I bought a car from a shop owner, he built this car and never got it finished. I bought it, all it needed was injectors and battery. Fresh engine build from a reputable machine shop here in town. Car came with a turbo setup on there, I didnt want to run boost to break the motor in, so i took it off and was running it NA.

JDM B16 block balanced
Eagle H Beam rods
JE pistons 9.1/1
P&P head, skunk2 valvetrain, gsr cams
copper head gasket, VictorX Manifold, 70mm TB

I bought Injector Dynamics 1000cc injectors and wired them in.

Using AEM EMS 30-1000 box.

Got the car to start and idle decent, using a Distributor King brand new OBD1 distributor witch has known issues with EMS, so i'll be ditching that for OEM or twinfire w/EPM and CBR coils.

Took the car for a drive, made decent power in VTEC, kinda pokey down low(typical B16). Once up to temp it would get all kinds of air in the cooling system and boil out of the radiaor overflow. I bled it Bled it bled it again. Running straight water with water wetter. changed the thermostat, same result, radiator and overflow would just boil, temp reading in EMS would get up to 230+ before i shut it down, thermostat would never open, even once i disabled the cooling fan and it still wouldn't open the thermostat at idle.

Ran the car without a thermostat, let it idle up to temp, but it just kept climbing. fan would kick on and level it out for a while but it eventually would start to boil over and shoot water everywhere out of the overflow.

I have a koyo thick radiator with felxalite with shroud and spoon rad cap.

Decided that it has to be getting combustion air into the water because it smelled like *** and was turning kinda grey.

Tore the head off, found a copper head gasket. head gasket looked okay, no burn marks.
then i pulled it off and saw a STR block guard.
Checked it and it was sticking up above the deck/sleeves in like 3 different places.

I dont know much about those, but Im guessing it was there and once up to temp it was allowing hot compression gasses to leak into the coolant passages, and could also be causing cooling flow issues.

Then i also noticed #4 piston is barely carboned up, and the other 3 are about normal, pretty much blackened on top.

Either way, i measured bore, and ordered a Cometic MLS Head gasket, Bisimoto heat shield intake gasket, and OEM thermostat.

I'm going to buy some PVC pipe that matches the diameter of the block guard, and tap that guard down about 2MM below the deck height, trying to make sure its not pinching anywhere causing pressure on the sleeves.


Any opinions ? I can get pics.

 

block guards are never good, if your going to take everything apart then just get it sleeved, block guards do more damage to motors than protecting, just letting you know, i would ditch that asap.

 

^^^Like he said just ditch it. The price to fix it will be pretty high.

 

i would ditch the block guard...

check your head for flatness and block.

if all is good slap the head back on an dcall it a day.

 

You might be screwed if it was bored/honed with the block guard in. It could go way out of round if you take it out...but you should take it out ha

 

as everyone above mentioned, block gaurds have the potential of causing more issues than they are worth. when installing them they often distort the bore and deck geometry. so after they are installed the block is often decked/milled to make it true. but if you remove it, the block surface may no longer be true. then it will not create a nice tight even seal when the head is reinstalled. it's a tough call, but you'll have to figure out what you want to do. either remove it or try and tap it down and realign it. but either way there is that possibility that the deck will not be true.

 

Did you decide to go with ARP head studs ?

 

I tapped it back down. I aksked the guy ibought the motor from and he didnt know if it was in there before or after he decked the block.

He also told me the studs are ARP, but they are flat on top and i thought ARP studs were allen/hex on top to thread them in.

Ether way im going to slap it back together and just see how it runs. if i still have the same problem ill probably ditch this block and either go b18 or b20. I also have a k24 block in the garage waiting for a build.

ill let you know, im doing it tonight.

 

Epic fail. Broke a Cam Cap bolt in the head. Luckily i got the bolt out.
Ordering a new one today.