BoostMonkey88

How's it going everyone, new guy on the block here.

I recently purchased a 99 4 door Civic LX that I had intended to use as a parts running vehicle for my actual project (78 Celica).

it's not the prettiest thing right now but it'll get me around, or so I thought.. ..



but as soon as I took it out for a spin I could tell something just wasn't right. It idled alright but the exhaust had a strange rhythm to it. And it blew more white smoke than it should, even in this cold Oregon weather.

spark plugs showed mixed results, cylinders 2 and 3 were cleaner than 1 and 4. At this point I began to suspect a bad head gasket.

coolant was pretty low but no oil in it

so a compression test was in order

results cyl 1-4: 150 - 45 - 45 - 155

bad head gasket confirmed. Probably a leak into the waterjackets between 2 and 3. Bad juju for me as the previous owner had just driven it 300 miles to bring it to me.

did not overheat so I may get lucky.

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I cannot believe this thing even ran, the valves are caked and burnt.


Each piston had a thick patty of carbon build up. Took about an hour per cylinder with a soft bristle brush and a can of seafoam to get them clean
cylinder walls look good, I'm hoping I can get away with just a hone and deck resurface but should I need to have it bored out, I'll shell out the cash for forged internals to prepare for the future turbo.

for anyone trying this without an air impact gun, a small 2$ walmart pry bar proper into the block we bing and locked into the teeth of the flywheel, works perfectly to make this a 1 person job. A little pb blaster sprey and the flywheel was off in 2 minutes

ARP head stud test fitting. Oreilly's ordered studs for the Z6 instead of the y7, (Z6 studs are almost 2 inches longer ando will not work) after another week of waiting, the correct ones arrived. I already had a new fel pro gasket from my last honda but I may go ahead and get a Cometic before reassembly.


Picked up the head from my machinist, looks like I have some bent valves, prob the result of those carbon cakes on the pistons. A new set is almost 200 from what I've found, so I cut my losses and ordered a completely rebuilt head online for 200, with porting and 3angle valve job already done.


Buffed up the ol' valve cover, when I have more time I'll polish it out to a mirror shine.

scored an intake manifold from a Y8 automatic off ebay for 20$ shipped got lucky as this one does not have air injection ports to deal with. Will still need to drill out the sensor spots.

a few hours and a couple cans of degreaser later, the bay is cleaned up a bit. I've pulled the harness tied owns out and plan to tuck the entire harness,

a coat of gloss black rustolium really cleans up the look. A couple things left on the check list before the engine goes back in: I'm relocating the brake proportioning valve behind the firewall and running custom lines, and relocating the clutch fluid reservoir inside the space for the wiper motors.

At this point I'm just waiting to hear back from the machine shop on the health of my block. I'm half hoping he will tell me it needs an over bore.

near future parts goals:

si tranny
Waldron 255lhp pump
forged rods/pistons (still deciding on cp ratio)
prob go with Vitara or Wiseco and some eagle rods
complete turbo setup
hondata s300
Possibly the y8 head swap but not sure if it's worth it since I'm boosting anyway.
updates will slow down from here as this is the accumulation of several weeks worth of work and I'm finally getting around to starting a build thread.

thanks for lookin!

BTW* if anyone has a used turbo setup that's not from Ebay, I may just be interested.

mac25

Nice, can't wait to see her boosted.

BoostMonkey88

Thanks, I'm really excited to get her back out on the streets. Just got off the phone with my machinist, the block is in the hot tank right now, he'll have mic specs for me tomorrow morning, then the hard decision making comes: if it's within spec, should I just hone the cylinders and get some 75 mm pistons, or just spend the cash to bore it .20 over and get 75.5 mm? From what I've gathered in my research, if I went with a Vitara build I'd be better off going 75.5 to help reduce the piston slap that brand creates. I'm wondering if brands like JE or Wiseco have issues with piston noise.

until I gather more info I'll be pulling dents and stripping the interior to run a battery relocation kit and some sub/speaker wires. pics to come

BoostMonkey88

Spoke with the machine shop today, my crank checked out good, so I wont have to mess with it. The block deck was within spec, but the cylinders were a little out of round. Boring .20 over. Going to order up some 9.1 CP's with eagle rods and ACL bearings tonight, New head should be here tomorrow, pic up soon