Here is the long Saga of my car problems. I have entailed the help of my friends and mechanics and no one is of much help solving the real problem. On a begining note I will announce the problem so one might choose to read on or just ignore the post. The car runs, but it will not stay running when braking or removing it from gear/idle after vehicle has moved for the first time. Now I am going to go into the long, long, long detail of my car problems hoping someone can help me fix it because I am stuped
<u> Introduction</u>
The car that I have is a 1997 Honda Civic HX (1.6L VTEC-E). Because I started to get into the car/import scene I decided it was time to upgrade my 105 HP engine. The thing to do on the market was to swap an OBDI Prelude engine into the car for an almost 75-100 HP gain and 50 lbs of torque. So I did this by buying the $500 motor mounts, $400 axles, and $1400 engine/transmission. I used a premade wiring harnes that mated up with my OBDII engine bay harnes and crossed all the wires to their correct location on the OBDI ECU. I pin checked it myself and all seems to be in order. I did however cut some of the connectors off the prelude engine harness and installed them to the appropriate location on the civic harnes (with a wiring diagram at my side for both cars). I also installed a Vorech Fuel Rail w/ Optamizer (not been adjusted yet), ACT clutch and flywheel/K&N Oil Filter/NGK Iradium Spark Plugs/New Water Pump/new timing belt/new balancer shaft belt. I left the power stearing pump off and the AC pump. I had to take the MAP sensor from my 1.6 engine and put it on my 2.2L engine (i dont think this is the problem)because I never recieved one. I got the engine running but had not got to timing it just right (via the distributor). I had a the check engine light jumped so it would flash me the codes because I knew there had to some. The codes it started me off with were EGR(it is not hooked up yet) O2 Sensor (wasnt hooked up but is now but its after the CAT instead of before the CAT [OBDI thing]) and MAP sensor (went away some how). Also my battery light and SRS light were on to. Come to find out that the alternator had a bad voltage regulator in it (i hope that was it).
<u>The Problems Begin </u>
Early sunday moring we left the Auto Hobby Shop from an all nighter session with the running for the first time. We stoped by our friends house on base to pick up our dogs. We decided to let him take her for a ride. And that he did I dont know how long exactly but he opened her up good. I would venture to say he only got up to 70-80mph. Then he came back and we headed of to home (10 miles). I opened her up a little bit 80-90 mph. The next morning my wife took her car (did i forget to mention that)[this civic] to work (10 miles) and all still seemed to be good. She sall the guy on base that helped us with 90% of the swap and decided to let him take the car for a spin. He took the car for a good ride reaching from 90-100mph for probably 2 miles. Once again all seemed to be fine. My wife was returning home from work (10 miles) and almost made it (this is were the fun starts). She was about 1 mile from home when "the car just quit running".
<u> The First Problem</u>
I met up with her and started with the basics fuel, compresion, ignition. I checked the fuel line and there was flow. I checked the spark plug by grounding it against the block, there was no spark. So I took of the distributor cap and asked her to start the car. The camshaft (wich turns the distributor) was not turning. So I looked at the timing belt. This is where I discoved my first problem. It looked like chaff in there, the whole timing belt was disinegrated to nothing, and you could tell that it eventially worked its way off the cam gears because it ate through some of the cover. So I got it towed and started work on it again. I thought maybe I did not do the timing right so I cleaned out that part of the engine (removed the "chaff"), put on a new timing belt and started her up again. To no surprise the actually sall the timing belt moving back off the cam gears again (wich I did not replace at all) via leaving the middle cover off. I would say it was off about 1/4-1/2 inch. So I decided to get a new auto tensioner. I re-did the timing with the new auto tensioner and again the timing belt started sliping off. Only this time it was maybe a 1/4 inch if that and it stayed there. So we decided to take it to the street races and ask the motor heads what they thought. We gave it a 10 mile drive home and checked the timing belt, all was still fine (with 1/4inch still hanging off). Then we gave it a 15 mile drive to races where it was still in the same place. We asked around and everyone said it should be fine and it will migrate from side to side a little since it is new. They did the finger twist method on the belt to determine its tightness and that passed.
<u> Problem Two</u>
