Well, I just rebuilt my engine, b18c1 stock rods and bearings, everything is working except the crank doesn't turn when all of the connecting rods are torqued down. Here's how it went:

- torqued rods down to spec, engine didn't turn
- loosened all rods, engine turned
- torqued #1, engine turned
- torqued #2, engine turned
- torqued #3, engine turned
- torqued #4, engine didn't turn
- loosened #4, engine still didn't turn

Also, I know it's not the mains or girdle because when they're torqued down and the rods are loose, it spins like it should. It's just the rods that are giving me crap. Also, what are the numbers on teh rods for? I seem to remember them being end bore sizes, but if that's the case, then why does every rod have the same bearing? I just had the crank polished, but got new bearings. Clearance was around 1/1000 ". Oil is going through the crank cause all of the bearings have oil on the friction surfaces ( i pulled them and looked ), and the thrust bearings look fine. I'm charging the battery now, and it's taking about 6 amps, so it was pretty tired. I'll go and try again tonight when the battery is fresh.

Any ideas? Thanks in advance

 

The rods have numbers to determine big end bore but the rod journals on the crank can also very in diameter and are identified with a letter. What colors are you running for bearings? Did you change anything else like maybe rod bolts? I'd like to help but not quite sure what it could be, it's obvious that it's binding when your torque it up. If the bearings are to thick then they can bind and if the rod caps get out of wack they can also cause it to bind, thats if your replaced them, if you are still using stock rod bolts then nothing should have changed in that respect. How where you trying to turn it over? I know that's probably not much help.

 

Are you talking about turning it by hand or by cranking the starter? Did you plastigauge the bearings? Could be a rod cap on backwards, or on the wrong rod, a piece of grit between the bearing shell and the cap/rod, wrong size bearing, out-of-round rod/cap, slightly bent/twisted rod, or maybe gremlins. Since it is definitely #4, make sure they gave you the bearing they said they gave you by measuring it. Also check the rod big end for out-of-round with the bearing cap torqued down. Good luck.

 

he's probably trying to turn it by hand.

 

colors for bearings are unknown. Machinist gave me the bearings. Nothing was changed, the crank was polished, stock rods, caps, and bolts.

I'm trying to crank it with the starter.

The caps are on so that the numbers (3 or 4) are complete, which is on correctly, right?

The bearings were given to me as a set of 8, which leads me to believe that all of the bearings are the same size which then leads to the assumption that all the rods and journals are the same. Am I wrong in this? I'll plastigage all of the rods and hopefully they're all okay.

I don't believe anything is warped in any way, the engine was fine in that respect.

The thing that also gets me is that the guy that did the machine work didn't keep the piston order. I gave them to him in order, but I got them back in random order, but was told that there was nothing to worry about. I really hope the engine doesn't have to come out again

 

If you have the number on the rod caps matching up exactly then the caps should be all fine. The rod journals on the crank may not be the same size for all four just like you could have a mixture of big end bores on the rods. I would plastic gauge them for sure. It sounds like the bearings are tight at one or more of the journals.

 

well, after examining and plastigaging the connecting rod caps, it has come to my attention that the bearings were too wide The only wear marks were on the outer .5 to 1mm of the bearings. So, after doing some research, I found that I need 3 sets of greens and 1 brown set of bearings.

This is based off of a fax received from the local acura dealer. Using the numbers off the connecting rods and the letters on the crank weights, I was able to find teh right colors. Well, problem found, hopefully the solution comes with those new bearings.

thanks again for the help