Well Im not that mechancally enclined but I have a friend that has done alot of work on Hondas and can rebuild my motor preety cheap labor wise. Recently I started having a problem where I overheated preety quickly and ever since then I would have to add water everyday and recently started seeing oil in my radiator.

Since my headgasket is probably blown since I can hear a pressure sound and steam coming from that area after a short drive. What else should I replace while he changes this out?

 

Are you consuming any oil?

Once the head is off check the condition of the cylinder walls. If they have bad glazing or any scoring hone the cylinders and replace the rings. In the process of doing this check the rod bearings. Replacing seals/gaskets is never a bad idea when doing a rebuild, though the costs can add up if you replace every gasket/seal in the engine and head.

 

If its just a headgasket then why are you rebuilding the motor? Its like a 1hr job to replace a headgasket?

 

It's not a 1 hour job on a b16a2 I can tell you that much for sure. Once the head is off, might as well take it to the machine shop and check it out. If he's been running it hot for a while, odds are it is warped.

 

how long could it possibly be? we did my D16 in 40 minutes with the help of 4 people to hold the head up. We just disconnected the front coolant lines and header and had 2 or 3 people hold up the head while I replaced the gasket.

 

Yeah, that's a single cam. Dohc is a bit more time intensive.

 

well how much more difficult could it be? it has head bolts, coolant lines and spark plugs just like a SOHC lol. And I even have ARP studs in mine which makes it more of a bitch because you have to lift the head like 8 inches to clear the studs.

 

It's not the difficulty...rather, it's the time consumption. In order to reach the B16A2's head bolts, you need to take off the cam cap holders and cam caps. Once that's off, camshafts go too. From there on the process is that of the single-cams. Reinstalling is the opposite way with another step added, check the valve lashes, if they're off...re-set 'em.

Do you just plan to replace the head-gasket? Or are you planning for an engine overhaul?



The obvious: new oil, coolant, possibly new hoses...maybe a new engine...

 

I havn't driven it much at all since it overheated. Maybe one or two 5 minute drives where I needed to get somewhere. Im also gonna replace the vtec solenoid gaskets and o ring since I had a small leak from there. The motor still runs strong so im hoping its just a gasket fix and thats it.

 

I'd personally still have the head decked just in case it is warped. $40 for peace of mind is good to go in my opinion. Or you could spend $30-$50 on a machinists straight edge and check for head warpage to be out of service limit, then end up still spending the $40 to have it decked.

 

a rebuild gasket/seal kit is like 80 bucks from fjdistributors.com how many miles are on your engine? if you're taking the head off you're already half way there, you might as well check everything out for peace of mind