Since I appeared to fix the problem I decided to race my friend that I helped put the same engine swap into his civic. I raced once (about 1/4 mile)...then twice...then I stoped to look at the timing belt, it appeared to move back on a little but it was still hanging off a little to. But it seemed to stay instead of before. So I raced again (3rd time) and again (4th time). Checked it all was still good. Then I let my friend racer with me in the car (5th time). Then my wife takes to car to town to get gas (3-5 miles) with my friends. She almost makes it back when she says she heard a "turbo blow off valve noise" and the car quit running. She also mentioned that when she was going through some round-abouts (entails some brake action) the car tried to die on her. So instantly i checked the timing belt and all was still fine. Then we started checking for the basics. To no avail we found out that some how the car had slipped time. when the crank was at TDC the #3 cylinder was TDC instead of 1. We could not figure out the problem so I just got the car towed again. When I took it apart this time my balance shaft belt decided to get eaten up. I dont know how this came to be I just know that my two balance shafts (front and rear) were siezed up and the belt that drives those two only via the crank was trashed. The car jumped time because the the pieces from the balance shaft belt got stuck inbetweeen the timing belt teeth. So I cleaned it out again and just left the balance shaft belt off because they are siezed (kinda they move but one with a ratchet and the other by hand but both with more force than usually needed). Everyone on Honda-Tech.com and my friends here says that you can run with out them you will just notice some secondary harmonics but thats it. So it put it all back together and took it for a spin to her work so she could have her car back. On the way when ever I took the car out of gear to slow down it tried to die again but just a little. The oil light would come on. But when you tried to brake it would do it worse than when you take the car out of gear. But if you mashed on the brake it would die on you. So I found out that if i give it more RPMs when its not in gear the car would not try and die on you, it would act normal. I determined it was an oil pressure problem since the oil pump is crank driven and when you give it more RPMs it seemed to be ok, and in conjunction with the oil light coming on. I remember that the oil sucker is at a spot in my oil pan where there was a dent about 1 inch maybe. So I banged out that dent to where it was even again, and still the same problem.
<u>In between Problems 1 & 2</u>
I almost forgot about the alternator. The alternator was bad from day one of the engine swap so the car was running straight off the battery, wich rendered it usless. I bought a new battery and a new alternator. When the alternator got here from the states the connector was broke so I frankenstined the connector from an older prelude alternator that worked just fine. In case you are lost I am in the miltary stationed in the UK right now, they wanted $550 dollars for an alternator here. Any ways I hooked up the alternator and new battery, and my battery light whent out. To make sure the alternator worked I dissconnected the batter with the car running to make sure the alternator was charging.
<u>Problem 3 (present status)</u>
Since my so thought oil pressure problem was not fixed I orderd a new oil pump. Come to find out through the grape vine "prelude oil pumps tend to go out quick". I got the oil pump in and replaced it today. I looked at the Honda Manufactors Guide book thing and the old oil pump "seemed" to be fine to me. But I put the new one on anyways. So I started up the car today and the idle was all over the place it would fluctuate about every second or two it would change RPMs. I took it for a ride and now the car just straight up dies if you let the RPMs fall low (like at idle once you start to drive/or take the car out of gear). I have put in 10w-30 synthetic since I got this motor, except for today I just put in normal 10w-30 (book specifications for this engine). I doubt this matters but I will include it also...I left apart of the oil pan gasked inside the oil pan a little casuing a decent oil, but I know how to fix that problem, just pull it out. That gasket is brand new as of the first time I banged out that dent. I just did not have time to do it tonight because of other plans. So I parked the car where I was working on it. I would say I had the car running for about 5-8 minutes today and that was it. So now what do I do?
<u>Conclusion</u>
So this is where I stand on my car I have concluded the most detailed decription I could think of. I am begging for your help this has all taken place over a 9 month peroid and the car is still not in working order. My wife is pissed because I wanted to do an engine swap on her car and now she thinks it will never work again. I am all out of ideas. I am willing to try almost any sensible thing and can/will include more detail where you have questions. I'll be here everyday posting responses and looking for responses. Please help!!!!

 

First of all, all honda engines are interference engines. This means that if you jump timing while the car is on, it will bend the valves. This could cause your idling problems.

 

So I should check the compression then. Dont forget that timming belt snapped the first time and it jumped time the second time. I figured it was good the from the first time because I raced it like 5 times and it was good. But I will do a compression test on Tuesday.

 

Just an update, but the problem is not fixed
I was double checking my vaccum lines when all of a sudden.... I found one on my evap can going somewhere where I dont know. The two metal lined on either side of it are for fuel, but this one isnt. The metal line goes to the back of the car somewhere. So I took it off (the rubber hose part) and put it on my intake manifold. It runs better now and does not shut off when you brake. But it does this think where the RPMs stay at like 800 or so and wont go up no matter how hard you push on the gas. It takes like two minutes before it works again. Its kinda like the car is in fibulation like a heart. I will post more on my fixes.