went to start my car this morning and heard nothing, from what i recall. drove to work no issues from what i could hear, work is a 1 miled drive. went to get in for lunch, and i heard the car ticking , seemed to be up top on the left side. car was cold. car is running stock b16a 00 civic with gsr trans. anyway, question is, can i test the lmas or the valve adjustment my a compression test? the ticking got a little quiter but not much once the motor warmed up. i would check the oil but decided to wait until motor cools back down on next break time. hate to take the head off without first diagnosing somewhat of what it could be. who knows, maybe oil is to thick, but i would assume the tick would have went away after warm-up.

 

I can only speculate... Assuming your valve adjustments are correct: Since your drive to work distance is not sufficient to actually warm up the engine the insides are probably coated with carbon. Try sea foam, intake cleaner, and then take the car out for a hard drive and bust apart any deposits that are present. If this is your problem you may end up needing another valve adjustment if you're successful.

I had the a similar problem with my motor, and this was the solution.


"can i test the lmas or the valve adjustment my a compression test?" - Answer is no. If your valves are not sealing a leak down test is your best bet.

 

i tried nothing else but what you had said(besides the checking oil) and i guess id have to say you were correct. sea foam, a little bit of premium, and a quick run down the highway, and it sounds good again. which is good because i just about dropped some dough on a laskey prepared itr cyl head. im still thinking about it, portflow stage two with supertech ss valves dual springs and three angle valve job. guy has the head just sitting, but i dont need anything outrageous and afraid tha if i strap that head on i might lose some dd drivability. i would run stock or near close to stock grind cams of course. so might not be worth the 900 bones to me.

 

maybe get a valve adjustment, when was the last time it was done? I had developed a valve tap on my 00 EM1, luckily I caught it in time. I had spun a rod bearing and threw the whole motor off. I was able to save it before the engine went catastrophic.

 

maybe right before winter, basically fall. thats why i thought it was funny that the lifter was tapping. i thought surely there was soemthing else, like maybe it was a injector tap, went and ran the premuim fuel and sea foam, and it sounds good.