Curated Content Editor

Engine Building 101: Selecting a Block
By Christopher Hurst

Building engines is a fun, exciting way to learn a new skill set while gaining a greater understanding of your car. It all starts with selecting the right block…

Car Analogy

This solidifies my belief most of these worthless curated content posts are reused recycled for many forums, and just edited to try and target the specific forum in question.

While an engine rebuild thread, even one that focuses on a specific motor, not the one for the forum in question, could be made relevant to many other auto forums, it just doesn't work on this one. These engines aren't diy rebuildable.

That the CCE's even tried to apply this rebuild thread to this forum defines their cluelessness...

manystyles

LOL

Car Analogy

First there is the frm coating. Most machine shops have no idea what to do with that, and will end up causing more harm than good.

Then there is the bearing and piston sizes. There are multiple possible factory sizes for these components. The motors were hand assembled, and these components selected for each block based on the tolerances of that particular block and crank.

Then there is milling bthe head or decking tbe block, which will destroy the cam chain geometry and cause the engine to never run properly again. Oversized head gasket is problematic due to the high compression and high rpm.

There are so many ways for an average shop to mess up trying to rebuild. Specialized equipment is needed to do it right. Even those that specialize in these motors have very limited success and only in very specific circumstances. Basically, most of these motors that suffer damage become unrebuildable, and most that simply wear out are unrebuildable for different reasons.

Often the only solution is to resleeve the block with traditional iron liners, but then you lose all the advantages of the frm coating and much of what made these motors so special.

s2000ellier

i diy rebuilt a motor

https://www.s2ki.com/forums/automoti...build-1146618/

rpg51

I rebuilt a few iron block motors in my youth, (Chevy 350 V8, Toyota straight six, Land Rover in line 4), with some success. But, after reading the pages in this forum for a few years now, I wouldn't touch one of these s2k engines with a 10 foot pole. I plan to do everything humanly possible to keep my motors in tip top shape.

That thread you linked for your build is a great thread. Kudos to you for that build and the success you had with it.

s2000ellier

ran fine 2 seasons of NASA TT until I shifted from 5 to 2 and spun a rod, never smoked or consumed oil. life got in the way for me to fix it after the incident but when i pulled the motor out every rod bearing looked brand new except for the spun one.

i mic'd the pistons and used a bore gauge but that didnt tell me much anyway as i didnt replace the pistons or sleeve the bores so it was irrelevant. micing the journals is probably a waste of time on oem honda parts, their tolerances are so good you'd be lucky to find an out of spec part.

plastigauge is literally what honda advises in their shop manual to verify clearances, like any tool it depends how well you use it and how well you take care of it.

i had no illusions that i was building a 100,000 mile motor with what i was doing in my garage.