I finally started breaking apart the motor today after pulling it last weekend. It's been burning a ton of oil and with 93,000mi I figured it was time for a rebuild.

When I pulled the head today I was a little disturbed to find that there was nasty black grime covering the top of my pistons and valves. It was actually loose enough to scratch off with my fingers and was very thick and gritty . Suprisingly my cylinder walls looked pretty decent which doesn't make much sense IMO. Plugs were also SOAKED black.

In addition to my oil buring problem the car had been having problems on cold start ups. It would spit and sputter at first, lumping around, and would pour black/blue smoke until it got warmed up a bit. Once warm it would idle fine and the smoke decreased (well until I put the engine under load to display my wonderful oil rings ).

Here are my questions.

1. Is the black grit, black plugs, and symptoms at idle all signs of the bad rings?
2. If not I've been suspecting a possible leaking injector (I have a set of used DSM 450's) as a possibly cause of the start up issue. Could the cylinder be getting flooded after sitting for a while causing the car to start up rough?

I'll be sending the injectors off regardless to have them cleaned so I guess I'll find that out on my own. Any other input would be appreciated.

 

Some pics might be helpful to diagnose, but I'm gonna bet the "grime" you're talking about is probably just the burned oil. My pistons, spark plugs, valves, and exhaust ports were totally caked with the stuff, and it was pretty much as you described it, although mine needed professional cleaning to get everything off it was so bad For me, I had a cracked valve and we think bad rings. While everything is apart, go over the head carefully (I didn't, which made the rebuild take almost a week longer than it should've).

 

I'll be sending the head and block off to a well respected shop to get throughly checked over so that shoudn't be an issue. I don't plan on taking any chances.

I'm just concerned if the car in addition to the oil burning might have a fuel related problem. I would hate to start up my new engine only to wash the rings from running to rich. I don't plan on changing the compression or having any headwork done so I assume my previous hondata tune will be ok, but it looks like I should be looking into an AF gauge just in case.

 

What was your previous setup? And as was recently discussed in some engine-building thread in the All-motor forum, unless you're going with the exact same setup as before, don't take a chance, tow the car to the dyno. That washing out could cause immediate damage to your nice new engine, and that would just suck.

On a sidenote, while I'm not the best comparison, on my rebuild the only change from stock I made was JDM ITR pistons. I say not the best comparison because the car was running like crap prior to the rebuild, but it feels very strong. Stronger, in fact, than I remember it ever feeling, although that is entirely subjective and could be completely wrong.