aaaaahhhh that throws me a huge curveball. what have you checked so far?

 

Well a word of caution because it could be a dozen things and no one will really know what's wrong without being able to see the engine opened up, and your engine issue may not be the same as mine.

I started by pulling the oil pan and it was filled with metal, I don't know how much work you are willing to do yourself but pulling the pan would be a good start. I the removed the rod caps and the bearings were fine. The top end of the motor is fine. I just pulled out the block and the cylinders are fine. Right now I am figuring it is either the main bearings and/or the thrust washers. It's taken me a long time to get to this point.

But I had a low oil pressure light come on at idle, you didn't seem to have that on your car. You might want to start by dumping the oil first and see if there is any metal or glitter in it. Pull the VTEC solenoid and see if there is any metal on the screen. The oil pan would be next.

 

ARGHHHH will start with an oil change and report back billman maybe you could shed some light on this for me?

 

hopefully this is what i previously thought it was and ap2 retainers and a valve adjustment will fix the prob, and my funny clutch and shifter ring are all because of a clutch on its way out. but being that its been oil starved for a brief period a couple times i worry that its something larger..

 

Im not sure if I mentioned it earlier, but my feeling of roughness and vibration thru the clutch pedal turned out to be spun main bearings. I had tracked my car a dozen times, but it had been run low on oil plenty of times, and I'm sure that it was a strong contributing factor.

My clutch did need to be replaced at the same time, but the vibration didn't go away when we replaced it. Then, we pretty much knew it was something serious, so we pulled the pan, and that's when we found the shavings, just like JFusion.

So, $6000 later I have a new AP2 block, and a rebuilt head with upgraded valve train. Since I track the car, yet it's also my DD, I wanted to make the valve train as strong as possible against my potential mess-ups.

But, my engine now burns 0 oil.

 

wondering if id be better off just finding a low mileage motor to swap and F all the headaches.

 

I decided defiantly against that. Primarily because so many s2000's have been abused. And even when they weren't, many s2k motors burn oil without the owners realizing it even. Witness mine...the previous owner had it new for 65,000mi. He changed the oil every 3-5000 miles religiously, but never checked the oil. He never abused it, in fact, never revved it above 7K (for sure), yet it burned a quart every 1000miles when I got it, so was running it chronically low without even knowing it.

 

so i start by checking for metal shavings in the oil, cool.

car ran horrid today by the way, this 'shifter ring' problem that it had turned into something that seems to be coming from the block and is a constant rattle. eeeeeeek
would a video or sound clip of the noise help?

 

just did the 'clutch test' and the car crept forward a hair in second gear. how will i know if its the disc springs or a dirty pressure plate? should i start with the clutch as the problem for the rough clutch pedal and shaky shifter or should i start by checking the oil for bearing particles?

 

anyone?