Is my S54 hydrolocked...

[heinzboehmer]

My only question left is, is it safe to crank the engine? I would hate to blow up another starter after I removed and reinstalled the airbox, so just doing my due diligence in checking.

Just crank it by hand with a 36?mm socket on the crank pulley. If you can't turn it then your starter won't be able to either. Kind in mind that there should be some resistance though, as you'll be compressing the air in the pistons. If you remove the spark plugs, there should be very little resistance.

[Triqzy]

Just crank it by hand with a 36?mm socket on the crank pulley. If you can't turn it then your starter won't be able to either. Kind in mind that there should be some resistance though, as you'll be compressing the air in the pistons. If you remove the spark plugs, there should be very little resistance.

Sounds good. If for whatever reason I can't rotate it with the spark plugs installed, I will try without the spark plugs. Cheers.

[maupineda]

Update:

Since the time of writing this I have done the following:
- new starter
- new spark plugs
- new coil packs
- new injectors
- new oil + oil filter
- removed fuel from butterfly valves (oddly, no fuel was found in the cylinders when accessing through spark plug hole)

My only question left is, is it safe to crank the engine? I would hate to blow up another starter after I removed and reinstalled the airbox, so just doing my due diligence in checking. Additionally, the car has been down for about a month, and I know ethanol isn't supposed to sit in the tank for that long. Should I remove it (and if so, how)? Or should I go get fresh gasoline and dilute the current ethanol mixture. Gas tank is only 1/4 full currently. Thanks again guys.

ideally do a compression test with all the spark plugs removed. You should see 150-160 across all cylinders. If you bent a rod it will read lower. Or you have a bad gasket

[TropicalM3]

Sounds good. If for whatever reason I can't rotate it with the spark plugs installed, I will try without the spark plugs. Cheers.

U need to remove the spark plugs and just turn it with the starter. No plugs no compression so no stress on the starter.

[Triqzy]

Update:

Appears the culprit was an injector. After replacing all 6 injectors (along with new coils and plugs, and the starter) the car is back to running well. Injectors are from FCPEuro so I don't mind running e50 from here on out so long as I'm hitting my AFR's and not running lean or rich. Thinking of adding in an 02 wideband in the near future for the purpose of monitoring this. Thanks to all who helped.

[sapote]

Interesting of the bad injector failed in opened position. My 46 yrs old 1974 3.0CSi coupe still running with original injectors.

Did you verify that the old starter is bad?

[Triqzy]

Interesting of the bad injector failed in opened position. My 46 yrs old 1974 3.0CSi coupe still running with original injectors.

Did you verify that the old starter is bad?

I think it was a combination of injectors having worse flow over time, coupled with the increased flow demands of ethanol stressing them. But yes the old starter did end up breaking. I believe that was the loud clunk I heard, as it was trying to start an engine that had some excess fuel in it and couldn't overcome that.

Just because I'm curious, I'm going to be getting injector 1 (failed cylinder) and injector 2 to be flow tested for $15/piece just to see what the condition of the injectors were at.

[Sharocks]

Interesting of the bad injector failed in opened position. My 46 yrs old 1974 3.0CSi coupe still running with original injectors.

Did you verify that the old starter is bad?

Not to derail this thread but please post some pics of the CSI lol

[sapote]

Not to derail this thread but please post some pics of the CSI lol

Not a bat mobile CSL. I had the chance of buying that one for $2000 more than the '74 CSi I have. I had the whole car stripped down to bare metal and new paint job, but have not put all together yet. Will take a few years with the dash and door walnut wooden pieces restored. I actually had 2: this '74 midnight blue CSi manual and a '73 CS metallic silver in 1987, but sold the CS cheap in early 2000 for less than $6000 to a lucky young college student as promised, since many people begging to buy it after I posted the ad.

The CSL was too colorful for my taste at the time; a big mistake of not buying the CSL.

[Castanoval]

I think it was a combination of injectors having worse flow over time, coupled with the increased flow demands of ethanol stressing them. But yes the old starter did end up breaking. I believe that was the loud clunk I heard, as it was trying to start an engine that had some excess fuel in it and couldn't overcome that.

Just because I'm curious, I'm going to be getting injector 1 (failed cylinder) and injector 2 to be flow tested for $15/piece just to see what the condition of the injectors were at.

Hey curious what was the result of the tests? Did you end up bending a cylinder or anything else?

Same thing just happened to my car. A bad injectors caused misfires, I towed the car, burned the starter, and then discovered that clinger 5 was full of fuel.