Honda Prelude Forum - PreludeDriver.com

Hi,

First - excellent site - the are great cars (all I've ever owned - 1988 4sw, 1999 vtec, 1990 s, 1991 sr)

My current prelude is i need of some care. It consumes massive amounts of engine oil - getting progressively worse - maybe 2L between fill ups, and now huge amounts of coolant too. Both fluids leave spots on the driveway, but most of it is being consumed driving. I'd like to rebuild only what I need. I think it's more than just a head gasket. Is there a good rebuild kits - I've read lots of threads where people recommend honda OEM parts. What kind of special tools would I need. I'm mechanically inclined, so not too scared, but don't want to have to remove the engine to do this.

When warm idling, the car stutters and sometimes stalls right out, when holding a constant rpm - around 3500 - it stutters too and the engine light will come on sometimes. At lights, I leave a bit of a cloud behind me - and it's been getting worse. I get ECU codes that vary - fuel system errors (but the fuel pump seems fine - and filters were just replaced), exhaust gas recirculation sensor error, and a few others - but nothing concrete - I'm sure it's something to do with the oil and coolant mixing due to blown seals. I drive my care like it was meant to be driven - hard <grin>

Any suggestions or help, technical articles or whatever else I might need would be greatly appreciated. I'll keep reading too and see what I can find.

BTW, is this somthing - a gasket / seal rebuild - that could be done in a weekend/long weekend? I'd hate to be without my car for too long.

Thanks in advance.
A

Welcome to Prelude Driver. I'm pretty new here too. but it sounds like you are a victim to the B21. the cylinder walls are made from a very dense material and its eating away at your piston rings. thats why you have a cloud of smoke ever time you step on it. also it causes you to burn a lot of oil. yes i recommend all OEM parts they last a lot longer. you need to get new rings ( try some ceramic coated rings they might last a little longer than regular steel rings) and change all bearings and make sure the sleeves are still in good shape. check you Fast idle valve it might be worn out or clogged with carbon. you might want to change your distributer it might be wearing out. try not to drive your car that hard because your rings will give out fast and try to keep the rpm under 3500 - 4000. don't put to much stress on the engine. treat the lude passionately.

It sounds to me like you have some very bad gaskets. I'm going to guess that you head gasket is cracked and that your oil is mixing with your coolant and ultimately getting combusted in your chamber. The smoke that you leave at intersections is white, isn't it?

Doing a gasket rebuild in a 3rd gen isn't too difficult. I can bust the head off a B21 in about 2 hours, and that's without rushing things too much. You don't have to lift the engine to change the head gasket out.

I'd start by fixing your head gasket and then troubleshoot other problems from there. You're going to need to flush out your radiator too as it probably has oil inside it.

I too suggest all OEM parts. I disagree with rod_a88 regarding the rings. I suggest Honda rings.

B21 engines are funny beasts. The FRM material used to make the cylinder walls is incredibly strong stuff and chews through rings faster than regular cylinder walls. It's not all bad, because you can rest easy knowing that your cylinder walls will never go bad, but you may need to pop in some new rings. A compression test will help you determine whether your rings need to be replaced.

Thanks spiffyguido. That's kinda what I was thinking i needed to do. Should I get a full rebuild kit, or just start with the head gasket - if I'm reading right, chances are my piston rings are gonna need replacing too. I suppose if I have the head off, it makes sense to do as much as possible.

I see you're in Alberta - I'm in Edmonton - do you have any suggestions for local suppliers of OEM parts - or even a dealership you like? Or should I look online for the best deal - but most of what I've seen online isn't OEM. Does Honda even sell a gasket kit?

Oh, and again about tools - do I need anything special other than a good torque wrench? I think I have a compression tester in a toolbox somewhere...

Thanks in advance for any help and suggestions.

Honda does sell a gasket kit, and you'll save a ton of money on other gaskets if you need more than just the head gasket.

