Hello everyone.

B16a2
Css block, 81.5mm 11:1 wiseco, eagle rods
Stock port head, supertech 85lb springs, stock valves
GSR cams
Stock intake/throttle body
PTE 5858 dbb gen 2 turbo
Tial 38mm wg, tial bov
Walbro 455, 1300cc ID’s, E70
2.5” exhaust
last dyno was 550hp@25psi

Ever since the car has been finished (April ‘19), I’ve had issues with radiator hoses getting rock hard, and subsequently filling the coolant overflow with coolant after spirited driving. Under normal driving conditions, everything is normal, no hard hoses, no coolant pushing through the reservoir.

It should be noted that the car never overheats, highest temp spiked around 215 F after it pushed out a fair amount of coolant. After suspecting head lift, I switched the Cometic head gasket and standard ARP head studs for a set of L19 head studs and a je pro seal. Also had the head resurfaced to proper ra finish for good measure, and also confirmed the deck was flat with a machinist straight edge and feeler gauges. No signs of detonation, and timing is “very mild” in the words of my tuner, as the higher compression ratio doesn’t require much timing.

After putting everything back together, I drove it maybe 25 miles, with multiple 25-30 psi hits and didn’t have an issue. Parked it for the winter. Now, started driving it again a couple weeks ago, and the problem is starting again. Coolant overflow is filling up, with super hard hoses.

Ive performed a leak down test, and it didn’t really show anything, and I’m running out of ideas. The thought now is, that the 2.5” full exhaust is really holding back performance, and I have a kteller 3” kit on the way. The plan is, install exhaust to free up some power, and dial back the tune until it doesn’t lift the head anymore. This is all well and good, but I don’t understand why the problem exists in the first place. I’ve read of countless builds making 500-600 hp, and are not having this issue. Where did I go wrong? Are the 11:1 pistons coupled with 25-30 psi too much? Am I expecting too much from this setup? What could I change to keep my 550 power level and not lift the head?

Any experienced advice is greatly appreciated, I’m 100% willing to answer any additional questions about the setup, and would love to hear from anyone with any usable feedback. Thank you.

 

Do you have a log exhaust manifold, or a mini ram exhaust manifold? That with a 2.5 inch exhaust and only the Tial 38mm seems like it would constrict the flow of exhaust. The 3 inch exhaust on the way should help.
With 11:1 compression ratio, I would try going with even less ignition timing because "very mild" might be too much.
After you resurfaced the cylinder head and made sure the block was decked flat, did you do the proper pattern of tightening and torque the head to specifications?
If you made 550 hp on 25 psi, did they tune it at 30 psi, and if so you would probably be well into the 600hp range, since you said 25-30 psi?
Also, like you said, dial back the tune until it doesn't happen anymore. I'm not sure what the limits are of E70 and how consistent or good of quality that fuel is. You may be near the limit. Have you considered 116 octane race gasoline?

 

for what its worth, last year when i experienced head lift, my cylinders filled up with coolant. Filled up to the point where it wouldnt even turn over. Had to pull the plugs and crank the coolant out. Minutes before that happened. Burst, split, and popped the rubber heater hose. And the bypass hose.

if your pushing coolant. You very well may be close to headgasket issues. Mite want to use more distilled water.

 

@highschooler I have a full ram horn manifold. I’ve suspected the 2.5” exhaust to be a problem since the beginning, and my tuner has also been saying since the beginning, to his credit, that it has to go.

After thinking about it, and discussing with him and others (including yourself), it’s been concluded that I’m trying to force too much effort into an inefficient setup. I’m actually pretty happy with anything between 5-600whp, and the plan is to install the exhaust, replace the head gasket and install copper orings (while also doing the usual checks for flatness, etc), and then dyno tune it to a power level that works for the setup.

