'05 Sprinter got 5 gallons of water in fuel!

I went to get fuel the other day and was pumped 5 gallons of water into the fuel tank. The sprinter ran for about 1/2 a block and shut off with the WIF light coming on right away. I flushed the water out of the fuel filter (or so I thought) a few times and got it running again for a few blocks. Then it just quit and wouldn't start. Got it to the dealer and they want $2000+ to replace the injector pump, and $400+ per injector to replace the injectors. The total quote was $7400+. I have a 2005 2500 Sprinter. Is there a "normal" list of repair parts for this amound of water? Is the injector pump shot for sure? Are the injectors ruined for sure? Please, I'm in the middle of a mess here any help would be appreciated.

May need to drain and clean out fuel tank also. 5 gallons is a lot! Is there a possibility for fuel station liability for this? Did you keep the receipt?

Yes, fuel station seems cooperative, but wants to move sprinter from dealer to his own shop which scares the heck outta me!

If it was me, I would at least get it home or some other place to have it serviced.

First thing I would do is to drain the tank and make sure there is no longer any water in the tank. Then I would change the fuel filter and see if you can get diesel to pump out of the WIF tube. Once that is ok...

I would try to find out (as I don't know if you can as I haven't done it myself) if you can drain the injector, injector rail, high pressure pump from fuel/water. Once you think this job is done and ok...

I would connect everything back up as if nothing had happened, turn the key at run for 30 seconds (without starting the engine), turn off and repeat the 30 seconds procedure a couple more times. Cross your fingers and start turning the engine over (make sure you have a healthy battery) and hope that the engine will turn over.

I don't think from the sound of it that your engine had hydro-locked, so this is at least what you should do before paying the dealer some obnoxious amount of money.

If it still doesn't start, then maybe talk to the station about where it is going to be serviced and whether you can work out something else.

Any idea why there was so much water? Had they just filled the tank from a fuel truck? Mind sharing what brand of fuel it was?

For the amount of damage done I would say if the station doesn't agree to do things your way you might want to get an attorney involved. It certainly wasn't your fault that this happened and their liability insurance should pay the whole shot! Remember, document, document, document!

Tim

You don't have to accept the gas station's idea of "who should do it".
You're the injured party and you have no idea of what other damage the water may have done (or be doing) to the fuel delivery system of the Sprinter (such as the possibility of needing new injectors).

Give a direct holler to Doktor A ( abittenbinder@yahoo.com ) for his opinion.

good luck
--dick

I use STP Complete Fuel System Cleaner to aid in removing water from fuel lines, etc in my car and truck (both gas models) about every third tank up. I believe they also make a version of this for diesels.

BTW, I agree with the others; the service station shouldn't tell you which repair shop to go to. Not just any old mechanic can work on a Sprinter properly. IMO

Red-Line 85+ will remove water but not five gallons not that it was aa2d's fault!But that's a first, paying $2.60 plus a gallon for water
Richard

Altered Sprinter said:

Red-Line 85+ will remove water but not five gallons not that it was aa2d's fault!But that's a first, paying $2.60 plus a gallon for water
Richard

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That's a WHOLE lot cheaper than the designer water people walk around with here in the Bay Area, more like $25 per gallon, based on $3 for a little pint bottle.

Who would have thought that water would ever cost more than gas?!

You've got to admit that it was clever marketing that got us all drinking bottled water.... especially when city water systems often produce water of equal or better quality.

Tim

I remember a time in the 70s, I lived in Big Bear, CA. Arrowhead made the legal headline news 'cuz they were not taking water from the mountains (near Lake Arrowhead, I guess), but were tapping their local faucet; basically not doing much, if anything, before stuffing it in bottles, then bottles on a truck and from trucks to the store shelves.

If you filter San Bernadino's tap water through coffee, it's not bad at all.

-Jon

Coca Cola did better here, they launched Dasani water, which turned out to be tap water and then managed to contaminate it!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2004/mar/20/medicineandhealth.lifeandhealth

"First, Coca-Cola's new brand of "pure" bottled water, Dasani, was revealed earlier this month to be tap water taken from the mains. Then it emerged that what the firm described as its "highly sophisticated purification process", based on Nasa spacecraft technology, was in fact reverse osmosis used in many modest domestic water purification units.

Yesterday, just when executives in charge of a £7m marketing push for the product must have felt it could get no worse, it did precisely that.

The entire UK supply of Dasani was pulled off the shelves because it has been contaminated with bromate, a cancer-causing chemical.

So now the full scale of Coke's PR disaster is clear. It goes something like this: take Thames Water from the tap in your factory in Sidcup, Kent; put it through a purification process, call it "pure" and give it a mark-up from 0.03p to 95p per half litre; in the process, add a batch of calcium chloride, containing bromide, for "taste profile"; then pump ozone through it, oxidising the bromide - which is not a problem - into bromate - which is. Finally, dispatch to the shops bottles of water containing up to twice the legal limit for bromate (10 micrograms per litre).

