It can be very stressful and frustrating to find out your car has a seized engine. You have no idea if it can be repaired or if you can afford repairs. You need to decide what makes the most sense for your situation considering the repair cost could be substantial.
Occasionally, repairs will be fairly inexpensive but more likely they will be expensive. If you can’t afford repairs or just don’t want to pay for repairs you could sell the car in the condition it is in. This will give you money that you can use towards a new or used running vehicle.
What is a seized engine?
A seized engine is when the moving parts of a car’s engine stick and no longer move enough to rotate the crankshaft. This often happens without proper lubrication and could increase the friction between moving parts. If an engine seizes, it can damage important parts of the engine, like the crankshaft, piston, and bearings.
Recognizing a seized engine is critical because if you keep trying to start the car, it’s going to do more damage. Getting a timely diagnosis, and fixing the initial causes of seizure, is essential to maximize the chance of doing no further damage, and keeping the repair costs down.
How to Tell If Your Car Engine is Seized?
First, you need to ensure that you are experiencing engine-seizure symptoms before you decide what to do with your engine. A mechanic can verify that this is the problem easily. An engine may be locked for other reasons, which you will need to eliminate.
Engine not Starting
If you have an engine that is seized, when you go to start it, it may simply not start. However, even if the engine is seized your car battery will provide power to the radio, heater, AC and other components that you can use.
If you feel any pounding or clunking while cranking the engine, you could be hearing things knock when the starter hits the flywheel.
Check Engine Light
The check engine light will trigger for any issues that arise with the engine
Whenever you have any sort of issue with the vehicle’s engine, your check engine dashboard warning light will present itself.
This is as classic as it gets when there is a problem with your vehicle. The red warning light usually indicates that there is a problem triggered by your vehicle’s diagnostic reading.
Engine Noises
Under the hood of your vehicle, there are a lot of moving things, and wear on components and parts will make noises. These noises may signal engine issues for you. If you notice a change in sound from your exhaust pipe, this may be an indicator that you are having an engine blowout.
Before the engine seizes, you may notice some weird sounds like tapping/knocking. The sounds will amplify over time as the piston connected to the rod strikes the crankshaft.
Sudden Odour Inside the Vehicle
You may start sensing a smoke odour inside your vehicle.
If you can smell burning or smoke inside the vehicle, then this is an indication of seizing. Even if you can’t pinpoint it but sense a different odour inside the vehicle, do not wait and have it checked by a professional.
Catalytic converter or external odours are completely different than the odour when there is a problem with your engine.
Poor Speed
Another common symptom of the engine seizing is the inability to operate a vehicle at a normal speed. You can expect a decrease in performance with the seized engine.
This means that every time you press the gas pedal to accelerate your vehicle, it probably won’t go as fast as it normally would. You probably can’t even increase acceleration at all. Eventually, it will come to rest, and your engine will stall completely.
Burnt Wires
It is also possible for the engine wire to either damaged or burn after failure.
The seize engine doesn’t burn the wires, it occurs after the fail. There is also a distinct problem when you turn the vehicle on, and or crank the engine.
The wire starts overheating when the starter can’t turn the engine on. Remember, it is also possible to smell burning wire, which is normally after the engine has seized.
Physical Damage
The car engine seizes when internal parts become loose and get lodged in other components, such as the piston connecting rods. If they pierce through the engine block, the piston rod will now break.
What Causes An Engine To Seize?
Before we discuss how to fix a seized engine and if it’s worth it to fix it first, we need to know what does seized engine even means. Engines seize as a result of mechanical failure.
Oil Problems
Most of the time, this is caused by a lack of oil. The oil could be sitting there, not circulating, or it could be that there is no oil. Without oil, you have no internal lubrication, and metal parts, as they rub against each other, create friction. In extreme cases, this can even cause some bearings to bond or weld to other parts.
This type of problem can happen if you run your engine out of oil or if you don’t have regular oil changes done. It is also possible to see a no oil seized engine as a result of sudden internal failures of their engine, and failures of engine oil pumps, etc. In addition to no oil, it is similar because it is also a low oil scenario.
Not running enough
An engine could also seize when it has sufficient oil. This is because of not running the auto enough. That type of cause happens when rust “freezes” the piston rings to the cylinder walls. You can avoid the cause of a seized engine by running your car occasionally.
Hydro Locked Engines
You may also have a hydrolocked engine. This occurs if water makes its way into the combustion chamber of the engine. This causes the piston to not make the top of the stroke of the combustion cycle since the water won’t compress like the air-fuel mixture is designed to.
If you have a hydro locked engine, it will almost certainly stop without warning. If you are lucky enough to have it happen at low speeds, you may have minimal damage done to the engine. If it happens when you are working the engine and the RPMs are significantly higher, expect damaged pistons and bent connecting rods at the very least.
A hydrolocked engine almost always occurs from water entering the engine through the air intake. Hydro locking is most common if you accidentally hit a high-water flood in traffic.
Vapor Locked Engines
It is possible your engine is vapor locked. If this happens, the engine will not start from the fuel system issue. This is found in older cars quite often if they have low-pressure fuel systems.
What will happen is the gas that is being pulled from the pump and in the lines converts from liquid to gas, starving the engine. You will notice a vapor lock by the engine sputtering, losing power, and turning off, as well as not being able to restart.
Vapor locked engines almost always happen from extremely high temperatures. The fuel temperature rises in line and the fuel vaporizes. Since the fuel pump is not designed to move vapor, it shuts off.
Overheating
Overheating would be the cause of the vapor locked engine, and could be due to many things, such as a bad water pump, a stuck closed thermostat, low coolant levels, or a leaking hose.
