D16SiHatch

background: boosted, obd1, tuned on crome, blew a hg on cyl 1/4
-stock b18c1
-arp head studs
-cleaned and resurfaced valves, new valve stem seals, pressure tested, head milled.

problem: cranks but will not start

what i do know:

Cam timing is dead nuts on. compression test revealed 180+ psi in all cylinders, cylinder leakdown showed 10-20%, well within the acceptable range. It is spraying fuel; plugs and tops of cylinders getting visibly wet. I can pull a plug, crank the engine, and watch it spark.

At this point the only thing i can figure that may be wrong is the distributor. although its unusual because i still have spark.. I am however unsure if it's sparking strong enough.. (for all i know the spark, if its weak, may be getting blown out once the plug is in the combustion chamber). Just put it in new ngk's gapped at .052


So at this point i am ready to buy a distributor, but i don't want to buy one if i don't need to. at this point however i have no idea what else could be preventing it from starting. Maybe i just need a fresh set of eyes to take a look at it from a different perspective, or perhaps someone else has seen something like this happen before.

twotonecivic

check your grounds, especially the one on the tstat housing

912fourtysx

your timing could be 180 out to check for this you can switch 1 and 4 plug wires on the dizzy if it starts your 180 out if it doesn't then the problem is elsewhere.

D16SiHatch

-Ground on t-stat is good, already checked it even though it was never removed.

- 912fourtysx; not sure what you're getting at with the timing bein 180 out and the purpose of switching 2 wires, can you explain further? Distributor only will fit it the cam one way, and the spark plug wires were never removed from the cap. At tdc the rotor button is pointing at cyl 1

NVturbo

timing.......

D16SiHatch

more specific? this is how things look as of right now

tdc mark is directly below the notch in the cover




and cam gears are where i believe they should be

farfrumugen

saying its 180 out means that the number 1 piston will be at tdc twice in a cycle. you must make sure its at tdc compression and not tdc exhaust. you could be 180 out. that would be my best guess
adam jeffery

Civic2Fast

what color spark are you getting??

NVturbo

gapped at .25? I believe it's supposed to be .44

D16SiHatch

.44 if it's stock b16, .52 if stock gsr. my car is boosted however, which is why I'm running .28

it runs now!,

although i'm still unsure what i did to screw it up. I switched 1 and 4, and 2 and 3 plug wires on the cap, and it started immediately. The distributor can't be installed 180 out because the tab is off-center to prevent just such a thing. The cam gear can only go on one way.. so i guess I'm having a hard time figuring out how this occurred.

farfrumugen

not the distributor 180 out, the crankshaft timing could be 180 out
adam jeffery

912fourtysx

You can switch the dizzy pieces it is a snap ring and slide pin holding on the piece that goes into the cam. Well it was that way on my friends h22 and my b18. Pm me your number and I'll send you pics of what exactly I'm talking about it takes about ten minutes to do everything.

D16SiHatch

Appreciate the offer but i actually got it worked out. Just had to set engine to tdc, remove distributor, rotate the crank one full revolution back to tdc, and then reinstall the distributor. I managed to install the distributor firing tdc exhaust not tdc compression. I don't know why it took me to long in my mind to figure this out, ugh.

Put new ngk bkr7e's in gapped at .28 and it drove great save for the fact that 1psi of boost caused it to ignition cut. Dropped the gap down to about .15 and i was able to see 4-5psi before cut. I remembered some days ago discovering a build-up of crud that i scraped off the points on the inside of the cap, so i imagine the gap may be greater between the rb and points, which is causing the spark to blow out unless the plug gap is real small. I will be picking up a new msd cap/rotor kit tomorrow and i hope that resolves it.

D16SiHatch

Well that seems to have done it, doesn't cut out any more after installing the new msd cap and rotor. Now i just need to get out and drive it for awhile to see if the head gasket is really fixed, I'm like afraid to lay into it for too long lol

charlie-bit-me

im in the process of a d16y7 block/y8 head (mini me) swap and ive replaced the icm but a weak ish spark could this be happening to my motor as well. im kinda new to distributor motors so any help would be greatly appreciated.