Yesterday while driving my 88 crx si I looked in the rear view mirror only too see a nice white cloud coming from my exhaust I was able to get home and took out all my spark plugs, two of the plugs were wet on the treads.

I also took off my valve cover and it was covered with a creamy brown color oil.
Make a long story short Im thinking my headgasket went bad.

This is my first time working on a honda so I have a few questions....
(1)What should I look for when I remove the head and look at the gasket?
[Im curious as to where the leak occured]

(2)Beside the head gasket where else should I look so see where im getting coolant into the oil.

(3) Since Im taking off the head should I leave entire valve assembly on the head when i take it to be resurfaced?

(4) what else can I do or replace while I have room.

Any more info would help alot since searching old topics is offline...

Thanks.
Mig

 

honestly, I would get a friend who knows what they are doing and help them fix it for you. Taking it to a shop won't help build your knowledge about cars(plus it costs a lot). If you risk doing it yourself, you might do more harm then good. I was lucky to have an uncle who mas a mechanic who walked me thorugh a lot of detailed engine work. Looks like it 's time to call a few motorhead friends over for beer and pizza! Good luck.

 

I agree

 

You know I would call over some friends to help me out, only problem is they are all in iraq right now. I have done headgaskets on toyota's and nissans, but this is my first time working on honda engines, thats why I was asking if there are other places that the oil and antifreze could mix besides the head since im not very familar with honda blocks.


Mig

 

Headgaskets aren't so bad... I've done two on the same motor in the last 3 days... Get into it and we can walk you through the rest

torque the head bolts down to around 70ft-lbs
torque the cam caps to 20ft-lbs, and the outter gold ones to 7ft-lbs

9 5 1 3 7 11 thats the torque sequence for the cam caps, the head bolts
10 6 2 4 8 12 are similar but fewer obviously, just do them in a couple of steps

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by trbob16a &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Headgaskets aren't so bad... I've done two on the same motor in the last 3 days... Get into it and we can walk you through the rest

torque the head bolts down to around 70ft-lbs
torque the cam caps to 20ft-lbs, and the outter gold ones to 7ft-lbs

9 5 1 3 7 11 thats the torque sequence for the cam caps, the head bolts
10 6 2 4 8 12 are similar but fewer obviously, just do them in a couple of steps</TD></TR></TABLE>

no no no

the head bolts are tighten to 22 ft-lbs first step
then after lal are donw torque them down to 53 ft-lbs

and when u take the head off..... clean the mating surfaces really good.... make sure that theres no warpage on the head... check for burnt valves.... bad valve seats... check for any corrosion or metal bracking on all the water and oil pasages between head and block....etc

 

Cool, thanks for the info... I picked up the service manual from honda (helps alot)..

Im pretty much done.. the only two problems I have right now are wrong parts from Hparts.com and also also the car cranking but not igniting..

-Mig-

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Silver_Rex &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">also also the car cranking but not igniting..

-Mig-
</TD></TR></TABLE>

I had that problem when I did my head gasket.... I forgot to plug in the dizzy