salt water in cylinder 3

[Foxsaver]

It appears I’m going to spend my first summer with our R33 Solitude getting her ready for winter sailing. At least I’m in S. California.

We finally got our first sail. After several weeks catching up on years of deferred mast and rigging maintenance we moved Solitude to her new berth in San Pedro at Cabrillo. It was very light air so we did motor sail the last couple miles. At one point the A4 just quit, and restarted on her own. Ruling out demonic possession, I put a tune up on the top of the TODO list. I have seen several good things said about electronic ignition so I ordered the kit and carved out a day for installation.

The installation instructions were very easy to follow, as were the trouble shooting tips. I could not get the engine to start, or even fire. I used the screwdriver in firing circuit test to verify I had spark, ouch. It had to be timing. So I went through the original A4 maintenance book I found online and the installation instructions. Nothing worked. After 5 hours of doing and undoing I gave up and removed the Electronic Ignition kit. I kept the new rotor cap and wires on. No she did not start. The last thing I did was to put the old spark plugs in. She started and ran smooth as silk. The question here is the A4 just too old and cranky for modern systems or is it me?

The real question is about what I discovered in the course of crawling all over this engine. RUST, lots of rust. The PO had over heated her once and just left the charred paint un attended. Fishing around for dropped distributor parts and screw drive heads I found chunks of rust in the engine bilge. Before I pulled the old spark plugs I attacked the Spark plug wells with a small wire brush and screw driver and vacuumed the area clean. I also vacuumed the spark plug wells before I put the new plugs in as a precaution. The vacuum drew salt water out of cylinder three. It’s a raw cooled engine.

Question; do I have a head gasket problem, a head problem or am I in need of a new engine? Is it time to become a purist and sail in and out of the slip?

Your suggestions will be appreciated and thanks for bearing with the monologue.

Larry
Chief engineer Solitude

[Irwin32]

Excessive cranking when trying to start the engine could be the source of your water in cylinder. If you are having trouble starting it is a good idea to turn off raw water until it runs.

I had good luck with electronic ignaition, though a mechanic told me he has seen lots of trouble with them.

I would do a compression check on each cylinder which will give you some idea of the engines health. Also, do some motoring and see how much oil she uses

[Irwin32]

See post below on compression test.

[hellosailor]

Absolutely do the compression test. And, I'd squirt some oil (engine oil, layup fogging oil, marvel mystery oil, anything) into ALL cylinders and crank it through it help make sure any moisture is pulled out and the rings don't start to rust up and stick from that water. That can happen very quickly if you let it sit with water in them.

If the compression test is good...it just means too much cranking pulled in water from the water lift exhaust. Memo: If the engine doesn't start right away, CUT OFF THE COOLING WATER before doing any more cranking. Then open it up after the engine starts.

Starters can and will be damaged by as little as 30 seconds of cranking, typically they can take 15-20 seconds per five or ten minutes, surprisingly little more can overheat them and cause internal damage to start.

And yes, the A4 like any old engine can benefit from a new ignition system.<G> Given proper care and feeding an A4 can last an awfully long time. They have very low compression, which gives them relatively low power but very long life. You might check with some of the A4 gurus, I've been told the engine was shipped in two different styles, with one having a restrictor plate (under the carb) to lower the horsepower and lower the import tariff. Simply removing the plate and modifying the carb, boosts the power.