Basic tools are all you really need. You'll need the torque wrench. A set of needle nose and regular pliers come in handy for the hoses, and you'll need a variety of ratchets, sockets and extenders to get at some of the manifold nuts/bolts. It's really not that hard a job.

I get all of my parts at Crowfoot Village Honda in Calgary. It's a bit of a drive for me, but they have never let me down even once. It's far for you though, so I suggest finding a good dealer in your area. In my experience dealerships that aren't trying to run a giant speedshop from their parts counter are the best because they're staffed by people who really know what they're talking about rather than by people who know how to talk to 16 year old kids who just got a civic from their parents and are wanting their first cheap cat-back system.

I checked my compression today, and all 4 cylinders read 155psi (+/- 2) so does this mean that my piston rings are probably okay? I'm gonna order an OEM set of gaskets to do the head gasket this weekend. I guess that means a rad. flush, and oil change too. What's my best bet flushing oil out of my cooling system and coolant out of my oil?

Should be an interesting few days as I do my first head gasket. I'm gonna take loads of pictures so I know how it all goes back together. I've also DL'd the haynes manual for maintenance.

A

155 is a little low, but not below the minimum. Honda lists the minimum as 150 with the ideal being 178.

You can get rad flush liquid at Canadian tire. Any old stuff should work just fine. As for your oil, just do a normal oil change. Any coolant that is left over in your oil after that will end up in the bottom of your oil pan and will come out with the next change.

Thanks for taking pictures. Post em up here so we can all see.

well, over the weekend I tore the car apart, tried my best to clean what looked like years of caked on oil dirt. I bought a OEM head gasket kit. Everything took a long time with seized bolts, bad directions, and I couldn't get my crankshaft pulley off to save my life - had the 50mm honda tool, a 6 ft breaker bar and another 3 ft breaker bar. No luck (except I first tried using my torque wrench and busted it!) So now I've put the car back together - it was, and I'm not proud of it, a bit of a 'close enough' job. I really should have replaced the valves and pistons after seeing the corrosion on them, but my main goal of stopping coolant and oil mixing and it being leaked into the cylinders was done.

Here's the rub. After putting it all back together, making sure the TDC was set before putting the timing belt back on (is it just me, or is it next to impossible to get both camshaft pulleys to line up exactly pointing up? I tried and couldn't do it - one is off by maybe two or 3 degrees) I fired it up. I had already cranked it over with the ignition coil disconnected to get some fluids circulating. When I finally turned it over, it began firing, but really rough and couldn't maintain an idle. I assumed maybe I got the distributor on wrong so I checked and it was lined up okay (I think). I tried moving it from one extreme to the other and got the same results. From what I've read, even if my timing is out, I still should get and idle. I know it's a broad question, but were should I start looking?

thanks

Sounds like quite a weekend. I'll try to help you as best I can.

First, the crankshaft pulley bolt: They're always hard to get off, so don't feel bad. Every time I've taken one off I've needed the help of an impact wrench to get it done. A breaker bar is good, but even with a really long breaker bar you won't generate the harsh impact and vibration that an air tool can. If you attack the crankshaft pulley bolt again, I suggest using an impact wrench to get it off.

The cam gears can be hard to align. The 'up' marks are not that helpful. What I have found more useful is the notches in the cam gear that are to be lined up with the surface of the head. These take some guesswork out of the process and is the suggested method by Honda. My guess is that your engine is running so rough because one of the cam gears is misaligned on the belt, and no amount of fiddling with the distributor will fix that. You have to get the cam gears right before working with the distributor.

Check your gears again, then when you're sure you have it right, use a timing light to adjust the distributor. If the timing is a little bit out, the car will still run, but as you've found, if the cam gears are causing things to be way off it won't run well.

Good luck. Hit us with more questions and pics.

Your valves and pistons were corroded? Why? Did the engine have water sitting in it for a long period of time or something? If your pistons are that bad, I would definitely plan on doing something about it. Glad to hear that you got the coolant/oil leak fixed.

