THE_EM1

Hey guys! Well yeah....

I picked up a mint as hell 97 civic cx hatch about a month and a half ago from a mechanic (and trusted friend). I picked it up for next to nothing and has 54,xxx origional miles on it. Clearly it sat for a very long time without any driven time (old people had owened it and hated 5 speed). Without a doubt its not a flood car etc. Etc..but I very quickly came to learn that its burning 1 quart of oil about every 50 miles of normal driving (some highway, some city). I suspect that it may be the piston rings along with the valve seals because the spark plugs are soaked with oil. Plus it appears that the crank, oil pan, and possible rear main seals are leaking too. Here's the kicker...

...it doesn't smoke that much. Really if ever. When it does smoke, its only when I get on it at high rpms. The smoking is also gradually getting less and less as weeks pass by. It also doesn't leak that bad. Were talking about a small spot the size of a couple nickels on the ground daily.

So far I have changed the oil with pennz 5/30, replaced the pvc valve, fuel filter, and fuel reg.

So I have two possible options ahead of me now. I can either....

A. replace the gaskets and fix the external leaking and run a thicker weight oil with lucas (I have always had great luck)

Or..

B. Pull the trigger on an overhaul kit and completely rebuild the block and head..

I really don't want to do the latter because I just can't justify rebuilding a civic with less than 60k miles on it if I didn't have too. I plan on keeping the car for a very long time and am not interested in doing swaps or crazy stuff. I just want something clean and reliable.

If anybody has any advice or info that im missing...please help!

I appreciate it in advance..

Oh yeah..



Picked up some ff type 1's with some new slips as soon as I picked up the hatch..

THE_EM1

Ttt.

NACvicSi

If it's something you plan on keeping and want to keep the motor as a good MPG motor then I would just bite the bullet and do a rebuild. Without knowing how long at a time it say it probably has some dried up seals/gaskets that could really use replacing.

THE_EM1

Thanks for the responce dude! I appreciate it.

95EG2

to be honest having 50k on a old car(in your case over 14 years) is not a good thing atleast not a good thing for a motor... cars are not made to sit the longer they sit the more problems u have... more then likely if ur burning oil the piston rings are worn...

motegicivic

Sometimes a low miles car sitting can be worse than a well-mainted car that is driven for 14 years.

1 quart 50 miles is crazy, like you said with oil soaked plugs and some smoke etc, you might need a rebuild.

I have a head gasket leak, that is external and do not burn that much oil and no smoke, I have 240k miles.

THE_EM1

Yeah you guys are totally right..I learned that. I guess I didn't think about that upon purchashing. I thought that well its a honda..and if the motor takes a dump, then ill just drop another in it.

NACvicSi

For me the body would be the main thing. Motors for the most part are easy to fix/swap and relatively cheap. Body work on the other hand is a tedious process and gets expensive fast. I still think it was a good purchase. How much did you get it for?

D Griff

Yeah, it looks like a clean rust free Civic. If you swap/rebuild the motor, you can probably get however many DD miles out of it you want and keep it for years to come. May as well get that over with now.

THE_EM1

$2000

redm3turbo

Id say rebuild the engine- you can get rebuild kits for like 300.

You shouldnt need to do any machine work (I mean, Im guessin- ) but I say this every time a low mile car topic comes up- but I used to work at a dealer, and we'd see A ton of low low mileage cars- and we wouldnt touch any of them. Too much involved in fixing to get them back to running correctly- we'd take in 10 year old cars with 10k miles and immediately wholesale them out. No money to be made when you got to dump a ton of money into it, or risk it coming in to be repair time after time.

Rubber + sitting for years on end is death

Theres ALOT of rubber in your engine (gaskets/seals/etc) and things like spark plug rings and a valve cover gasket- they are 10 mins to change- however, the rest of them are a pain in the rear to change.

I say- if your going to keep it....tear the top of the motor off, change all the gaskets etc...and timing belt---- even though your under miles, Im telling you rubber belts and sitting around is absolutely horrible. Plus a Honda OEM timing belt is like 50 bucks...and a 4 hour job....(if your sorta handy) or try getting your mechanic friend to do it. Offer a bunch of beers, and be done with it.

Obv while you got it apart, do the water pump (because its right there, and they are like 40 bucks to purchase) I know they do make eng kits....get all the gaskets/seals...and get to work.

Even with 2-300 in gaskets/belts/seals/etc.....thats still a HELL of a deal for that hatch.

Mynameisray

4 hours to replace a timing belt? does that include a 2 hour nap?

ThA IntegrA HI

why wouldnt you do a compression or leakdown test first of all? you pretty much didnt even start to diagnose your problem. and why didnt anybody else suggest it? you guys would just spend all that cash instead of first figuring out the source of the problem.................

EJ1_CRIS_909

Lucas??? Really?? Why waste your time? Never put none of that crap in your engine, just fix the seals.

THE_EM1

No need to if I go ahead and do the rebuild. That would be a waiste of time.

THE_EM1

Clearly its never solved an oil leak problem for me...but from I personal experience, its worked great for cutting down smoking/ burning..




And thanks for the responce everybody! I really appreciate it. Im going to go ahead and do a rebuild in a few weeks once I get all the necessary items needed. Again thanks guys.

redm3turbo

lol....the first one I did took me about 4 hours- so I use that as a rough estimate to time.

Took me about 1 hour 30 of wrenching....and the rest of the time wrestling with the damn crank bolt.

Now i have an impact wrench---no more extension + breaker bar + scratching my head for 20 mins etc etc etc

ThA IntegrA HI

yea i guess. its up to you. where i work we actually gotta diagnose the problem before deciding to rebuild or anything.

are you sure you couldnt just find a same model engine to swap in real fast

THE_EM1

Hmmm.... maybe. Lol! Its kinda up in the air at the moment.