When it was first dyno tuned to 550, it was running stock b16 cams, soon after the head lift started, I then switched to GSR cams while installing the new head gasket with the L19’s. I did torque them down to 90ft-lbs in 3 equal steps. Afterwards it was “street tuned” to 30psi. At that point we were just kinda marveling at how fun it all was, and the head lift continued, so I parked it again. I believe with the addition of the exhaust and o rings, we will hopefully find a happy medium between power and solving the problem. I believe we could achieve between 5 and 550 with less than 25lbs after everything is buttoned up. Time will tell.

Ive tested the pump ethanol in my area, it was about 75% 2 weeks ago, summer blend in my area of Pennsylvania starts in April, so by the time the car is ready for the dyno, it should be testing out to 83-84%. There’s always the option to pick up some Sunoco E85r from a local distributor, and I may do that as the car is driven maybe 2k miles a year, so it’s probably worth the cost.

If everything goes well, the only other problem I foresee would be the 38mm gate having trouble with boost control. It hasn’t missed a beat yet, and was controlling down to 8lbs rather well by way of the boost by gear setup. I cut the original wastegate flange off of the manifold, and somewhat re-designed it to work very efficiently, but if the 3” exhaust changes all of that, I’ll handle it accordingly. It does seem to pair well with the 5858, hopefully it works out.

 

Would you suggest trying more than a 50-50 mix? More water than coolant?

 

All of that seems accurate, especially trying to force too much from an inefficient set up, and the "street tuned" to 30 psi. When you changed to GSR cams, those could have increased the power a lot, as well as the 5 psi more of boost, you could be well over 600 hp while using 11:1 compression ratio and a 2.5 inch exhaust.
You should be satisfied with between 5-550 hp since it's still on stock sleeves and has 11:1 compression ratio, plus that's a lot of power anyways. The 3inch exhaust should help reduce pressure on the exhaust stroke of the engine.
I'm not sure what the torque rating the head studs need, you are probably right at 90 ft/lbs in 3 steps if that's what you've figured out. I meant this pattern:


There is also a loosening pattern which I'm not sure if it's the same/opposite.
I don't have any experience with E70 or E85. I don't know about it's limits, but if there is no pre-detonation then I guess its working fine...
Definitely find a happy medium between power and problem solving.

 

70(water)/30(coolant).

 

It sounds like head lift to me - I battled the same thing on my D16Z6. I was pushing coolant while in boost, but not on trips where I stayed out of boost. No real overheating, no mixed oil/coolant...it was a mystery. Leak down and compression were normal. Block test was negative for exhaust gases in the coolant. I think we finally got it under control after 3 iterations. I ended up backing timing down, using a bigger head stud (D-series are smaller than B-series), and going to a JE ProSeal head gasket. In the warm months I run 100% distilled water with 1 full bottle of Redline Water Wetter. In cool months I switch back to 50/50 coolant / distilled water with Water Wetter.

Can you post a screen shot of the timing maps or email the tune file (if it's Hondata)?

What is the radiator cap you're using rated at? I tried a wide range of caps from 13 psi all the way up to 30 psi. I ended up staying with the 23 psi cap made by Stant.

Do you have any pictures of your Cometic head gasket that you removed? Could you tell where it was blown / allowing the cooling jacket to pressurize from?

Based on what you've done, I'd be leaning towards it being a timing issue still.

 

I will be recording one more datalog before pulling the head off, so I can get you some data probably tomorrow. My tuner wants me to try one more modification to the tune (around 20 psi and very little timing) so we can see what happens. If it pushes little to no coolant, that should tell us we’re on the right track.

I currently have a mishimoto 2 bar cap, it was a band aid fix when the problem first started happening. I’m not sure if I should switch back to oem or not, any info is appreciated there.

Here are a couple shots of the last head gasket that was used, an oem. (Started with cometic, then tried oem, then L19 studs and je pro seal)

Also, I’m not very well versed with Hondata, i know how to upload tunes, record datalogs, and also view datalogs, also can switch a couple settings sometimes. Any info on how to upload a datalog from my laptop to this forum would also be much appreciated.

