HYDROLOCKED Now running rough and stalling HELP!

Hi All,
Here's the tech details story,
So i've got a 98 xj with a 3.5 lift and 31's. I was wheeling last sunday and hydrolocked the engine is a deep puddle. In the field i took out the spark plugs and water filter then spun the engine with the starter. Good amount of water came out. Also dried the intake with a rag and fished around to get it as dry as possible before replacing the plugs and wheeling for the rest of the day. She ran OK
Next day after i got back i replaced the oil and oil filter and checked for crud in the intake; oil seemed ok too.
Now it can;t idle well at all, and when i hit the gas she'll rev up well and then die rather than coming back to idle. I checked the pistens via the plugs and they seem to be firing but it still skips a beat a few times a minute (via the dollar bill on the exhaust test).
Runs well when cold but once it heats up it's crap; and runs terribly when it is raining.
Is it sensors (MAP, TPS, IAC)? Did i bend a rod" Break a valve? What do you think i'm planning on doing a cumbustion test with a guage on the cylinders tomorrow and put a meter on the sensors (if i can get it to stay running).

HELP! THANKS

Did you pull the distributor cap and dry it out?

Well since it runs well when cold I would not guess a bent rod or anything that extreme. Try cleaning all connections for your sensors especially the O2 sensor since it runs bad when warm. Also could be the Crank sensor connections.
Re check all your spark plugs as well. Make sure there tight.

Sensor connections look good and the plugs are snug. The thing is that even if i hold the throttle to keep it at 1000rpms in park she'll skip a beat alittle bit once in a while. I could just adjust the throttle to idle high but it's super gutless right now; i'm thinking something is off with sensors; but would that also explain the occasional misfire/skipping?

I havn't pulled the distributer ima check that real quick right now; but she looks pretty sealed

Just pop the cap off and look for moisture. You could shoot the cap inside with spray start to remove residual moisture. Make sure it airs out good before you reinstall. Spray start can be explosive. (Saw that happen, LOL.)

Distributer looks ok. I don't think moisture is the prob because it ran fine afterwards when everything was the wetest

I did that once and cracked a piston. Had to rebuild it.

Did you look inside? It could have initially been water, and then it got hot and vaporized droplets all over the inside of the cap. It's not like it's hard to do.

Winterbeater - no i didn't the two screws on the sides of it are rusted and look stripped, but if it's a strong possibility i'll put the time into it with a pair of vice grips and elbow grease

Sounds like you need a new cap and rotor anyway if it hasn't been off in that long. I've never seen one stuck on like that! Good luck with that. It DOES need to come off. The cap and rotor are the weak link in the ignition circuit (except for the wires and plugs). I strongly suggest that you get that apart. Use PB blaster and be careful. If you broke off the screws in the housing, it would be a pain to get them out. Probably time for a Junkyard replacement if that happens.

Mine doesn't have the cap system. Are you sure that those screws hold the cap to the distributor housing? If so, you might want to carefully bust the cap off so you can get better access to the screws.

Edit addendum: OK, I loooked up the part and saw the screws. It looks like a lousy Phillips head. But the ones I saw also looked like they had a hex on the outside. Maybe it will help to wrench on the hex with a six point socket. If it's real tight, soak in PB blaster.

Could my crankshaft position sensor have gotten wet? And would if have gotten worse and worse like it has been?
Update to date -
-replaced spark plug wires
-oil change and engine flush
-oil pressure now low
--- Car seems to be ok when it does idle but it still dies very offten after coming down from high revs

HELP - today i plan on checking sensors via a multimeter - TPS, IAC and CPS

Until you know the underlying condition I wouldn't be worrying about sensors. Do a full compression test. Pull the pan and do an inspection.

You could be wasting money.

SqueegieSteve said:

Could my crankshaft position sensor have gotten wet? And would if have gotten worse and worse like it has been?
Update to date -
-replaced spark plug wires
-oil change and engine flush
-oil pressure now low
--- Car seems to be ok when it does idle but it still dies very offten after coming down from high revs

HELP - today i plan on checking sensors via a multimeter - TPS, IAC and CPS

Click to expand...

Christ on a cracker, have you pulled the cap and checked it yet!

Haha yes i pulled the distributer and cleaned the terminals... Had to drill out a bolt to do it though what a pain.

Just for grins, start it, then pull the oil filler cap. Do you see/feel air/gasses coming out?

With it cold, pull the radiator cap and watch for bubbles/gasses coming out.

Did you replace your spark plugs? How do they look?

- Old Man -
Sure i'll do those two things and post back in an hour... What should that tell me>?

JNickel101 said:

Did you replace your spark plugs? How do they look?

Click to expand...

The plugs looked fine i didn't replace them

I would suspect the TPS as the culprit. This is an obvious question but it hasnt been addressed yet...Is there a check engine light on?

check engine is on...
Always threw the code for the coolant sensor (i replaced it and it never went off before the hydrolocking)
now i've got codes for the TPS and the IAC and i think a couple others. I am pretty sure that when one throws it can set off the others too though. The TPS potentiometer is hanging outside the throttle so i don;t see how water going through the intake could break it.