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ECM Got Wet....


mikestewart395
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Trying out my inner fender snorkel this weekend, it worked successfully, but my ECM is soaked. It caused the relays to click a song like crazy, fuel pump going on off on off. I pulled it to a friends house near the forest where I was at. He called this morning and told me the ECM is full of water, he is drying it out today while I am here at work. Should I replace the unit? Everything else under the hood held pretty water tight, but the ECM needs to be moved to higher ground for sure.

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See what it does after drying out. If it somehow still operates normally, buy another just in case and leave it in the cab. Most likely later on it'll start developing corrosion and short out.

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^x2 but I'm not sure how often they recover.

 

Definitely relocate it (there are threads on it here) and get a replacement.

 

Nothing personal Bud, but I advise you quit charging into things until you have things set up a little better, it will reduce the total cost/digging/downtime. ;)

Good to hear the snorkel worked though, otherwise you'd be asking about motors as well. FYI if you do ever ingest water, shut it off immediately, get it clear, pull all the plugs and crank it to clear the water.

 

B

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After making the inner fender snorkel I had to try it out, lol. And I have no way of knowing the weak points unless it is put through the paces. Like Gandy (RIP) on Buck Wild said.,"You don't know if it is any good unless you put it in the @!*%"., lol . Any way. Not a big deal. I know now that I have to relocate that. My friend who is looking it over now is a retired AF airplane mech. specializing in electronics. From boredom he is tearing through every scrap of wire on that truck. His advice to me was to get a Jeep Wrangler, put it on 44's, snorkel and double winches, the way I drive, haha. Probably good advice. I don't tip toe in the woods. Anyway, he is looking at making some 2 part silicone casings for all the connections and relays under the hood, even though after he inspected them this morning he was impressed with the parts Nissan went with. Most everything was factory water tight. After running the diagnostics he could see the problem was coming from the ECM. It was still holding water. As I was leaving for work he was taking the seat out. Going to see what it's looking like in the morning.

 

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I've read that with water logged cell phones you can pack them in rice to aborb all the water. I wonder if that would help? The ECM not the interior.

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Next time you want to put your truck in the drink (its going to be hard to resist with your snorkel...lol) I suggest using some plastic bags to cover up your computers to keep them dry (tape up the ends), then take them off when your done your day of splashing. Its the cheap and easy way to keep it working other than relocating it behind the glove box like others here have done.

 

Hope it works after its dried out.

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Next time you want to put your truck in the drink (its going to be hard to resist with your snorkel...lol) I suggest using some plastic bags to cover up your computers to keep them dry (tape up the ends), then take them off when your done your day of splashing. Its the cheap and easy way to keep it working other than relocating it behind the glove box like others here have done.

 

Hope it works after its dried out.

Good point, that reminds me that GrimGreg sealed his in a Tupperware container. Not a bad idea...

 

The rest of you are animals! :lol:

 

B

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Tupperware container really isnt a bad idea....

 

Rice the interior?!? Now THAT I want to see. If someone thought of its, its bound to have happened by now. Where's Google when you need it.

 

mike395: Dude, wish you were down here. I need a hard charging wheeling buddy. But there is some knarly stuff down here!

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My M30 had been submerged at some point. (probably in a flooded road accident before I got it) All I know is it drove fine 200+ miles from where I bought it to my house and the ECU ran great. The car got stripped, parts went on warm dry shelves and 6 months later, the ECU did not work properly inside its new vehicle.

Opened the case, White powdery corrosion all over plating inside the case covers and a little bit of rust where the plating had corroded away.
Much closer inspection found corrosion crawling under the lamination on the circut board and the #1 injector driver had failed (forcing the injector to stay open/flood the engine)

 

So like kingman said, it may run but it may fail of corrosion at an unexpected time.

Edited by MY1PATH
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The white powder in the M30 ecu sounds like water (and whatever was dissolved in it) got trapped inside the ECU and ate away at it. If your ECU still works, I'd open it up and have a go at it with contact cleaner or rubbing alcohol to wash out any remaining muddy water. Make sure it's entirely dry before you put it back together. And then, yeah, get it off the floor!

