Hi all first post on the forums, skip to the bottom for the short version;


Ok i recently purchased a 89 CRX with a B18b1 swap

I took the car to the track and despite the fact my crappy driving the car ran great, I was able to get a 14.9 out of it.

now while I was running the car my Girlfriend and daughter where sitting in the stands and a couple of guys watching me run said "hey there’s a bit of white smoke puffing from his tailpipe, only happens once in a while, could be nothing but he may want to get it checked could be the sign of a head gasket getting ready to go"

It was cold outside around (8-9 o'clock at night avg temp that day was 52 degrees) and after watching the car it would only puff the white smoke after the car had sat on in place while on as I started toward the staging lane then would go away it did this each time I came to the staging lane while waiting my turn.

also since the track i have driven the car in mild weather on a trip for over 3 hours straight, the car runs at the same operating temp with no spikes or variations after the motor has warmed up.

To be on the safe side I took my car to Midnight performance and had a compression and leak down test done, I was there for about a hour the car was in the back for about 30-35 mins of that. I was told my compression was:

200 125 90 200

with the leakdown being around the following ( I’m at work paperwork is at home)

5% 55% 67% 30%

I was very bummed out my new rides motor was basically shot I was being told.

I told a buddy of mine that night he wanted to run one. And a compression test revealed:

165, 165, 135, 165


better than at Midnight but still one cylinder low. I was also told that 30 mins for a compression test AND leakdown was close to impossible considering a leakdown takes 10-15 mins a cylinder and my car was not in there nearly long enough for the leakdown and compression test to have been performed together

I don’t know Midnight very well, they where located by my work so i figured a performance shop would have a better understanding of my car with it having a swap and all.

Only odd thing about the shop was that one of the employees was very interested in buying my car even after the test.

This prompted me to start looking for info I found:

http://www.team-integra.net/sections...ArticleID=1086

Which instructs how to properly run a compression test on the motor, I found that the test we ran ourselves wasn’t done at wide open throttle which could affect the results

so a trip to Napa and one compression tester of my own later; I followed the instructions to a tee,

Here’s my results ran twice almost identical numbers each time,

170, 170, 165, 170

Which according to what I have read is rock solid.


short version:

compression test results 3 different places:

200, 125, 90, 200 midnight

165, 165, 135, 165 friends test

170, 170, 165, 170 my test as documented in the link above



so to my question, what numbers do I go by? Is there anything wrong with my engine? I don’t know if I was getting fed a line at midnight or not, I don’t know of any other shops barring taking the car to a standard mechanic in the area.

so suggestions? Advice will be extremely welcomed and appreciated

 

one bump to see if anyone has any ideas

 

was your car still REALLY hot from when you were racing it? or had it fully cooled down before the shop performed the test?

the numbers you got look good to me, although i don't know fer sure what is good and what's bad... sorry.

sounds like the shop might be trying to scam you out of your car... if you performed the leakdown test as per the instructions in the provided link and got the same results twice, sounds like you did the test the correct way, and things are ok... although you may want to keep an eye on cyl. 3... doing a PROPER leakdown test will lead to results of weather or not you have a blown headgasket...

but i've never seen a cyl. leakdown test done THAT fast before, so i'd reccomend having it done again. not that hard, you just have to make sure each cyl. is at tdc of the compression stroke, other wires the motor will rotate back down and mess up the test. (i guess leaving it in gear would help avoid this problem tho)

hope this helps

 

Well you gave us a lot of pointless info. Was the motor hot or cold? Also for the leakdown they could of not been on TDC. Also the compression numbers are fine. Another thing the headgaskets don't "start to blow" they are either blown or they are not. You didn't say when the white smoke was coming out. Was it cold that day? What were you doing when it was smoking. Finally, just because you get bad numbers does not mean that it is a headgasket. It could be bad valves, valve seats, or piston rings. We need more specific information not a history lesson.

 

the car had sat in front of the shop for about 30 mins, this was the next day after the track I drove it from my work, about 20 mins of driving I was not driving the car hard. Both the other tests where done with the car driven a few mins to warm it up but no hard driving


Thanks for the honesty I’ll clean up the post and remove irrelevant info and add the info in this post as well

It was cold outside around (8-9 o'clock at night avg temp that day was 52 degrees) and after watching the car it would only puff the white smoke after the car had sat on in place while on as I started toward the staging lane then would go away it did this each time I came to the staging lane while waiting my turn.

also since the track i have driven the car in mild weather on a trip for over 3 hours straight, the car runs at the same operating temp with no spikes or variations after the motor has warmed up.

if you need any other info please let me know.

 

your description of when it was puffing smoke sounds to me like it could be the valve stem seals