The Drinking Water Inspectorate confirmed yesterday it had checked the Thames water supplied to the factory and found it free of bromate. Because it is unsafe at high levels, standards for bromate in tap water are strictly monitored.

Bromide is a naturally occurring trace chemical which has a sedative effect. It is said to have been added by the British army to soldiers' tea during the second world war to dampen down their lust. But when it is oxidised into bromate it becomes "a pretty nasty carcinogen", according to David Drury, one of the principal inspectors for the DWI.

"I've checked Thames water's supply this morning and it is free of bromate," he said.

The legal limits are set to have a wide margin of safety, and the Food Standards Agency advice yesterday was that while Dasani contained illegal levels of bromate, it did not present an immediate risk to the public.

"Any increased cancer risk is likely to be small. However the levels are higher than legally permitted in the UK and present an unnecessary risk. Some consumers may chose not to drink any Dasani they purchased prior to its withdrawal given the levels of bromate in it," the FSA said.

Coca-Cola said it was voluntarily withdrawing all Dasani "to ensure that only products of the highest quality are provided to our consumers".

If you want a refund you should call freephone 0800 227711."

TimJuhl said:

You've got to admit that it was clever marketing that got us all drinking bottled water.... especially when city water systems often produce water of equal or better quality.

Tim

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Yep Tim,
When they first started selling water in those little bottles I was the genius that said to my wife, "Who the hell is going to pay that much for water when you can get it from the tap in your sink?" The one that really cracks me up is that they now have people believing that you can't refill those little bottles with your home tap water that contains a purposeful amount of residual chlorine, because refilling them is unsafe. Didn't we all use canteens filled from the tap when camping as Boy Scouts not too many years ago? I don't recall ever losing a single day of camping, let alone any fellow Scouts to that "unsafe" practice.

I know, quietly step away from the soapbox. Thanks in advance for putting up with my rants. AP

Here is the problem i have with this, the high pressure pump runs at i believe 15000psig or so(correct me if im wrong), at that pressure water will boil, will not stay a liquid at all. I would imagine that draining the tank and cranking the engine a number of times should clear out the lines, and push what ever water there is in the system out. I would empty the tank, put a few gallons in, remove the outlet from the fuel filter(which is low pressure) to purge out the lines, it should pump continuously since the pressure will not build up. Then the only remaining water would be in the high pressure side, and that should boil off. $7000 seems outrageous, im sure people have paid it though.

aa2d,
I would be concerned that the longer the water resides in the injector system the more potential for damage. I second autostaretx's suggestion to contact Doktor A. I'd be doing that for sure.

Good luck. AP

aa2d,
Please update your profile to include your location.
Steve

aa2d said:

Yes, fuel station seems cooperative, but wants to move sprinter from dealer to his own shop which scares the heck outta me!

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poiuytrewq said:

Here is the problem i have with this, the high pressure pump runs at i believe 15000psig or so(correct me if im wrong), at that pressure water will boil, will not stay a liquid at all.

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Um...

Pressure -increases- the boiling point of water.

That's one reason your radiator cap is a "15 pound" spring-loaded gadget... and why/how pressure cookers work. Even only 15 pounds raises the boiling point to about 260F.

The inverse is also true: lowering the pressure lowers the boiling point... so trying to boil food at mountain altitudes takes a lot longer, since the boiling point may have dropped to 160F.

Those are -ambient- pressure effects.

--dick
p.s. using a general steam table calculator, roughly 15,000 psi boils around 700F
http://www.efunda.com/Materials/water/steamtable_general.cfm

Aqua Puttana said:

Yep Tim,
Didn't we all use canteens filled from the tap when camping as Boy Scouts not too many years ago? I don't recall ever losing a single day of camping, let alone any fellow Scouts to that "unsafe" practice.

AP

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Because of space and budget limitations, our troop's Grand Canyon High Adventure went dumpster diving behind the North Rim's restaurants for 2-liter bottles to refill. The picture below shows one of the scouts carrying the empty bottles in anticipation of the day-long waterless hike out of the canyon.



In keeping with the Sprinter subject matter:

I do have the receipt and have talked to the gas station owner (it was a BP station). He has agreed to have it fixed at the dealer and he's going to pay for it (though he wants to try to negotiate with the dealer). I have been told that the fuel pump runs at 13,000 PSI, and that even a little water at that pressure will cut into the injectors and ruin them. I don't really know if this is true or not. The engine did not hydrolock, though that never even crossed my mind. Another problem is that it has been sitting for 12 days now with water in the fuel system while working it all out, that can't be good either. I'll keep you posted as things progress.

aa2d: Thanks for the update BP at least is prepered to deal with your problem not admiting to or denying liabilty customer realtions good will. Good news; at least the onus is not impacting on your finances completly.
Appreciate the update.
Richard