ok well....very depressing news....i tossed in the h23a bluetop vtec motor.....it turns on and runs but the oil light is on solid and its not getting any oil to the top! I kept the h23 pickup (which by the way is a different size than the h22a4) kept the h23 pan and still no oil pressure! oil light is still on and i even ran the car for a sec without valve cover and oil does not come up. we kept it obd2 and swapped the oil pump from the h22a4 (which was obviously working fine) The car starts up....revs at around 2500 then drops to 2000 then kind of bogs and dies after about 30 sec or so (doesnt sound to lubricated either....kind of whinny). The whole while oil light is on solid. I dont know what to do here......im at my wits end with this swap. We cant figure out what the heck the issue is! I didn't get a chance to do an oil pressure test but regardless oil is not even coming up at all.....not even a little.
Can it be a sensor or valve or something? anything?
Anyone ever experience this at all?'
I really need help with this issue.....i feel like my head is going to explode im so frustrated......this build has gone wayyy over budget....no $ left AND i've been without a car for over 2 months! who knows how much longer
If there's anyone even local (GTA) that can give me a hand or advice it would be a godsend!

Thanks for any help at all!!

 

Sounds like to me you need to get a new oil pump, and or something is blocking or clogging the oil ports from getting oil to the top of the head.That is the cheapest way to go on a new engine, you definitely should of put a new oil pump, water pump and t-belt on when swapping in the new motor.
Is the h23vtec engine legit did you get it from a known company or just some person?

 

first off, you dont run an engine that long with the oil light on.

second, did you remember to put the gasket between the pickup and oil pump?

 

Definitely agree on his statement never should run an engine that long with the oil CEL on, and you now have some things to be checking out and hopefully your engine is still good to go.

 

thanks for input....i put new water pump and t-belt.....reused the oil pump because its a $400 part from honda.....my old h22 never had oil issues.
also i did remember the oil pickup gasket AND i even used a tiny bit of liquid gasket too!
oh and yes it was purchased from a legit jdm shop

 

Keep everything the same. H22a4 oil pump, pickup, and pan.

 

pretty sure you cant use the h22 pan......doesnt clear

 

Yeah well you don't need to buy an oem Honda oil pump, if your on a budget build...you could have bought one from a website that carries Honda oem parts or eBay like most of us do, most of us don't have $400 to throw at an oil pump. And if you bought it from a legit place then id think bout returning it and getting a new engine.

 

an oil pump is like 200 from majestic honda. something like that. Always, always use a honda pump.

 

really dont think i need a new motor :S ill consider majestic thanks!

 

anyone else?

 

ok something i just remember......look at #11 the spring relief valve.....in my jdm h23 oil pump assembly (which i didnt use obviously) that spring is pretty long and realllyyy tense. so to screw in #12 you really have to compress the spring!
that being said.....the spring on my h22 pump assembly is short....so it just kind sits in there....no pressure on the spring at all
could that be my issue!!?? should i swap the spring

btw i know this because we opened that screw in the beginning of the build and forgot to put it back in till the last minute! so im thinking maybe we put in a different spring or it broke during that time or something!!

thanks guys

*** i might be missing #10 on that one that may be why the spring seems too small?? ill check that again too!

 

when you took off the valve cover, was there a lot of sludge or black oil? if so, it could be the oil ports. if not, theres something fishy with the pump. hate to ask the blatantly obvious but there is oil in it correct lol...

 

I'm telling you, dude, oil pump, oil pickup, and oil pan are all designed to work in tandem. Keep 'em all the same and you can't go wrong.

 

I dont know I believe I have on built H23V Turbo Crx H22A4 Pickup and H23V Pan. I never had an oil issue. Oil is pretty crucial with turbo. Wouldn't recommend this but correct pickup is F23A. I would imagine it may be only as much as 1/4-3/8 difference in length. Pan was only about 1/2 from H22 to H23V

I am pretty sure issue is here oil pump is dead.

 

I'm doing a similar project but keeping the H23A VTEC oil pump, pan, etc. & distributor, but trying to use the H22 engine harness. I have the ECU that originally went with the H23A. My issue is that I can't figure out how to wire in the crank position sensor. The H23 has one plug in the distributor with 8 wires. The H22 has 2 plugs with 4 & 2 wires going into the distributor AND 4 wires going to the crank pos. sensor & TDC sensor. So, that's a total of 8 on the H23A and a total of 10 on the H22.

The car I'm working on is a 2000 Prelude VTEC automatic. I'm putting in the blue top engine with a manual trans. ECU will be JDM from the engine donor vehicle. Any help on this issue would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

 

It sounds like he tinkered with the oil pump. That could be what killed it. You rarely hear of an oil pump failing.

 

Why not just use your existing distributor ? I'm not sure if the h23a vtec crank sensor connector would plug right into your existing harness ? If not, then you need to search some pin outs and just run your own wiring. Keep in mind that you will need to use shielded wire cables for your crank sensor, tdc sensor..etc etc.

 

If I use the existing distributor I also have to abandon the plan to not swap oil pumps since my original distributor has no crank sensor in it. It's a lot of work that I'd rather avoid, plus I'm a little worried about the same problem cooliboyz is having if I swap oil pumps. At any rate, I think I have the issue resolved with a jumper that I got (it's on its way now) from rywire.com. They have ready made adapters for several different distributor/crank sensor setups. This one goes from my timing cover back to the dizzy and converts from the 2 plug style with external coil to single plug with internal coil. I also got a jumper to go from my stock USDM H22's engine harness (OBD2a) to the JDM's OBD2b ECU. Hopefully this will save me a lot of work.