Ian and salt water

Just curious and not trying to start  arguments for or agianst electric cars.

If an electric car gets flooded by salt water - is it viable to fix it?

I will add , if it was underwater can you harvest the battery pack  to transplant to another EV ?

Doubtful. But then fixing an flooded IC car is also just as doubtful. In my mind they should both be parts donors.

In reply to hobiercr :

Aren't flooded IC cars considered totaled no matter what?  

Although, the worst reason is interior flooding, so in theory, a flooded gas car can be used for a race car.  The cleaning out of the salt water would need to be quite careful.

But a valid question regarding a flooded battery in a very conductive fluid.  No real idea one way or another.

Salt water berkeleyS any and all electronics up. 

If the water doesn't kill it outright, the slow corrosion over time will make it a nightmare down the road. 

Let's put it another way: Being underwater, even for a short time, turns boats into salvage, and they're made to resist the trials and tribulations of operating near salt water.

 

I'm neither a professional nor a gambler, but my money says ....negative.

I'll see myself out. 

I wouldn't even want parts for my ICE if they'd been flooded with saltwater, electrical or not. Keep that rust causing fluid away at all costs. 

Floods don't total cars cause of water screwing with the electrical systems (but they do, oh gods they do.)

Floods total cars because every flood means that everything underground gets into the flood waters, and that gets into the cars.

Sewage contamination totals cars as much as electrical damage.  You cant get it out, it gets into the wire insulation if its under water long enough. 

And we thought Harvey destroyed a lot of cars in Houston.

The number of ruined cars in Florida after Ian is staggering.

It would be damaged at least as badly as an ICE vehicle. Any body electronics and wiring harnesses would be destroyed and all metal things would begin to rust as with an ICE, but if salt water gets into the battery pack it would just FUBAR everything due to the salt water shorting everything to everything else and the pack could even catch fire. See also: Fisker Karma chain explosion during Sandy. That little incident finished off the company.

A coworker had a Miata that had been underwater in a Texas flood 25 years ago. It suffered weird failures constantly. I don't think EV is a factor here. Cars that go diving are no longer cars  

But it would be interesting to know just how waterproof the HV systems are on production EVs (not Fiskers). Obviously they have some level of waterproofing or you wouldn't be able to drive in the rain!

I guess the other question would be: are EVs more susceptible? Many (most?) battery packs are mounted under the floor, meaning any water level even just up to the floor level potentially means a flooded battery.  

Of course there seems to be a trend to mount a lot of modern cars electronic boxes, on the floor, which isn't much better.

I would guess you are probably more like to salvage major parts of of a flooded non-EV car, as long as it wasn't flooded too deep.

Well, there's this yahoo.

I’m wondering how a first gen ram with a Cummins would fare. 

Seems like you replace starter, alternator, and essential fluids and be good??

Any other electronic gremlins could be bypassed as they show up? Not much to go wrong...

If you  were  buying a salt water flooded car to get a body for an off road race car ,  is there a way to neutralize the salt on the inside pockets of the chassis ?

the only way I can think  is to dip it like you  would to strip the paint , and that might pollute the stripping agent bath.

Asking for an off road racer friend :)
 

Those trucks rotted out bad enough without being under salt water.


Not to mention salt water intrusion through the turbo, intake and exhaust into the engine...

californiamilleghia said:

If you  were  buying a salt water flooded car to get a body for an off road race car ,  is there a way to neutralize the salt on the inside pockets of the chassis ?

the only way I can think  is to dip it like you  would to strip the paint , and that might pollute the stripping agent bath.

Asking for an off road racer friend :)

So with certain metals (copper alloys are real bad about it, google Bronze Disease,) when they are exposed to NaCl (salt, as in what's in salt water) the chloride atoms will migrate into the metal and you have to use very specific processes to leech the chloride ions out of metal.  If you don't get the ions out of the metal then they will always degrade the metal

I'm not sure if iron/steel is a metal that will allow chloride ions to diffuse into it, but it might.  Even if it doesn't travel into the metal you'd have to open up all the pockets where water might get to (such as frames and unibodies and whatnot) and drain and cleanse the salt residue away from the metal in order to ensure that it would not have any future rust.

Folgers said:

I’m wondering how a first gen ram with a Cummins would fare. 

Seems like you replace starter, alternator, and essential fluids and be good??

Any other electronic gremlins could be bypassed as they show up? Not much to go wrong...

The drivetrain might be fine, but the body and chassis will be dust in about a week.

The magic number for a saltwater sunk outboard engine is about 6 hours. If you don't get to it by then it's a write off. Inboards are about the same. 

Any electronics that aren't potted are dead instantly. Salt water is conductive. 

12v batteries will work submerged. A high voltage battery is going to be a different animal. It would need to be water tight and the connections would also need to be sealed to stop shorts. Not just splash proof but submerged for hours water tight. 

Any car made post carburetors that spent any time submerged in salt water I would consider to be junk. 

I would be very leary of any good deals on Florida cars for the next year or two. 

I would assume EV battery packs are watertight. The last thing they want in there is moisture.

Even so, i would still guess a submerged car is still a total loss.

Keith Tanner said:

But it would be interesting to know just how waterproof the HV systems are on production EVs (not Fiskers). Obviously they have some level of waterproofing or you wouldn't be able to drive in the rain!

I've seen one photo of a burned-out shell of a Tesla that was ostensibly caused by immersion in salt water from Ian (man it's weird to see my name attached to that hurricane).

But yeah, burned out or otherwise, if a car has been underwater (especially saltwater) it's at best useful as a source of parts for a race car.  Unless it's a Esprit, of course. :)

I would imagine that an EV could be better off than an ICE, as it is likely easier to make everything in the drivetrain watertight, and there are less parts to replace. That said, I don't think that everything that would need to be watertight is, and then we are still left with everything else on the car that was submerged in salt water. As everyone else has said, it's a "no" for me, regardless of the propulsion. 
 

Interesting tidbit: my ex-uncle buys flood cars. He will ONLY buy cars with power seats. His theory is that the power seats are the lowest lying electrical component in the car and the first to go. If the seats work well, he'll take the risk. He said he hasn't been burned yet. 

We instantly total anything with water over the seats (doesn't matter what kind of water).

A local rebuilder used to buy the occasional flood car. He had a Hyundai Elantra that had seen just a bit of salt water on the floor. The corrosion in that thing was visible without pulling the carpet. I would never, ever buy a salt water flood car.

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