hydrolocked - i think, what are my options Options

[bman]

Ok so anyone who lives on or near long island knows we got some extreme rain last night. Driving home from work my block was flooded as usual and I never had a problem. I have a CAI but it is situated where I never had a problem with the water.

Last night was different.

Upon fording the river my car stalled out and in fear of hydro lock I didn't bother trying to start it. Instead I took off my work shoes, socks, rolled my pants up and simply pushed the car into the front of the house where the water wasn't so deep (2 inches)

I tried to start the car but all i heard was clicking. I can't go into details beyond what I say because it was cold and dark and the amount of troubleshooting i was able to do was limited.

I'm pretty savvy with mechanical things, so I pushed the car into the driveway and pulled the spark plugs thinking if would give the water some place to go. I tried to crank it and I still heard click click click as i turned the key to start it. I inspected the spark plugs and they weren't even wet! It was always my assumption that a hydro locked motor was waterlogged and you'd have, at the least, web spark plugs. Hell, they were still hot when I pulled them. It was too dark to see inside the cylinder(s) to look for water.

I had the g/f drive me to work, and with Valentines day today and work again on Friday I won't be able to sink any time into repairing it until Saturday.

In thinking about it, I'm thinking i may have just stalled the car out, and water-logged the starter. I may be mechanically inclined but I lack experience.

So... what do you guys think?

In addition, here are my specs
94 Celica 1.8 manual w/ CAI
147K (used to) run mint.

Thanks for your time everyone!!

[tin_foil]

yeah...I've got to agree with Lagos on this one. You may have just shot your motor. After you sucked up water you shouldn't have tried to start it at all. The real issue with hydrolock is not extinguish plugs; that's an easy fix, let them dry out. But bad stuff happens when you suck up a good amount of water. I think you understand that water doesn't compress like air does. So when that piston tries to come up, something gives...and it won't be the water. My friends CAI sucked up water into her b18, and then another friend tried to compression start it for her. Needless to say, either the initial stalling, or the push start ended up blowing two quarter sized wholes in either side of her block where the mangled rod hit. And then I got to replace her motor for her.

Anyway, a word to the wise, after sucking up water, never, ever try and start the car (with key, or compression) until you've taking out the plugs, turned the motor over by hand, and inspected it. I really hope your motor's fine, but if you're not getting any compression, you might want to start preparing yourself for the worst...