My friend has a 91 Accord and blew the head gasket last week. We replaced it, etc. nothing really out of the ordinary, not our first rodeo, he seems to have a knack for running cars too hot.

Everything went back together fine it seems, but it won't start now. We have tried all we know to try. At first my friend had it together with the plug wires in backwards (thought 1 was 4 and 4 was 1) so after we corrected that to no avail we treated it as flooded and etc. then after that, checked fuel: plugs come out wet, spark: well it sparks, compression: 165-175.

Assumptions:
Dizzy only goes in one way.
Firing order is 1-3-4-2
Cap has #1 closest to the ground and rotates clockwise

I am especially concerned now about the placement of the plug wires on the cap, its not marked at all, and we peeked at the haynes at autozone and thought it showed #1 on the bottom and going clockwise.

Not sure what else to look for here, looking for some insight.

 

I would start with the thermostat housing ground for the ecu. It won't turn over if that ground is off. Second, make sure you use oem cooling system components, especially thermostats. And I hope you atleast sent the head to a machine shop to have it unwarped and resurfaced or the head gasket will blow again in no time.

 

I agree with what holmes said about getting the head checked to make sure its flat, but about the ground on the t.stat my guess is thats ok because if you get spark, it has to be turning over, on the cap their should be a dot or and arrow or A by one of the terminals that will be #1, also double check to make sure all your timing marks line up, if they are off it wont fire, also check to make sure all the wiring is correct and all your grounds are hooked up

 

Thanks for the suggestions. I will check the ground on the t-stat housing, and the rest of them for that matter. My friend hooked it all back up by himself, so I will double-check his stuff, I should have done that in the first place. I'll see if there are any marks on the cap as well. I hope its something simple like this.

Thanks for your concern about the head, we definitely took it to the shop. It was cracked so we got another one from the pull-apart and had it resurfaced, we're good to go there.