OK I'm kinda frustrated now. after having a million and one setbacks on doing the turbo install, I'm finally ready. Problem is... I flushed my coolant the other day only to find what I think are little oil blobs in the resorvoir. NOT GOOD. It wasn't a lot of oil and when I drained the coolant into a pan I couldn't notice the oil in such a large amount of coolant. My guess is my headgasket is leaking. The car doesn't over heat, it doesn't smoke, and from what I've seen it doesn't burn coolant or oil. I was just gonna go ahead and install the turbo stuff since there wasn't any other sign other than that but I rethought it (thanks to another setback in finding time to do the install). I need advice. Most people will probably say to just pull the head myself and check it out and replace the gasket. Thing is, I've never pulled my head before and I'm definitely not comfortable trying it myself since school has started again and the car is my only daily driver. And spending the money for a shop to do it is making my wallet cringe at the thought of the $400-500 numbers I've been hearing as the going rate for headgasket installs. Is there anyway I could check out what's wrong without pulling the head? I was told to have them do that pressure test thing where they pressurize the coolant system. I spoke to a guy I know who owns a shop and he said he could do that but it wouldn't really check for anything other than a leaky radiator or something. I'm kinda pissed. I dunno what would cause the headgasket to go or for oil to be in the coolant resorvoir at all. The car has been basically stock (i/e) for 11 months now since I sold my nitrous kit. And during that time and up until now no problems were showed up. The guy at the shop suggested retorquing the head as another approach without pulling the whole thing. If anyone has any input please reply. I was so anxious to get the turbo stuff on but now it looks like i might have to put it on hold longer. Thanks.

Marc

 

cliffnotes:
-oil in cooalnt resorvoir
-thinking headgasket leaking
-no signs of it (no smoking, no overheating)
-want to put turbo on but not if it's gonna blow the h/g
-what the hell should I do?

 

well you could always pull the head, get a $65 from any Honda/Acura dealer and be done with it....all you gotta do is take of camshafts, unbolt head studs and remove head...oh some vaccuum lines and stuff to, and timing belt...might take a day (or two), but you'll learn something and save money.

 

Take it in under warranty before the turbo goes on!

 

$65 what? I would do the swap myself but I'm not that comfortable with doing it myself. I have friends that are are somewhat knowledgable... but none of them have done h/g swaps either. maybe if i didn't have school i would attempt it. but again... $65 what? headgasket?

Warranty? What's that? hehehe... warranty been over for a while... car gots 42k miles on it!

 

I hear you on the whole school/daily driver thing Makes it rough when project cars are needed for school....mine's been down a month already
You could try retorquing the head and flushing the coolent, then look for more oil.....if you find more, well, better get a helms and swap out that headgasket!
Make it a weekend project and change the timing belt while you're at it....plus if you take out the cam/cams you'll need to adjust the valves again, which would be good to do anyways......
Brian

 

even better then their ideas are to go to honda and get a new head gasket and the factory service manual. Take a weekend and learn to do it yourself. The factory manuals are very detailed and im sure you could do it yourself if you have patience and want to learn. A turbo car is high maintence you should learn how to do it yourself. Honestly youll appreciate the car more.

 

Ain't that the ******' truth.

 

 

Ugh ... that sounds like a hell of a lot of work, but if you could do it and put it all back together yourself it would be pretty cool. I was reading up on the procedure in my Helms manual last night and it seems pretty involved. The part I don't understand is where is says now remove these wires/wiring harnesses/ or whatever it is and list 6 things. There is no accompanying picture. I am a visual learner, dammit.

 

yah i know it's just the school/work aspect. i go to school and school 4 days a week... the other 3 i'm working. if i had the help of someone who has swapped a h/g on a honda before then i would attempt it... but i dunno anyone that does, or anyone that would able to/want to help. wow this sucks ***...

 

Get a compression test and leak down test dunno why no one else hasn't suggested it. That will tell you the story, compression test should be free or cost little not to sure about the leakdown test but it wont be a lot.

 

$65 service manual is what he meant. Yeah man, I have learned so much from my manual.......tranny, block...... almost everything, but I see what you mean about the daily driver.......figure out a one or two day break and do it.

 

what do u guys think about this:





took those pics on sunday afternoon
EDIT #1: pic update
EDIT #2: BTW oil was leaking from my valve cover also cause honda didn't put it on right when they did the 30k mile servicing so there's basically oil on my head (not shown in pic) and on the block
EDIT #3: also... the pic only really shows oil/grease on my tranny... the block's like coated w/ dirt/oil n stuff, can't even see the D16Y8 anymore

[Modified by CivicRyda2k, 11:29 PM 9/9/2002]


[Modified by CivicRyda2k, 11:39 PM 9/9/2002]


[Modified by CivicRyda2k, 11:42 PM 9/9/2002]

 

[Modified by FredoSP, 12:20 AM 9/10/2002]

 

You can remove the head off in about an hour with all the proper tools. It's easy.

If you have an SOHC...now that is easy. Dont' even have to remove the CAMSHAFT.

 

my b18 does the same thing....has for 6 months with boost

no signs of overheating either....i will re-torque the head and do a "Ldct"

let you know....i'd say throw the turbo on...who else agrees?

 

I THINK my antifreeze reservior looks something like urs...

what's wrong??

never overheated.... but it sounds lie something is wrong, is it??

 

you have to remove the cams on a bseries to pull the head?! is that true?

 

Yes.

 

hehehehe... i was thinkin bout doin that. like putting it on, just riding with it and try my best to be careful, check all signs, etc u know and if i see anything going worse then my last resort is to swap gaskets. maybe by then school will give a long break or get time off from work (pfft yah right). I dunno... if i put it on it might be thursday, just gotta work out how the guy's gonna do my piping

 

You sure that's oil? Oil floats... Clean out the overflow reservoir... they usually collect crap like that in them...

Brand new motors like yours almost never have head gasket issues, unless they are boosted... which yours isnt

What does your oil look like?

 

it's had nawz run thru it for 3 months only though. but this was sold back in november of 01. hadn't had any problems up until now. BTW I noticed the "oil" in there... when i was doing a radiator flush. i flushed the radiator a week ago, then took these pics this weekend. i never noticed the "oil" before, although i like never looked at the coolant resorvoir much at all prior to the flush.

 

My block looks like that as well (oil where block and head meets), my motor is new and boosted. What does that mean, just replace the head gasket?

 

Yeah that is what I thought. I looked at my Helms last night and sure enough the head bolts are underneath where the cams are.

I think I want to get a SOHC civic to learn on and play with. Until then I think I will just stick to oil changes.