I’m just at a loss. I didn’t think this setup was so extreme that it would have regular head lift issues. In the words of my tuner, very little timing is being used due to the 11:1 compression, and I do trust what he says, as he’s a pretty reputable guy around here.

I’ll be pulling the head a 4th time very soon here, and then installing the 3” down pipe and exhaust, and then to the dyno again to see what happens. I’m really hoping this is the last time, as the engine only has 2,500 miles since it’s been fully built, and I haven’t been able to enjoy it as much. Every nut, bolt, piece is brand new with proper machine work, double triple checked, with all possible proper measures taken to check and re install/torque head (I’m a diesel mechanic by trade, so I have some finesse and skill in this type of stuff), and I just can’t seem to put my finger on it. I’m also debating using my tuner’s Isky o-ring tool to cut grooves in the head to allow for copper o-rings, as we do a similar thing to some of our Diesel engines at work. But I’d hate to go through all the trouble if there’s still an underlying issue here.

Either way, I really appreciate all the input, please keep it coming.

 

If you've already lifted the head, you've already compromised the Viton on the head gasket - it still may push coolant with lower timing.

I'd probably go back to a 1.5 bar cap. With the 30 psi cap I felt like I was risking my hoses bursting or popping off (I'm using stock rubber hoses and stock spring clamps).

The tune file has the extension .skl and should be saved somewhere on your computer. I don't think you can upload them to the forum.

Your pictures look similar to how my HG looked - Viton blown out between the cylinders and water jacket...looks like on the block side too...mine was the same. I know it's a dividing issue, but I personally would not use any copper spray.

 

Im not a believer in copper spray, to be honest I took someone’s “advice” and attempted it with the hg pictured, the third gasket (the je pro seal) was installed dry.

I will post a few screen shots after work of various points in the datalog, if you need more info I’ll gladly email to you, I do know how to do that as I regularly email logs to my tuner when he’s not nearby.

I would really like to get a second opinion on the tune, I do like and trust my tuner, but he is a very busy guy and a second set of eyes never hurts.

 

For anyone who can give me some feedback, here’s a snapshot of a recent log. I’m not a tuner by any means, but the timing doesn’t seem out of control to me. Keep in mind, this was a “fixed” tune that he sent me to see if the problem persisted, and it did push coolant, but it had already been pushing coolant before this so I wonder if it would really make any difference at this point anyways.

Looking at this though, I’m kind of wondering why he insisted I install a fuel pressure regulator, just to have it set to 43psi and then proceed to have my injectors run at a 100+% duty cycle in some places.

 

I'm not a tuner either, however the over 100% duty cycle of the fuel injectors stands out as a problem to me. I don't know much about Ethenol fuel but I know it requires a larger amount then gas to operate, so with 1300cc fuel injectors, at 550 hp, you are probably near or past the limit of that size injectors. I think 1000cc injectors are only good to 500 hp with gasoline, so to base a comparison off of, I assume your injectors aren't adequate for the power you are/ were pushing. Plus a tuner should know not to use a fuel system to 100% duty cycle. Even 90% duty cycle is too much to be comfortable and safe with.
I'd not even hit full boost until you are sure you aren't going lean on fuel. I'm not a tuner though.

 

Here’s an update, it breached cylinder 3 between the layers, just in that one spot. Interestingly enough, if you see where I have my straight edge placed, I can fit a .0015 feeler gauge under it at cylinders 2, 3, and 4, but I cannot fit a .0020 gauge underneath. I would think #3 is just a bit lower than the other 2, but I can’t measure between .0015 and .0020. Head is completely flat everywhere.

So, will copper o rings make up for this discrepancy, or is a trip to the machine shop absolutely necessary? I have the isky o ring tool so I can do the o rings myself, which would be more convenient than pulling and stripping the entire block right now. Any opinions or insight welcome.

