1G Water in Spark Plug Wells - Stock 4G63 Turbo

[rrmbrembo14]

Hi all. This my first post on DSMtuners. I recently picked up a 1990 Talon TSi AWD. The car is in pretty good condition but needs some refurbishing. I recently drove it home from the shop where they did the steering rack and front control arms. The drive was about 1/2 hour (18 miles) or so and the last mile or so I noticed hesitation and running rough in the mid RPMs. I got home and shut the car down and did not see any issues. I finally had time today to dig into it and found that it still seemed to run rough/have a misfire when I was moving it. I found milky white "water" in the spark plug well of cylinder 4. Also, the plug wire boot had rust residue on it.

The other spark plug wells look fine (see third pic for cylinder 3).

Long story short, has anyone run into this? I have tried to search with little luck.
Here is the plan of attack so far:
1. Drain oil and look for coolant
2. Compression test on all cylinders
If no coolant is found in the oil I plan on vacuuming out the water, soaking up the remainder and changing the plugs and wires and seeing what happens.

Any input would be amazing!

 

[BLACK'98DSM]

Remove it and see if it comes back. Based on the rust it has sat in there for a while. It probably wouldn't hurt to replace those plug wires either, since they help keep stuff out as well.

 

[Jk's97DSM]

The shop probably sprayed water to clean up the mess that power steering fluid makes and got some water in the holes. If you haven’t done it yet, use and air hose and blow the tubes out and replace the spark plugs for good measure.

 

[rrmbrembo14]

Thanks everyone! Going to tackle it Thursday evening when the plugs and wires come in.