really dumb thing to do with pool shock

[Farm boy]

ok so if any of you remember i was changing my tranny from a th350 to a sm465 late summer/early fall. well i did get that done n all i have left is the drive shaft. but thats not the problem, here is what im having trouble with: today i tried to start the old girl just to hear her run bc she hasnt moved under her own power since i stuck her in the garage in August, well she started right up but ran like crap! so i started trying to figure out what i did wrong. here is what has been done to the engine sine it was parked. i have taken the distributor out so i could get the engine angled low enough to get the tranny in, so then i got it all in and put it back in and hooked it all back up n then after a lot of frustration, fiddling, and starter fluid i got it going. well since then i  needed to swap out the headers, so i drained the coolant (into used rinsed out pool shock bottles) , took out the temp sensor, swapped the headers n then put it back together. well when i went to put the coolant back in i was really dumb and wound up putting in a new gallon of pool shock so i drained it back out but do to something else i had to go to i didnt get water in it for a good week or so to thin it out n then drain again. so that said how bad is it to put pool shock in a chevy 350? and would it mess it up enough to make it run really bad? if not then any ideas?

[bake315]

Oof.  One thing chlorine is really really good at is making things rust and/or corrode.  I can only imagine concentrated would only accelerate that process.  Did you start it before you realized what you'd done?

[Farm boy]

ok i went back out and figured out that the choke was stuck on so its back to running good
but i put it in and then realized it right away and drained it right back out. but then i didnt do anything with it for a good week to thin down anything that was still in there. do u think it could cause any problems or am i more or less safe?

[bake315]

I think it could definitely cause problems.  Even if you drained it right back out, the fact that it sat for a week with not only the residue but in some cases several cups' worth standing in various places in the engine probably ate things up a lot.  If you haven't yet, I'd be pulling every heater and radiator hose off, and forcing fresh water into every orifice to try and get as much as you can out that way.  Flush out the radiator separately.  Then reconnect everything and fill with plain water.  Then maybe try and start it, and hope that the water pump hasn't seized up completely.  If it hasn't, then I would then look at running a baking soda solution through it for a few minutes to neutralize whatever's left. Then drain/flush thoroughly top off with fresh coolant, and pray.

[Farm boy]

oh boy, sounds like im in for some work:P although at least the water pump still works bc it was running last night

[bake315]

oh boy, sounds like im in for some work:P although at least the water pump still works bc it was running last night

That is a bit of good news for sure.  Good luck!