My UrQ Can't Swim

[William Elliott <wcelliot@concentric.net>]

I hope you're dry wherever you are tonight.  Over 6" of rain fell today
in SE WI.  Basements completely filled with water, interstates closed
due to flooding. (I came out lucky... only about a quarter inch in my
basement.)  Parts of the state declared a disaster area.  People on city
streets stranded on top of their cars in 3-4' of water!

My story:  I go out to the parking lot which is standing in 6" of
water.  The UrQ starts fine and I very slowly pull out of the parking
lot.  Everything's fine, rain is coming down in sheets.

The roads are wet, but no standing water.  About 3 miles down the road,
with the car warmed up normally, I accelerate from a stop light.  As
soon as boost comes on, the car kicks violently. Seemed to run okay
without boost.  Another few hundred yards down the road, it dies. Not
suddenly (like an electrical problem) and not missing like a fuel
problem, but it just seemed to lose power gradually until it died.

So, I'm sitting by the side of the road in a tremendous storm. All the
gauges read normally.  Car turns over fine, but won't "catch".

I check under the hood.  Distributor and wires are dry.  Really not much
water under the hood at all.  The fuel pump fuse was fine. Connections
at the fuel pump look okay.

For the next 15-20 minutes, every few minutes I try starting it. No
good, just tuns over, occasionally trying to start, but never really
catching.  Throttle position doesn't seem to have any effect.

Then it stumbles to life (like my occasional hot start problem) and runs
fine, including at full boost.

My question: what was the problem?  I would really like for this _not_
not to happen again.  I'm assuming this may be signaling a forthcoming
failure... or is it just water-related?  Any ideas would be appreciated.

Bill Elliott
Lake Mills, WI