2103 FR-S Flood recovery
 

Greetings all. Picked up a flood title '13 FR-S this week with full intent of gutting, caging, and LS swap. But when it was delivered today, it's in much better shape than I expected. I might try and get the engine running and try to drive a bit before weather sets in and gutting it.

Battery was charged, ignition came on, even bumped the starter to see if the engine would roll. Not enough juice, so will test the battery and put it on the charger and see from there.

The fuse panel cover was off which would seem to indicate someone looking for some sort of problem. I'm not fully convinced the car was written off for flood damage, but maybe something mechanical underlying.

I have Techstream and a cable on the way. I used to build BMW motors, but not familiar with these at all.

My plan is to do the following while I wait for cable to arrive:
- fully charge battery
- change oil, cut open filter, inspect for debris
- pull plugs and check compression
- Pump out all old gas
- check for spark to see if immobilizer and ignition system is working


Aside from that, anything else you guys would recommend looking at until I can scan it?

Take the door cards off, pull the carpet oil and remove residual water probably hanging out in there. Change the brake fluid and replace all the fuel as you had said.
My 2013 was a stage 1 flood car and I was lucky, it was perfectly capable after the above

Generally biggest problem with flooded cars is not mechanical issies but electrical.


As a lot of the electeonics is still powered even when car off, once stuff gets wet electrolysis set in amd many of the plugs and modules that are npt 100% sealed will develop corrosion and in some cases damage modules permanently or even worse intermittent faults. The cars arw full of electronic modules quote a few need to communicate for the car to even start.


Your best hope would be a donour car and swap in all the modules wiring loom dash cluster. Unless your lucky amd not much got wet

Steve is wise.

I had 5 minutes to look at it further today and definitely some water in the carpet, so will pull that when I get a chance. Serpentine belt was removed when it arrived as well and a couple of idler pulleys feeling pretty rough. When I get a chance to pull the plugs, I'll see if I can bar the engine over from the crank. I have a sneaking suspicion the engine may have been problematic before it was flooded.



If that ends up being the case, no sweat, my plans were to gut every ounce of interior, OEM wiring, and electronics except ABS and EPS and have a cage built for it. I paid next to nothing for it, so not a loss at all and just would have been a bonus if I could get it working until I have the swap engine, trans, swap package, and Motec gear ready to install.

Does the engine even turn over? put a 27mm socket and breaker bar on it and see if it is hydrolocked....and get the interior out of it and dry it out pronto.

Yeah, no. I'm on crutches at the moment, so getting out to the garage to do anything takes a little extra effort.

Breaker bar on crank and no movement either direction. None.

I'm going to be optimistic that if I pull the plugs, it might just be a cylinder hydrolocked, but given these motors are prone to spin bearings anyway, not expecting much from it.

Weather should be decent this weekend, will start getting seats and carpet out.

It's done, get a new motor....

Kind of what I figured. Talking to a local guy and will probably pick up an L33 this weekend for $500 and a second from LKQ for about $750. I can get the conversion and fab done with it and have a spare motor for cheap.

I've been reading through your first build and leaning towards the HTE-Rs, going to sit in some next week. Do you see any issues with fitting them in full cage?

I was able to spend a couple of hours on it today and fully stripped the interior. I don't think there's ever been a trace of water inside.

The more I look at it, the more I'm convinced it was claimed as a flood for insurance when in reality the motor was toast.

It looks clean enough, I'm considering just finding and FA20 for it and keeping it streetable even though it does have an auto trans.

the auto is honestly not bad in this car, though the manual is obviously preferable. With the paddles, it's definitely decent.

I haven't driven one but I would imagine a supercharged auto would be a blast.

I'm honestly spoiled, I've only driven DCT or SMG for the last 10 years or so and left foot braking is second nature to me. To the point I was looking for dog boxes for the LS, but the cost is silly. BMW 6MTs run almost half what a T56 or TR6060 do, but haven't seen much for adapter plates to an LS in the US market.

Looking around for FA20s, holy crap they aren't cheap.

Got one to sell?

Yes, they are. :)