Newly built GSR motor. Benson sleeved 84mm, CP pistons 9:1, Pauter rods, LS crank, ARP head studs, stock GSR head, bored OEM head gasket, mix of ACL and OEM bearings. New gaskets, O-rings for everything. Assembled by myself.

I have 105 miles on my engine right now and its been broken in hard NA. Ive notice some oil on the front of the block where it meets the transmission bell housing, right where the block stamp is. Its only a light coating but it appears to be coming from the head gasket area. At first I thought it was the vtec solenoid assembly as I replaced all the gaskets there and thought I had screwed something up. And it only seemed to leak oil in this area after running the car HARD. While the engine is idling, no oil leaks from anywhere that I can see.

But the vtec assembly does not show any oil directly under or around it. And its def not the valve cover gasket or the exhaust cam seal. So Im thinking it has to be the head gasket. But I am not experiencing any other signs of head gasket leakage such as oil/coolant mixture or over heating. However I suspect maybe one of the head studs needs to be re torqued. But are any of the oil chambers pressurized in that part of the head gasket?

Any thoughts?

 

distributor seal possibly?

did u resurface your head?

 

def not the distributor. leak appears to be coming from the front passenger side corner of the head, around where the upper coolant hose enters the head.

head was not resurfaced.

 

did you use copper spray, this is a common occurance.

 

nope. never used any kind of gasket sealer on a head gasket before, never had any problems.

You say this is common. Is it usually just a bad gasket seal or is it common for head studs to work their way loose?

 

i've seen this a lot of time when people don't used copper spray, sometime you get lucky.

 

****, well its either that, or a loose head stud.

 

youre always supposed to use copperspray headgaskets sleeved blocks unless its the cometic kind that specifies u not to from my understanding. retorquing the head is probably not going to do anything unless one or 2 studs are way off

 

They are tight. Gonna take it off and spray it.

God damn it. I didnt know that was a rule!

 

Its my VTEC solenoid! I took it off and made sure the gasket was ok (its a new gasket) put it back on, still leaked. Took it back off and put some Hondabond around the outside gasket, now it leaks alot less but still some. Wtf?

 

https://honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=901429

this was a problem of mine also. Also, it smoked when i coasted down. I had 2 bad striiped out head studs that i got fixed, doesnt leak anymore. Spray break cleaner around the area, and clean it, keep an eye on it. My tranny would get covered in oil and it was coming out only when i ran the car hard. at idle it wouldnt leak at all. if it keeps leaking, you blew your headgasket.