 

I've been surprised at how much abuse electronics can bounce back from. Somebody at the community college I went to spilled a soft drink into one of the school's laptops, which of course made it quit working. The school figured it was shot and let me have a go at it. I cleaned out the sticky nastiness inside and got the hardware to respond, the school's tech support person fixed a few driver files, and last I heard, it was back in service.

 

That's probably the only time I've been impressed with a Dell computer!

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I made the mistake of wheeling alone, got stuck in a deep puddle and flooded the driver sided of the truck. Ruined the ABS computer/controller under the driver seat. I got lucky it wasn't the passenger side. You can flood the computer long before the engine will suck water even with stock intake set-up.

 

 

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The white powder in the M30 ecu sounds like water (and whatever was dissolved in it) got trapped inside the ECU and ate away at it. If your ECU still works, I'd open it up and have a go at it with contact cleaner or rubbing alcohol to wash out any remaining muddy water. Make sure it's entirely dry before you put it back together. And then, yeah, get it off the floor!

 

I've been surprised at how much abuse electronics can bounce back from. Somebody at the community college I went to spilled a soft drink into one of the school's laptops, which of course made it quit working. The school figured it was shot and let me have a go at it. I cleaned out the sticky nastiness inside and got the hardware to respond, the school's tech support person fixed a few driver files, and last I heard, it was back in service.

 

That's probably the only time I've been impressed with a Dell computer!

The white powder is corrosion. Aluminm and many zinc and cad platings become a white power when they corrode. The steel lids on the M30 ECU are Cad plated so that's where the white powder came from and then once the cad was gone the base metal started to rust. The ECU does not work and it is beyond saving.

Like I said, flooded road accident before I bought the car. No worries though, I have spares.

 

Hopefully things work out well for the OP.

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Tupperware container really isnt a bad idea....

 

Rice the interior?!? Now THAT I want to see. If someone thought of its, its bound to have happened by now. Where's Google when you need it.

 

mike395: Dude, wish you were down here. I need a hard charging wheeling buddy. But there is some knarly stuff down here!

I wish.

 

Update today, the ECM is shot. It isn't powering up at all so I will have to replace it next week. When I do I am going to take all the electronics off the floor. I'm going to give it a good once over under the hood too with a couple of bottles of silicone.

Maybe I should take the doors off and join a Jeep Club. I'll tell them it's a rare Japanese version, only one made in 88.

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after you dry all the connections by some dielectric grease and inject in into every connector. I've had plendy of dunks and full nose submersions and none of my underhood connectors corroded from it.

I think I put it on here somewhere, but my ECU is currently in the glove box. I notched the glove box liner so it doesn't take that much space in there. Eventually It will go above the glove box but space is tight there with the AC duct...

 

Edited by MY1PATH
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after you dry all the connections by some dielectric grease and inject in into every connector. I've had plendy of dunks and full nose submersions and none of my underhood connectors corroded from it.

 

I think I put it on here somewhere, but my ECU is currently in the glove box. I notched the glove box liner so it doesn't take that much space in there. Eventually It will go above the glove box but space is tight there with the AC duct...

 

 

 

Good advice, thanks. I will deff. do that. And when I get the new ECU it's going in the glove box too before I climb back in.

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Yea, JY here has a few, around 60 bucks.

 

Me and the wife taking our Pathy for a swim on a sunny Sunday afternoon. The death of my ECM, lol. I need some pontoons!!!

 

IMG_20140216_135353_zpsf77fe4ea.jpg

Next time set the air bags off with your forehead and float across? Sorry about the ECM but on the upside you got a great pic!

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:rofl:

 

Sorry to hear... I have an ECM for sale, but I'm certain it is not the right one for you... (1995 manual VG30E)

I'm sure you'll find one pretty easy though.

 

B

Precise1,

 

How much are you asking for the spare ECM? I have an 89 with a 5 speed and have been considering making the intake swap to a MPFI since I have a complete spare engine and intake someone gave me. I'm just not sure of it's condition internally since it sat outside for a few years.

 

You can PM here and I can either reply or send you my personal email address.

 

 

Look forward to your reply.

 

Thanks

 

krmiller07

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