the bottom of the hill, and thats where it all went wrong

He couldnt tell what was behind him because it was pitch black out there and everything looks the same, and he didnt hear us screaming stop, so he ended up turning the wrong way right into neck deep water with knee deep mud on the bottom, at the deepest point his bed and headlights were both underwater, but he didnt stop fighting until he settled with the water just under his headlight and door handle.



Now that hes settled with his truck off i had to pull his dead weight out of the water, while im still sitting on the top of the hill.


Somehow the filter was dry...


and a shot of the rescue truck :D

Rickys truck blowing out white smoke the whole drive home

the water line

sand in the bed

sand on the floor

water on the door

and the dirty trucks





Sorry the pictures are so dark, flash doesnt work to well out there, but if anyone knows how to brighten them up feel free to do it.

 

dang ricky, now thats deep if it came up to your headlights like that. Ur very fortuanit to be able to still drive it home.

 

ewww nasty...
looked like a good time tho..

 

Dang, yall are hardcore. haha

Brenton

 

ah too bad the pics didnt come out better.

 

Lol, wish you had a video camera.

 

looks like you guys should invest in some better lighting for these night mud/water runs. At the very least pick up a spotlight that plugs into the cigarette lighter. I have one and it is great to have at night while driving around in dark tight areas, or in your case lakes. They only cost around $20-$30 around here. Nice pics, I'm glad I live in the desert, my wheeling consists of sand,dirt,rocks and the damage is usually torn up skid plates or as of the last outing half of a front bumper/valance being held up by some killer type of glue from Home Depot.

 

or lord son that looks like fun!.. sorry bou tthe damage tho

 

haha, it was awesome!

I really want to get another light bar, but I just don't like it on my truck. I need at least two foward and 2 reverse lights, so I was thinking of just getting an all black KC bar with black lights, put 2 foward 2 reverse, then have the best of both worlds.

I'm really thinking about it...especially after what happened!!!




I wish the pics came out better, but we'll have plenty more, we're going out to holey lands and possibly the place where I got stuck again during the day. I still have to swap the 8.8 though...

 

Ricky, looks like you have the right attitude about this. If you do it, it's gonna break. If it breaks, replace it with something better. If this is too much to deal with, don't do it.

Painless has a water tight fan controller but it's in the $100 range. If memory serves me right, Griggs made his own water tight controller. There is a thread here somewhere.

 

What a moment:

 

Definetly. If it breaks, replace it with something better...

Going along with what I said, I'd love to upgrade the transmission somehow...but I'll probably stick with a stocker and just extend the vents...call it a day.

Either way, SAS is coming b/c I can't take this 2wd IFS anymore, my wheeling has become too much for the truck to handle.


It's going to be a lesson that I should have learned a long time ago!!! Vent extensions. Griggs just sunk his truck (a little less water than mine ) and he is still fine, but he has extensions.

The water came in from the vent, no doubt about it. Thats my problem right there. I broke it, so now I fix it and make it so it never happens again!!!

I learned my lesson, but I still will hit that same hole (just not fall into the rut!!!!) as soon as it gets fixed (and the vent extensions on)

Lesson learned!!!

 

^ thats the right attitude right ther!!

haha get that **** done son!

 

I'm tryin, I gotta save up some more money, I just killed it since I have to have work done on the tranny...

 

At least you didn't have to hold your breath or swim.
I had a buddy that sunk a truck years ago and only the roof top was still showing, he sort of took a flying leap off a hill into a pond about 6' deep. Everything survived, but it got towed home and it took two weeks of drying everything out. The worst damage was lower sheetmetal and a bent hood latch after it nearly got ripped open when it hit the water. It landed flat and even dead center of the pond, probably the only spot that was deep enough to completely submerge a truck. I was the lucky one that got called to go drag him out of the lake and tow him home. It took me an hour to get to where he had gotten stuck from the nearest road. It took two wreckers, four cables and 200' of chain to get him back on flat ground.

>Change all fluids, remove the seats and floor mats to dry in the sun, and make sure the doors drained out, maybe even leave the door panels off for a bit to let everything dryout.
As long as it was freshwater, if you let everything dry well before use the electrical system has a good chance of surviving, if it was saltwater, you have major problems ahead. I would also check the wheel bearings, not only for water but for sand, the same for the ujoints even if their the original sealed type. Be sure to flush out around all seals and relube everything.
You are about to find the real purpose of WD40 too, it's meant to displace water not so much as a lubricant. I would spray any inside body seams that you can get to to help get the water out. That means inside the doors, cab corners, etc. Blow out the heater box too, you may want to give it a shot of Lysol to stop any mold from starting there.
The two problems you could face down the road are electrical corrosion or component failure and mold.
I also bought a 1994 T-Bird that had been flooded and totalled, I stripped, cleaned and reassembled it and it served me well for 4 years and 145,000 miles.
The insurance company totalled it assuming it was worse than it was.