 

I don't know because I don't have engine building experience, so maybe someone else will be able to answer that. But I'd guess its safer to get the block decked. I don't know what the tolerances are for the block though. If it's within tolerance then go with it, but if it's out of tolerance then deck it.
I thought O-ringing is mostly for oversized bore, but I'm not sure. Your's is 81.5 so maybe it's a good idea to O-ring it.

 

I haven't used o-rings before, so I don't have any input.

I hate recommending this, but if you have a piece of thick glass or a small granite surface plate, you could use some 600 grit paper and "deck" the block in the car. The reason I hate recommending this is that gravity is trying to pull all the grit and aluminum dust down into your block. You would need to be carefully mask your bores and/or use grease to trap all the particulate generated during the decking process. I bought a 6x18x2 granite surface plate from Amazon to resurface my head with. It turned out well.

 

You know, I’m 100% the type of guy to believe in and attempt these kinds of things. As a matter of fact, I have a 2ft by 4ft piece of granite counter top that I got for the granite company across the street from the company I work for. It sits on a separate workbench, and I have sheets of different grit adhesive sandpaper to use with it. I’ve flattened turbo manifold flanges, wastegate flanges, dirt bike heads, etc.

However, with the amount of money invested in this particular engine, I try not to “cut corners”, and I’ve decided to just strip it back down and have the machine shop deck it. I’d also like to replace the piston rings while I’m in there, as I went a little wide on the ring gaps and the engine smokes slightly under hard acceleration and deceleration, so I kinda want a chance to correct that as well.

Here’s what sucks, the block was sent to Cylinder Support System and I payed for the whole package, $350 to install the cylinder support, and $350 for the deck, bore, hone, and jet wash. Now, the engine only has about 2500 miles on it and has has issues with pushing coolant since it left the dyno. After pulling all 3 head gaskets apart, you can see where they kept failing in the same place on cylinder #3. In retrospect, I should’ve checked the block surface more thoroughly, it never occurred to me to check at the edge of the cylinders, and sure enough there’s a couple low spots. You can definitely see where the L19 studs helped stop almost all of the gasket breaches, except that particular spot near #3. So, I hate to knock a professional place, but it seems to me that the deck job just wasn’t that great. I’m convinced now that after the block is decked again, there shouldn’t be any issues.

Oh well, lesson learned, triple check every square inch every time. I’ll update this post after I get the block back from the machine shop, and try to include before and after pics.

Im still considering o rings, as I do believe the power level should be in the mid 600 range after everything is back together with the new exhaust, and it probably wouldn’t hurt to have the extra insurance.

 

Have you been able to take it to a machine shop yet? I’m interested to see if the block wasn’t decked correctly.

 

Update

The block did indeed have a low spot at cylinder #3, the machine shop resurfaced the deck and I rebuilt with 10.5:1 pistons (previously 11:1) after finding some scoring in the piston pin bores. I failed to mention an oil pump failure that occurred last summer, so I attributed the piston damage to that. I assembled everything with a je pro seal head gasket, and broke everything in for about 200 miles on a low timing/low boost tune before hitting the dyno May 15. So far everything seems ok, the car made 611 hp 434 ft lbs torque @30 psi. I’m set up for dual maps, so the low is set at 456 hp, 310 ft lbs torque @19psi, high map is the former. It hasn’t pushed any coolant yet, but I don’t plan on using the high map very often. I’m reluctant to call it “fixed”, as only time will tell.

We’re (my tuner and I) are guessing that the irregularity in the deck surface could be a result of the initial head lift when it was on the dyno last year, as everything was properly machined the first time around.

The thing is a hoot though. If anything else changes, I will update the thread.

 

Awesome- glad to see that it did well after the rebuild. That’s a lot of power at 611, so it’s good it’s holding up so far. The deck, lower compression pistons, and the JE headgasket probably all helped.

 

Good deal! Sleeper AF right there.
Edit.. I am floored again. I kept thinking this was a K build and shot back up to #1 there and re-read B16A2..