DEL FORO "MUD IN MY BLOOD"
HOW TO RECOVER A SUNK BIKE
I've been getting a lot of PMs on the various forums that I'm on about what to do when they either sink the bike or the bike dies with the pipe under water and the oil gets milked, so rather then type everything out over and over again lol I'll post it here and just direct people here. I know I've heard many different "procedures" to recover a sunk bike, this is the way that I've always used and its worked great for me on more then one bike. Hope it helps someone.
First and foremost, if the bike dies in the water with the pipe under water, if you don't get it to restart within about 2 seconds after it dies, DO NOT TRY TO START IT.
Get it out of the water, stand the bike up on the back rack to get all the water out of the pipe, then set the bike back down and pull the spark plug/s out and crank the motor over to make sure there is no water in the cylinder/s and to also make sure the spark plug is dry, if the plug is wet either use a lighter to dry it off or put a new one in it. If the bike is carb'd, you need to drain the carb/s also to make sure there is no water in the carb bowl/s.
Now start the bike up let it run for 30 seconds to a minute then shut if off and check the oil, if the oil is milky don't run it any more for any reason, tow it back to camp/the truck/the house where ever you may be.
Drain the oil out of the engine, don't remove the oil filter yet, pull the spark plug/s back out and unplug the ignition coil/s so it doesn't try to spark (VERY IMPORTANT TO DISABLE THE COIL/S) and put about a gallon of diesel fuel in the engine, crank the engine over for about 30seconds to let the diesel fuel circulate through the entire engine, after you stop cranking the bike shake the crap out of the bike to help stir everything up and hopefully get all the grit out of the little nooks and crannys then let the bike sit for about 5-10min to help get all the dirt and water in the engine to settle to the bottom of the engine by the drain plug then drain the diesel fuel out, and keep repeating the same steps over and over again until you have clean diesel being drained out of the engine.
Once you've got clean diesel coming out of the engine replace the oil filter with a new one at this time and fill the engine with the proper amount of oil, put the spark plug/s back in and plug the coil/s back in and start the motor and let it run for about a min or so, let the bike sit for about 5-10min and drain the oil out, then fill the bike up with the proper amount of oil again, run the bike for 5 mins or so (its ok to ride it around the yard or something while it runs no need to really push it though) then drain the oil out, replace the oil filter again at this time, fill the engine up with the proper amount of oil and you should be good to go. Some people like to use a cheap oil for the flushing process, just make sure if your bike has a wet clutch in it use an oil approved for use with a wet clutch even for the flushing process. Better safe then sorry.
NOTE: You cannot flush the engine too much, so if there is even a question in your mind about if you should do it more, do it more lol.
The diffs require a very similar process, I use diesel to flush out the diffs also cause it works so much faster then using gear oil, I have used transmission fluid also to flush the diffs out also, but diesel is cheaper. This procedure is nice and simple imo, jack up the end of the bike being worked on so you can rotate the tires by hand, drain the milked gear oil out, fill the diff with as much diesel as you can get in it, put the fill cap back in and rotate the tires by hand to stir everything up, drain out the diesel, repeat till there is clean fuel coming out of the diff then do it one more time with gear oil to get all the diesel out of the diff, then fill it up to the proper level and you're good to go.
NOTE: This does not apply to any diff that uses a special type fluid and/or additive as I cannot guarantee that the diesel will not harm those diffs.
I would hope that the fuel tank would be somewhat self explanitory, but all you really need to do is dump out the contaminated fuel and put some fresh in, and again make sure there is no water in the carb bowl/s. Putting some fuel treatment or denatured alcohol won't hurt either but really shouldn't be "neccessary".
WARNING: I cannot guarantee that this process will save your bike's engine or any other component, flushing the engine is not a sure bet, but many times it can help delay a rebuild by a good long while if done properly.
EXTRA:
Just to add...i would recommend changin the oil filter at first also. it traps alot of trash and water. so if you flush thru it, then that water and whatever trash that is small enuf to go thru it will keep circulating thru the motor.
Did you put a little bit of oil through the spark plug holes to get compression back on the pistons?
Also, make sure your exhaust pipe isn't full of water...