Most insurance companies will total any vehicle that has had water that reached the dash board. So if it got to the dash, and you don't want it totalled, be careful about making a claim, if they see a water line above the bottom of the steering collum, they may right it off as totalled. I saw lots of trucks get totalled in my years at dealerships and the usually question from the adjuster was always whether or not the dash got wet, nearly 100% of the time if it did, it was over.

The airbag system is also very sensitive to water, the air bag monitor and safeing sensor can be ruined if submerged. (If you were to go in deep enough, the airbags themselves I can also get wet, the internal bag isn't totally sealed, water can soak that area as well). I actually had one that got flooded and when I removed the airbags, they were dripping as they thawed out on the bench. Apparently that truck did a nose dive off a boat ramp.

The most important things when dealing with a flooded vehicle is to 1) not drive it until you dry the electrical 2) change all fluids, and 3) dry the interior out 100% to preven mold and rust. If you miss something, you will notice it the next time you let it sit in the sun with the windows up, it will start to get a swampy or musty odor. You might even want to see what is available to spray the floor mats and seat cushions with to preven mold from starting.
Your speakers are most likely toast too, that may depend on how long they soaked in the water. Items to be most concerned with are electric motors, solenoids and relays, most processors are resin sealed and pretty water proof, it's the connectors that can cause problems there. Items like the heater blower motor if run wet can get ruined, but if flushed out and let to dry it can easily survive. The worst part is not knowing whether or not you got everything and what may fail later. I would also go buy a tube of dielectric grease and put it in every connector that you can after you blow dry them real good. It will help prevent the terminals from corroding later down the road.

Good luck with the cleanup.

 

Thanks for the info. As of right now, I took care of everything. The only problem is the transmission. The water level was up to the right speaker, it works fine. I took apart everything, examined everything.

Sadly enough, I wish they would total this truck. I wonder if I could make a claim on insurrance so they would total it. I would love to get a fx4...

 

 

ur a funnny kid ricky. wouldnt of happened if you were on some 38's.

 

Hell no it wouldn't have.

BTW, I gotta talk to you about some solid axle stuff. I'm pissed off with the 2wd IFS, so my next couple of mods is the dana 44. I want to go on some big swampers or boggers. Probably go with 38" ssr's or 38.5" boggers...

My wheeling has got to be too much for the truck to handle...I need this thing cut and welded up!!!

Figures, I'm off all this week and the 5th through the 8th, I am going to TRY to come up on the 5th still, I hope I get the tranny fixed before then. i want to pick up that axle if I can...probably do leafs and just get her done. I gotta get rid of my suspension...it's killin me.

 

If you have a lot of money in modification and bolt ons you will have to take that into consideration as to what the truck is worth to you and then compare what the trucks book value is. The insurance company will usually total a vehicle when the repair estimate reaches between 50% and 75% of the trucks value, especially when they feel that it cauld end up being an open ended estimate.

I've had them total a few that came through the shop without even asking what it needed, often they just asked me to show them the highest point that the water had reached. I had several adjusters tell me that if the water was beyond the bottom of the dash it was totalled, no other options. Another had said that their guidelines were a combination of water ingestion in the engine combined with any interior damage. I worked at a dealer that got numerous flooded trucks, mostly from guys running in the woods, but we also saw plenty from the shore areas after huge storms.

I remember after one storm back in '93, we had over 40 totalled cars and trucks come through in a week, all were customers who worked at the shore and got caught in the storm surge that year, some were only minor but the insurance companies were taking no chances and wrote off any that had been wet inside. Insurance companies usually take the safe route when making the decision to fix or total. If there's any chance that there may be unseen damage and the estimate all ready is over or even near half its value, they will most likely right it off.
They are assuming that the engine, trans, both rears, the soft interior parts and nearly all of the electrical components may need to be replaced, plus labor.

What they fear in most cases are the dreaded supplimental repairs to the original estimate, plus a cutomer could claim any number of items later on down the road by saying it was caused by the flood, they could then be open to those further claims.
Rarely will they open themselves to that posibility.

 

I bet you are thinking of the DEC 92 NorEaster...
Lost a car in that storm myself
Also insurance companies look at what type of water too
Salt water is deadly and an almost immediate total loss with just minor intrusion

 

Because the salt incrases the conductivity (short circuits!!!), as opposed to fresh water where corrosion and rust are the only problems.

 

You're my hero, Ricky.

Brenton

 

Someone needs to take that picture and write "monster from the black lagoon" instead of submarine.

 

I don't know how I missed this thread, but the pictures are cool! Sounds like it was an interesting night out there!