Hi all,

Took the Fourtrak out again this Sunday (24th June) to Slindon safari down here in West Sussex, only our second outing, had a superb day, didnt get stuck once, and the beast performed excellently once again..... UNTIL....

On our last half hour after we agreed to go home at half 2, my dad decided to drive her straight into a deep mud/water pool and we were proper stuck, it took two marshalls in their big V8 Landy's to drag us out.

Anyway, we spent around 30 mins stuck in this deep water, and all this time we kept the engine running, as we thought this was the best idea so water wouldnt run up the exhaust pipe and into the engine, but kinda neglected the fact the water was deep enough eventually for the air intake to start sucking in some water. The other reason we kept it going, as we thought it'll aid our recovery as we can either help by reversing or driving out under recovery, losing the engine would of meant just being dragged out, which might of been harder.

After about 20 minutes stuck in the water, the marshalls finally turned up, and once we were attached my dad tried to use our own power along with being pulled out to aid our recovery, but suddenly alot of smoke started coming out of the engine bay through the gaps of the bonnet and the grill, this started as what everyone thought as just steam off the manifold and probably exhaust gas, as our exhaust only runs to about level with the handbrake under the car (lost the rear section at the previous event) soon developed into a faster, denser bellowing smoke, so we all assumed it was on fire, so my dad turned her off and tried his best to escape, as soon as he turned off the ignition this thicker smoke suddenly stopped and went back to the lighter steam looking smoke, and eventually phased out after a minute or two.

This was then thought because of this reaction from the smoke from my dad shutting the engine down, meant it was not a fire, but perhaps just exhaust fumes again, or the clutch burning out, or something else.

Anyway, we finally got recovered and out on relatively dry land, we attempted to start her again and she fired up first time, although under a bit of a splatter and a big cloud of white smoke out the back.

She idled a bit lumpy for about five minutes, and it needed my help with the throttle to keep it running, and revving hard to try and blow out any water or obstruction, and after a couple of minutes this seemed to help.

We then proceeded to return to our trailer and go home, and the longish drive from where we were recovered back to our trailer went pretty smooth apart from alot of white smoke from the exhaust, and when upping the revs a bit more to say get up a incline even more white smoke was coming out the back, and it kinda felt like she was losing power.

Plus the power steering belt came off, and now virtually all the lights on the dashboard are all on, including the orange fuel filter light, red charge/battery light, and the green turbo light is constantly on, is this down to a electrical fault with the alternator being submerged in water so long, and or other electrics, as the cabin did fill up with water up to the seats where you park ya bum.

So basically, does anyone know what the cause of all this white smoke could be, or how we can get any water that might be in the turbo, or engine out?!!

We will change the air filter give her a oil change etc.... but apart from that we dont know where to start or what the best thing is to do!

So please lots of suggestions, help, pictures would be vastly appreciated, as we love the truck, she's given us so much fun within 2 days that we've used her, we dont wanna throw her away yet.

http://www.photobox.co.uk/album/5905081

The link above is of the pictures of our days offroading, and includes pictures of us stuck in the water, so please feel free to look at them if it helps....

I cant think of anything else to put to help diagnose the problem, so thanks for reading and I hope someone can help us...

Many thanks,

Shaun
C'reg 2.8TD LWB Fourtrak