Unfortunately I wasn't with Elaine when this happened, I was at the other end of her mobile giving my best advice. So I don't know about the exhaust colour, but it might have been cold anyway. It's worth noting though, that with KRM up on her front paws atm, Elaine is parking the opposite side of the road and due to width etc., we have to straddle the pavement. Aka, the car sits at quite an angle much of the time. I think she also lets the car get quite low, so that I have to fill it up. So we are not good at keeping the tank full, which must not only increase the probability of picking up water, but allow more moist air to be 'breathed' into the tank, to subsequently condense on the walls and run down into the bottom of the fuel. I'm suggesting keeping a tank full(ish) ought to reduce that.
I asked about lights and all she saw was the battery light because it stalled and idled very slowly. I'm surprised it didn't pickup any misfires. If you recall the US Cougar user manual warning light info that Andy kindly posted recently, it had a lot to say about misfires and fuel and some of those lights were tempoary codes too. Sadly no MIL light, but I could still run the reader on it.
I spoke earlier to the local garage and he suggested looking for a 'drain screw' on the filter. So I checked the Haynes manual and sure enough it is mentioned. There is also a 'Water Level Switch' in the filter housing, so you would have thought that ought to have triggered an MIL light. Maybe its too common and GM didn't want to make their vehicles look too 'sensitive'.
What it really needs is one of these off an old Ferguson tractor !
I have a smaller 'electric drill pump' like the ones you were looking at. I bought two at a boot sale and took one apart as it didn't work. It has a 'flap wheel' impellor, so I have to be sure to prime it and not to let it dry out in use ( the dud one had melted inside! ). I also have a 'peristaltic pump' out of something. Hopefully not out of anything hospital related. This just has rollers that pinch a replaceable piece of tube, so it can be used for anything and the tube replaced. I think the biggest problem would be getting past the antisyphon device in the filler.
If that can be done and it turns out to be a plastic tank, maybe a thin tube with a magnetic end could be manoeuvred using an old hard drive magnet, down to the lowest point. The garage also suggested using some RedeX injector cleaner ( half price in Tesco ? ) in the next tank. We're going to try not to drive it until I've done the filter at least.
Thanks for your input Chris, much appreciated as always...