i have a 93 civic with about 123k miles and the engine is tapping. when i first got it (about 6 months ago) it had a slight oil leak but nothing major. so the mechanic said that it had a bad crank seal and replaced it. after that, the engine still had an oil leak and got progressively worse as i drove it. one morning, i filled it up with oil, drove it about 10 minutes to the mechanic's house and when i got there, it had no oil in it at all. again, he "fixed" the oil leak but didn't put oil in it after he did. so i ended up driving it all the way home only to find out that it prettymuch had no oil at all. since then i've had more problems:
1) it still leaks oil. not as bad, but it does leak.
2) now, it starts up and runs fine until it gets warmed up. once warmed up, when it idles, it does so at less than 1000 RPMs and the oil light flickers on and off.

the CEL does not come on so i cannot look up a code. when i took it back to this guy, he said that it's fine and that it might "fix itself". i have changed the oil, and added STP oil treatment but that didn't help. my friend's dad (who is in the car business) thought it was a bad valve but we took off the valve cover and there were no visible problems with any of them. i'm not super literate when it comes to cars, but i know enough to know that this is probably not gonna fix itself.
any help is greatly appreciated.

 

Well, Hondas idle below 1000 rpm so I don't think that's a problem.

It's very bad that you drove the car without any oil in the motor. How long of a trip was it to your house?

 

You have done irreparable damage to the internals of your engine, most likely a bearing in the bottom end. If this is your daily driver I would suggest having a backup and dont count on your car too much. No long trips.

My stock B18B in my Integra had a "click" and then one night in -20C weather, oil light started flashing (engine full of oil) my rod bearing spun and my motor seized at 80 Km/h. Very disconcerting.

Not saying this is going to happen to you, but something similar could. I would start looking for another engine. An engine for your car will be very cheap to replace.

 

x2

 

def. f'ed the motor and the clicking could also be valve lash

 

It's not just that it idles below 1000...it idles so low that it sounds like it's going to turn off. I drove it probably about 7 or 8 miles to my house.

I'm thinking it's not worth the trouble but just out of curiosity, how much would another engine probably cost?