Broken Timing Belt
Although not common, a seized engine can occur if the timing belt or chain breaks while driving. In this case, you would expect the sound of the seized engine with a loud knock and a sudden stop.
How To Free Up a Seized Engine- Your First Steps
If your engine has seized up and you have already diagnosed the symptoms, it is time to learn how to free up a seized engine!
If you’re lucky, you may be able to fix yourself straight away. Switch your transmission to neutral and figure out a safe spot, if you’re not already, but just see if you can turn the engine over one or two times.
Do not keep trying after that point either, especially if it will not crank. You can create damage and could have to do more than repair the seized engine after.
Follow the few simple steps below, and you can give your engine a brand new life and get it running well. Let’s get started.
Step 1: Check the Oil Level
First thing you want to do is check the oil level in the engine. It may sound basic, but it is a critical step. Remove the dipstick from the engine, wipe it off, re insert it, then check for the oil level. If you oil level is sufficient, than go on to the next step.
Having an adequate oil level is a positive start in reviving your engine after having to check for any inappropriate oil levels.
Step 2: Lubricate the Engine
Now it is time to add some lubrication to play the role. Remove the spark plug before doing that; it will allow you access to the insides of the engine.
Once you have the spark plug somewhere safe, add a small amount of WD-40 lubricant or Marvel Mystery Oil into the cylinder. Both products are easy to find in big box home improvement stores, and both are proven products to penetrate and lubricate.
Step 3: Let the Lubricant Work
After you put in the lubricant, the waiting stage will begin. You can wait for approximately one hour before proceeding to the next step, recording to let the lubricant penetrate deep into the engine components to break down built-up rust and corrosion from ions of having a seized engine.
Step 4: Gently Pull The Recoil Starter
Now that you have allowed the lubricant ample time to work, it is time to gently pull the recoil starter. You should know that pulling the recoil starter does take a little finesse.
What you want to do is pull gently at first, and gradually give it more strength until you feel the engine starting to give. You want to do this step to work the lubricant into the mechanism and start loosening up parts that were seized.
Step 5: Clear excessive lubricant. Reassemble the engine.
Continue pulling off the recoil starter a few more times to clear any excessive lubricant. Then go ahead and put the spark plug back in securely and prepare to give the engine an honest start.
What To Do With A Locked Engine?
You will need to figure out what caused your engine to lock up before you can fix the problem. If the engine seized while you were driving it, then you will be making many costly repairs and need the help of a mechanic. Even learning how to fix a seized engine with no oil may just be as simple as using the best penetrating oil for seized engines.
If your engine seized due to sitting time, start by removing the spark plugs from the engine cylinders. Fill each cylinder with engine oil and wait a few days and then try to rotate the crankshaft clockwise with a breaker bar. The results of that will help you decide if you need to rebuild or replace the engine or if you can just fix it.
If you have a hydrolocked engine, then you must remove the spark plugs and immediately crank your engine so it can pump the water out of the cylinders. You may get lucky and have a low cost of engine seizure repair, assuming there was no interior damage to the engine.
If your engine has vapor locked, you need to allow your car to cool so the fuel vapor will cool and condense. You can just wait, or you can splash ice or cold water on the fuel pump and the lines.
Can You Fix A Seized Engine?
Besides knowing how to tell if an engine is seized, there is some confusion about whether there is a fix for a seized engine. Some people will even tell you can’t fix a seized engine, but actually, it is situational.
It is entirely based on the cause of the problem. If an engine has seized from a lack of oil, and you catch the problem soon enough, it is possible to fix the engine. The same can be said for a bad starter or a seized engine.
However, the same scenario might happen, and if you did not respond at the time, it may have created damage to other engine component groups. If you were dealing with a bad starter or a seized engine with no oil, the damage may be so extreme that it doesn’t make sense to repair.
Each situation is unique, and while you can learn to know how to break loose a seized engine, it is not feasible to know how to unlock a seized engine in every instance. Sometimes it is just not practical, and even experts are left with dead engines.
Typically, when you have asked what a seized engine sounds like, the answer might be louder or more noise, indicating potentially greater and more difficult repairs.
Freeing a Seized Engine – How Much Should You Pay?
Understanding how a seized engine occurs is one thing, but you also need to know how much it will cost to free it up. The cost depends on what causes the problem and how bad it was damaged of course.
If you were lucky to get a problem from a hydrolocked engine, all you will have to do is to pay for an oil change and some new spark plugs. Or maybe you will have to pay a lot of money and replace your engine, or have it rebuilt.
If the problem was due to something like an overheating fuel pump, you will probably have to replace the fuel pump, which might also cost $500 to $1500 to replace.
Can I Rebuild It?
Maybe you would be able to rebuild it to fix a no oil seized engine, but the labor to do that would be very expensive and likely impossible.
The mechanic is going to have to inspect your auto and completely disassemble it, then spend hours of labor reassembling it. It would just be a lot of mechanical labor hours of determining the mechanic could not rebuild your engine.
When to consider an engine replacement.
With any engine that needs to be rebuilt or replaced, expect it to cost you at least couple of thousand bucks minimum, likely $3000 at a minimum.
If the cost depend on your make and model of auto and the type of labor involved, plus whether you choose a new engine or a rebuilt engine.
Engine Failure and Car Accidents
A seized engine can lead to an accident. For example, a car stalls at an intersection, leading to an accident. A car without power while merging onto the highway. An abrupt stop may cause a rear-end collision.
In these events, the driver has no time to safely pull over or another driver had no time to react. If an engine failure caused, or contributed to the accident, serious safety and liability questions arise.
If you have been injured in a car accident involving engine failure or sudden stalling, contact a car accident law firm to learn about your legal rights.