I posted a while back about my massive oil consumption and it's just gotten worse. I went through an entire saga to try and get Acura to help out under warranty and it was a big waste of my time. Anyway, I'm going through about a quart of oil every 500-700 miles and that is with NEVER going into VTEC. The reason I never hit VTEC is because I'll blind the person behind me with smoke. It's white/blue and afterwards leaves a nice coat of oil/soot on the back of my car. If I hit VTEC even once a day I could easily go through a quart in a week of driving.

I've done a compression test a couple times in the last two days. Today I had a friend crank so I could watch the gauge and count the cranks to try and be as accurate as possible. Yes it was WOT, yes the car was warm, and this was a dry test. We got 220 across the board with 6-7 cranks. For the hell of it I did 15 cranks (basically until the needle on the gauge stopped) and got between 240 and 245 across.

The spark plugs (NGK Iridiums) are about 2-3 months old and #4 looks like ****. The rest look good but ALL had oil on them (and not just to the touch, they left nice sized drops of oil where the plugs were laid down). Here's a pic of #4 and #3.



So- if my compression is good, I'm smoking heavily in VTEC, going through a ton of oil, and #4 spark looks bad, what's going on here?

 

Even though the compression rings are holding up fine, the oiling rings could be not sealing properly. If that's the case, I personally would simply keep filling up the oil until the compression goes bad. You could opt to do a rebuild at this time, however.

A lot of ITR's seem to have this same problem of bad oil rings, but good compression. It was frequently complained about when our cars were newer.

 

Chevrolet makes and sells a product that will help unseat a stuck oil ring. I am not sure of the name of the product but I know they sell it at their dealerships. You simply pour it into the cylinders and let it soak for a few days. I will see if I can get ahold of my friend who has used it before and get the name. He has used it on Honda/Acura's before with some success. Not that expensive and if you have a stuck oil ring it might just unseat it and save you from having to do a rebuild now...

UPDATE: He said the best he can recall it is called "Top Seal" Said he was not 100% sure but that was what struck him as being the name.. Give it a try it might just work


Modified by 98DC2-ITR at 3:04 AM 11/20/2005

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by 98DC2-ITR &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Chevrolet makes and sells a product that will help unseat a stuck oil ring. I am not sure of the name of the product but I know they sell it at their dealerships. You simply pour it into the cylinders and let it soak for a few days. I will see if I can get ahold of my friend who has used it before and get the name. He has used it on Honda/Acura's before with some success. Not that expensive and if you have a stuck oil ring it might just unseat it and save you from having to do a rebuild now...</TD></TR></TABLE>

I forgot to mention that.

Since there is already something clearly wrong with your bottom end, I would try using CD-2 oil treatment to see if it helps anything for the time being. This stuff.

 

#4 spark plug looks horrible!! It looks like detonation and fouling caused by oil in the combustion chamber. I realize you're not running boost or high compression, but I would NOT run your engine like this for an extended period of time before getting it fixed.

Did you look at the tops of your pistons? Is #4 a mess? Did you run a leakdown test yet? I would replace your spark plug grommets - it's cheap and easy. That will tell you if the oil on your spark plugs is due to a more serious problem (rings or seals) than oil getting past the grommets, which is also a common problem on our cars.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by uncleben &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I posted a while back about my massive oil consumption and it's just gotten worse. </TD></TR></TABLE>

You should get a leakdown test just to make sure it's not worse than you think.

You've already got some good advice from people if you're interested in going on with the motor the way it is, and that's good advice if you just don't want to go into the motor right now.

I'd just like to add the suggestion that you consider going ahead with having someone look at the motor closely right now. You might spend $1500 now instead of having to spend $4000 at the end of the next summer.

There was a season that my car was acting like yours, and I waited too long.

 

a leakdown test is your best bet. And remember those oil addidtives are only a band aid

 

how much are those spark plu gs retail for a itr

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by vtehc &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">how much are those spark plu gs retail for a itr</TD></TR></TABLE>

A bunch of great feedback right up until this post???

Ben - I agree with all that has been listed. With bad oil rings (stuck, not sealing, etc) the additional oil in the cylinder can cause a great compression number. Hell - I wish I had 240 across the board

I think you should just sell that motor to me for $20 & buy a new one from acura

 

Thanks all-

I'm going to get a leak-down tester now. I will also look for CD-2 or Top Seal.

Question- shouldn't the compression tester needle stop climbing after a few cranks? I was telling all this to my dad and he thought it was kind of odd for it to keep climbing even up to 15 cranks.

Also- I looked at the service report from Acura when they did a compression test a couple months ago where they said, and I quote:
"DRY 1- 175, 2- 170, 3- 175, 4- 173, WET 1-4 @ 200 / NORMAL COMPRESSION 135 PSI / POSSIBLE DAMAGED RINGS / RECOMMEND BEARINGS @ RINGS"

What is your thoughts on that? And why all the freakin variation not only between cranks but between me doing it versus Acura? Do I have a shitty gauge maybe?