First things first here are the specs on the car in question:

1998 Honda CR-V, AWD, automatic w/17X,XXX miles with stock b20b4 block and rebuilt head. <1k miles since first rebuild. New radiator, all new coolent lines, new thermostat and waterpump. New time belt.

I've rebuilt US V-8 small blocks before myself and never had a Problem like this before.

About 2 months ago I drove said crv on a round trip to Houston, (around 250 mile round trip) in the middle of a monsoon and had the top radiator line pop off and the engine overheated. (or overheated and line poped off after. Hard to tell with the rain.) pulled over when it got hot, however it got that way. Towed it home. Pulled the plugs and had water in all 4 cylinders. Towed it to local shop who has done good work for me in the past. He pulled it apart and had a)warped head b)burned gasket and c) bad valve. I knew suspected the valve since I bought the car 20k miles earlier. He said he checked the block deck and cylinder walls and all seemed good. He said all it needed was head rebuild and look to see what caused the problem in the first place. So rebuilt heads at another machine shop that has rebored engines and rebuilt heads for both the mechanic and myself in the past. Good shop does US, euro, and jap engines all the time Put it back together and wait.

600-700 miles, and 2weeks go by seems ok

Then start to notice coolent blowing out radiator cap (non safety valve) and long story short check oil, no water in oil. Pull plugs and water in cylinder 1, 2, driving it to shop and head gasket goes. Tow to shop. Pull the head and send to get checked. Machine shop checks the heads and they check out. This is when mechanic replaces pump and thermostat. (to make sure it was not over heating. Took radiator back to get new radiator ( still under warranty from parts store from replacing 6 mo. Earlier.) repete step putting back together.

Drive over weekend and it starts smoking water again in the cylenders now 1,2, and 3. Mechanic is stumped and refunds most of the money from both rebuilds.

I looked during second rebuild and the block looked ok.

Now I have the car in my shop and I pulled the block out and am trying to see where the water is coming from. Can a sleave come loose? Could the side wall have an invisible hole? What about something else

 

I'm also so sorry for the hideous grammar and spelling, I've been trying to pull the engine for a few hours now and I'm tired.

 

Sounds to me like the block deck surface is warped, is scored, or the block casting is porous. In any case i'd say it needs a block. Low mileage JDM B20s can be had pretty cheap, and they normally come complete with distributor, alternator etc.

 

Sounds like headgaskett is not sealing properly or you have sleeve failure.... Try a leakdown test before pulling motor? was the block decked before re-installing? Very sorry for all your troubles, as stated in above post these motors are easy to come by, I would start looking for a new block. Let us know how it goes.... Im assuming head is good as it has been checked 2x by machine shop? very weird problem. Might suspect block warpage from over-heating but hard to say for sure.

 

I ultimately went and bought an entire long block. It went together well and haven't had a problem with it until just recently I will be posting on a separate thread about my new problems.

 

Thank you both for your responses