Well this is my first post and hopefully any of you all can help me. I have a 1996 honda civic 4 door automatic. It's my work car. Well about a week ago I blew a head gasket and said what the heck just go ahead and replace rings, bearings, mains, and thrush washers as well. Note I didn't drive the car into the red when it was overheating. Took the head off sent it to the machine shop. They resurfaced it cleaned it and gave it back. took it home replaced the temperature sending unit to the fan and the sending unit to the gauge. As well as the head gasket, and so forth. An we honed the block mainly to just clean up the tiny little build up at the top of the cylinder wall. Did a in car rebuild if that helps didn't knock before I have done in car rebuilds before. Also traded in my Y7 Intake Manifold for a Y8 Manifold. Flushed the cooling system and changed the oil. Started the car up and ran great! Well 2 days and 586 miles later cranked the car up and did a little bit of sputtering and 7 seconds of whitish looking smoke from the muffler then everything ran fine. Note no loss in performance or to seem to struggle. Well drove about 15 minutes to the gas station after that and cut the car off went inside got somethings come back out go crank it up and the same thing. It doesn't smoke while driving at all and neither does it have a sputter while driving. Few seconds went by and it was fine. What could be going on? I have been searching google for over 2 days to figure this out. New head gasket as well 3 ply I believe it was. The other thing is that is weird I have taken it to 4 mechanics at shops and showed them when the cooling fan kicks on the temp rises but goes right back down. The highest it has went is in between 3/4's of the way and half. Other than that everything else is fine. Please could someone help me on this. There is no discoloration in the oil of coolant either.

 

did you use new headbolts?
if you reused old did you tq them a few lbs more then spec?

 

No I bought new head studs. I just cranked it again after sitting for about a hour, An it happened again. I checked the coolant and it was low.

 

I have a question the dowel pins did they need to be milled down a little? Reason I asked is cause the head did get resurfaced. if they are longer can that cause it? Or should I just buy a new head gasket and do it again?

 

depending on how hot she got, alu head engines crack pretty easy, you also mentioned you blew the headgasket? did you have the block surfaced, these open deck blocks will dip in the center

 

No I didn't have the block surfaced I didn't have time to take the motor out that's why I had to to the in car rebuild.....the blocked checked out fine though as far as
Level should I just try retorquing the head studs?


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