So, I'm in New Jersey, and we just had an enormous amount of rainfall in the past 24 hours. All the roads got flooded and then we lost power, which has yet to come back on. There is debris ALL over the road (I felt like I was in a Bridgestone commercial tonight) and it's just a complete mess.
Anyway, earlier today, when everything was flooded. I went out driving to "inspect" the problems. First, I got to the end of my street to find the road flooded. Last time that happened, I put two tires up on the curb to get an extra bit of height and forded it. This time, as I drove, it got to the point where the water was probably at least over the top of the bumper on the left and likely 8+ inches up the door sill. So I decided to slowly back out and wait. Another SUV got stuck in the middle and the cops came to block the road off. When that finally cleared, I went to another road with a small one-lane bridge, and sure enough the river was going AROUND the bridge. Everyone was turning around, but I went through that (about a foot of water.) I went through a few more flooded roads up to probably a foot and a half at worst - it was pretty exciting. I love my Outback.
Anyway, this brings me to my question. When I get a new car, one of the things I'd like to to is bring the car to someone and have done whatever has to be done to make it "waterproof" up to a certain depth (most likely the hood scoop.) Obviously the air intake is the main concern, but I'm certain there are other things that need to be done to a car to ensure there won't be any problems in deeper water. Just curious if anyone here has a Jeep or something that they've done that to, and what they had to do and how much it costs to do something like that. I also wonder if anything special has to be done to keep things like the engine block from cracking, or if that won't happen as long as you don't plow into the water. Thanks!
Anyway, earlier today, when everything was flooded. I went out driving to "inspect" the problems. First, I got to the end of my street to find the road flooded. Last time that happened, I put two tires up on the curb to get an extra bit of height and forded it. This time, as I drove, it got to the point where the water was probably at least over the top of the bumper on the left and likely 8+ inches up the door sill. So I decided to slowly back out and wait. Another SUV got stuck in the middle and the cops came to block the road off. When that finally cleared, I went to another road with a small one-lane bridge, and sure enough the river was going AROUND the bridge. Everyone was turning around, but I went through that (about a foot of water.) I went through a few more flooded roads up to probably a foot and a half at worst - it was pretty exciting. I love my Outback.
Anyway, this brings me to my question. When I get a new car, one of the things I'd like to to is bring the car to someone and have done whatever has to be done to make it "waterproof" up to a certain depth (most likely the hood scoop.) Obviously the air intake is the main concern, but I'm certain there are other things that need to be done to a car to ensure there won't be any problems in deeper water. Just curious if anyone here has a Jeep or something that they've done that to, and what they had to do and how much it costs to do something like that. I also wonder if anything special has to be done to keep things like the engine block from cracking, or if that won't happen as long as you don't plow into the water. Thanks!
.