my buddy has a 92 hatch with a jdm h22 complete swap with skunk 2 intake manifold rmf drag header and exhaust tuned on crome by me...

we were driving it around one night and getting on it alot we pulled up to a car meet and it sounded like it had a rod knock so he drove it home, the car drove just fine...

so the next day i had him start it up, and it sounds like a rod knock but then it doesnt, so i thought maybe the lma's have gone bad so i pulled the valvecover and checked them all and they dont feel like they are sticking..

then i pulled the oil pan and all of the rods arent loose, none of the rod bolts seem to be stretched ( i got a tourqe wrench and made sure they were tourqed to spec ) but yet it still makes the noise...

the only thing i thought it could be is crank walk, because he is running a stiff pressure plate, and i can move the crank side to side about 1 mm...

anybody have any ideas ?

 

how are you testing to see if you can move the crank i had a similar problem and it turned out to be the flywheel bolts had come loose , this has happened twice so i bought arp flywheel bolts and used loctite no problems since

 

pull one spark plug wire off one at a time and see if the sound goes away

 

mine did the same thing and one of my spark plugs were loose. lol. never hurts to check that.

 

oh ya im sorry... i forgot, i did that also and no the noise did not go away

but thankyou all for the replies so far

thats a good idea i will check that, but i mean its pretty loud like a rod knock.. he told me he just took it to qualcomm to run it, but he forgot one of the valvecover bolts and it didnt pass inspection so he drove it home.. thats about a 120 mile round trip and its still running good, just the noise idk

 

anyone have any ideas

 

it probably is rod knock.. pull a cap off..

 

my friends h22 had the same problem....took it to the track
and on the second pull the motor blew..he drop a valve

 

yea its starting to sound like thats my only choice...

im also thinking of replacing the thrust washer... if i pull off the girdle do i have to replace all the main bearings or can i get away with just pulling it off and replacing the thrust washer??

usually when i pull a main girdle off i replace all of the bearings, but the motor is still in the car....

maybe a rod bearing spun, thats all i can think of, because none of the rods are loose

were gonna do a g23 build, he already has the f23a1 block and rods, but he doesnt have alot of money to be putting into his car all the time so its gonna take some time to build it, but he just wants his h22 to be healthy for now

 

Check cam pulley bolts. I had one come loose recently and i could have sworn it was rod knock. Was intermittent.

 

thats a great idea, it could have backed off and is hitting the valve cover i didnt think of that...

his doesnt do it all the time.. ill have to get a video that would be better help im sure but ya ill check that

 

i have somthing like this,sounds like a rod but coming from the head pulled wires still makes it but mine only makes it under load.

 

Spun bearing would lead to the silver sludge of death in the oil pan though. If it was crank walk, it should go away when you push the clutch in (ie, it pushes the crank to that one side). Have you checked your valve clearances?

 

i never pushed the clutch when it was running when we were listening to it, i will do that tonight... the lma's and the valve clearances were the first thing i checked... because at first it sounded to me like it was more coming out of the exhaust so i thought it was lma's...

the oil looks great when he drained it, there was no metal shavings in it thats what really has me confused but idk.. im going to get a video tonight

 

you sir is what we call detonation... if you can hear it that loud there is something definately wrong... i dont want to get off topic here, but pull some timing and run better gas if its that loud, maybe even get a step colder plug

 

okay, so i honestly dont think its a rod knock... i have a video now, but i started it up, and with a flathead screwdriver, i put it up to the header on each cylinder to see if its in the head...

cylinder 1 and 2 i couldnt hear the noise but cylinder 3 and 4 it got louder..

i used my digital camera for the video, and the car wasnt warm, so its not a great great video, but you can hear the noise..

could it be lma's??

heres the video

 

Likely the lifters. Had the same noise in my Neon.

 

like what the rocker arms are bad...

well we both dont have a day off until sunday so, i guess sunday ill pull the valve cover and the cam's to see if theres something wrong with then rocker arms or anything else idk..

i remember my friends b16 had bad lma's but it wasnt this loud, unless its a rocker arm thats just loose as **** and i missed it when i was going over the top end...

but i appreciate everyones help, ive been driving honda's and working on them for 10 years now, but i dont know everything, sometimes you just gotta take a step away from the picture to figure out what it is, and ask for help...

if anyone else has any ideas of what it could be that would be great... thankyou

 

Have to say that's exactly what mine was like with cam bolt loose. I was listening everywhere with a stick. Noisest place was low on the block by cylinder 3. Rocker cover was quiet. Noise went away about 2500rpm. Sometimes you start it dead quiet, others rattling like hell. Pulled all my big ends and centre mains and all fine. Then pulled cam belt cover to see if that was slapping and saw the cam pulley bolt and washer "walking" around. I build engines for a living and it had me stumped, kind of embarassing really!!
Did you listen over gearbox to check if its clutch release bearing? As others said push clutch in when its running.

 

Yea, I'd pull the cams out and double check the LMAs/rockers...hell if you can find a cheap set, go ahead and replace them. Could also be a very slightly bent valve that is "sticking". Any recent ventures over redline?

 

Sounds like my h22 did when the crank pulley started coming loose.

 

yea when i started it up, i revved it to 2k when it started to make the noise and it didnt stop when i pushed in the clutch...

im honestly starting to believe its something in the top end...

im pretty sure he never over revved it, hell when i tell him to get on it, he doesnt like to floor it all the way... he put alot of money into it and doesnt really feel the need to beat the crap out of it and break it... just enjoys driving it...

but it doesnt start making noise until around 2k rpm then it goes away and comes back, which leads me to believe its not the bottom end... so im gonna pull the valvecover off again, recheck all the rocker assembely, and if nothing is loose im pulling the cams out to check the lma's better, last time i was just pushing down on the middle rocker, but thats not really a definate way... its hard to feel them sticking like that...

if it is the lma's that are bad its gonna **** me off lol not that they are expensive, ive had to replace mine in my b18cR motor and that **** cost me 480 bucks but i know the prelude lma's are way cheaper but just the fact if thats it and i missed it lol

 

we had the same problem and it turned out to be a cam gear washer was starting to bevel outward weirdest thing ever

 

have you tried checking the valve lash?

 

i have had the same noise for quite some time. it sounds like a lazy lifter, but i replaced mine. replaced lma's. i am still stumped, good luck