Midnight_ep3

Hi everyone, I've read through tons of forums before but this time they just didn't help so I decided to give posting my own a shot. So I have a 2003 Honda civic si hatchback. It has the original k20 block, K24a2 head, K24a2 camshafts, K20a2 cam gears, Injen cold air intake, Honed block to 87mm, Wesico pistons, Hks connecting rods, and I just purchased the hondata k-pro version 4 tunable ecu. Sadly, I did not do any of the work myself (besides the ecu of course) I picked it up on a trade for an old beat up chevy blazer, so getting it running correctly has been a pain. Like the title states everytime I come to a stop the car dies and it takes a few times cranking it to get it to start again, sometimes if I let the rpms drop to 1k before completely stopping it won't stall, Orr sometimes it will. The issue I've been dealing with since I've owned the car is the fact that while driving it, it won't let me go above 4000 rpms,like it's in some sort of limp mode. The scariest part is that it has developed a terrible sounding rattle type of sound coming from the right side of the engine bay when the car is running, which happens to be the side where the timing chain is (original owner also said he did timing 5k miles before I got the car. I've removed and cleaned out the throttle body, and iacv, cleaned all sensors and connectors for them, and fully secured the air intake to the throttle body (previously just kinda sat there not tightened down and would fall off). Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks.

JRCivic1

First, do you have a CEL ??? If so, what codes are stored ???

Second, the combination of short block, cylinder head and cam package is uncommon. There is NO start up calibration in the tune library that will run this engine properly... so you ABSOLUTELY NEED A TUNE. Seek a reputable tuner and your idle issues will be a thing of the past. Codes may be creating the 4K rev limit, and the tuner should also be able to resolve this. As for the noise that you believe to be in the timing chain area... you will need to provide more information to get some help on this. A video/audio recording may be helpful if you can post one.

TomCat39

You might need to get more details on what PO did for timing 5K ago.

The K series is known to have issues with the timing chain tensioner over time. It should be replaced every 100,000 Kilometers or so just to avoid issues. When idling or low rpm the oil pressure is low and the tensioner relies on the spring to maintain tension. That spring weakens with time. It's a pretty easy part to replace and will keep the chain in good working order. Also I'm not sure on the K24's valve spring rates or cam lobe profile. It's very likely that the profile requires heavier springs and is a higher lobe which is also known to damage the teeth on the OEM timing chain tensioner. If this is the case then you will want to spend the 300 dollars on the Hybrid Racing K timing chain tensioner. It's a far superior built tensioner for aggressive cam applications.

https://www.hybrid-racing.com/produc...series-engines

And driving that mish mash of engine parts together without a tune..... Asking for trouble. I second JRCivic's recommendation of getting the car tuned.