Thanks for the suggestions. Turns out I missed - yeah, it's a big one - the hose to the bottom of the carbon canister. Made for very little vacuum. With that connected, the rough idling started to clear up as the car got warmer (it's nearly 20 below outside making the garage barely zero to work in) and I began bleeding the cooling system. I've got the distributor centered and the car is fast idling and hot idling not too badly. It, for lack of a better description, 'puffs' a little when listening to the exhaust. I took it for a drive - a nice easy drive keeping the rpms under 4000 with the windows down (chilly!) and it sounds not to bad. The typical injector clicking could be heard. There was some smoke as I rolled back into the garage, but I think that's just from residue on parts. I think the spark plugs should be changed - they were a nice chocolate brown before the service, but have turned black with all the fiddling. The coolant is going to need flushing again soon as it clears all the oil that leaked into the system, and the oil will need a filter and change too right away. I'm going to see about borrowing a timing light tomorrow. Incidentally, and correct me if I'm assuming too much - I marked on my crankshaft pulley TDC with a grease pencil, and when I line it up and look at the timing mark on the flywheel, the pointer and the + line up - that's a good thing right?

Here is a picture of the pistons in the cylinders - I'm guessing they're so fouled because of the coolant that had been mixing with the oil of way too long. The car also had a bad thermostat and overheated dreadfully a couple of time this summer as it consumed coolant on the high way.

http://picasaweb.google.com/alex.briton ... 2434449282

I cleaned off what I could with a sharp scraper, being very careful of the sleeves. The sleeves were in pretty good condition, but given my low compression tests early on, I suspect the piston rings at the very least should be replaces. It looks like I forgot to take any photos of the valves - the exhaust were thick with carbon which I cleaned off, and I scraped of what could best be described as ceramic like corrosion on the intake valves - perhaps from coolant leaks? Pictures would have helped. There is one of what the piston head look like after some cleaning.

http://picasaweb.google.com/alex.briton/Prelude[/url]

I love my preludes, but after working on this one, seeing that the engine was not original and had loads of wrecker parts on it (tell-tale yellow paint markings) and having some pretty bad rust in all the typical places, I'm not sure how much more work I'll put into this one. I'd like to do some tuning, possibly replace the valves, valve springs and possibly pistons in the spring when it's a little warmer to work in the garage. That's all gonna come down to dollars and time though. This experience was valuable and I was able to tackle while between jobs. I'll be sure to follow up with results of a timing check and as the system cleans it self out after a change of oil and coolant in the coming weeks.

Thanks for the help and suggestions. The search is going to begin for a 4ws 3gen now. I had an '88 and loved it. If I can get a nice 'project' car, perhaps parts from my current prelude will live on! (grin)

I think I have some 'valve slap' happening after me head gasket change. Trouble is the lock nuts on the valve adjust screws are torqued on really tight - what's the best way to get them free without having to disassemble the cams again? I just want to be able to adjust the valve clearance and put the valve cover back on!

Thanks,
A

Yes, it's good that the mark on your crankshaft pulley and flywheel line up, but to be really precise, you have to use a timing light. Remember, these engines are sensitive to even being a degree out, so being precise is important. Get the timing light (perhaps from Canadian Tires loan-a-tool program) and time the engine. It's easy, and you'll get things bang on.

Thanks for the pictures. The engine is dirty, but I don't think it's beyond help. I've got a B20A5 taken apart right now that I rescued from a similar state. Mind if I re-host the pictures so that people can see them inline with the thread?

As for your cam adjustment, are you absolutely sure that you can't get the lock nuts to loosen on the adjustment screws? I know these can be tight sometimes, but you should be able to crack them. If not, we'll work on a plan.

Thanks. Feel free to rehost the pics - I've got some more I'll put up - I tool them mostly so I could put the car back together in the right sequence.

I'm gonna try the valve adjusts today I think.