noob question, please bear with me.

i am in need of some guidance or advice about getting used or junkyard parts for my mini me swap. i dont want to buy anything i can use.

1. is there anything i should look for when pulling the head?
2. how do you know its good?
3. any signs or flags that help i.d. a bad one?

i was there today and saw a ton of d-series motors. anything else i should grab while im there?

thanks in advance. you h-t guys(and gals) rock.

 

Look in the oil cap and if it looks like caramel pudding, it's got a blown head gasket. Walk away. Look for burnt up caked on oil inside the cap too. Will tell you if motor was beat on.
Try to pull one from a car that's wrecked. Means its there cuz of accident and not cuz it died.

 

thanks,
blown hg... prolly wouldnt have thought of that. what if the cap is gone?

im leaning more towards a junkyard head. i saw a TON of civics out there, but i didnt have enough hands or a decent parts list. i didnt expect to see so many intact d's out there.

for the valves, how do you know if theyre bent? the only head work i have ever really done was a vc gasket.

 

pull the rocker assy off so all the valves seat then dump some liquid in behind the valves one or two at a time and see if they leak. Or you can take the head to a machine shop which i would do anyway and have them refurbish the head.

 

Looking for a crashed car works the best. You know it was running then then take off valve cover and inspect

 

just get one out of hmo.com check it out

 

i would suggest getting some arp head studs too if you havent already thought of that.

 

all,
thanks for the help. arp studs are on the parts list as well. if it doesnt rain, ill be headed to the yard first thing in the morning. i actually took a day off(special lib for the military out there) just to enjoy the junkyard to the fullest.