Can anyone shed some light on what this could be? Just purchased the car a few weeks ago.

Red mark and peeling ?

Higher up view

 

I believe that's where a bar-code sticker with the engine number used to be. It's not laminated/protected, so comes off easily (the first time I cleaned off the oil and grime from my block the sticker fell apart immediately).

Edit: Nope, I'm wrong, the sticker is lower down, by the crank pulley. Hang on, I think I know what it is...

 

OK I think it's *a* sticker, just not *that* sticker.

Here's a VERY old photo (2002?) of my motor, showing a dark circular sticker right where you're talking about:


And here's a SLIGHTLY more recent photo (2004?), where it's gone without a trace - obviously just cleaned off with no residue. I have no memory of this little detail, but I suspect this is the (remnants of the) thing you're seeing.


Cheers

 

Did someone JB weld a hole in the timing cover? Would signify previous engine damage.

Take a brillo pad and scrub that spot clean, will help identify.

 

Scrubbed clean. It looks like it was that sticker. I thought it was some type of repair at first

 

That sticker on the chain case it very similar to what we would put on engines that we test fired after a repair. We used orange at my plant in Canada.

 

To clarify, you mean repairs at the factory, prior to cars sale, correct?

When you say repair an engine, it makes one imagine something done at a dealership or something after car has had some miles.

 

Yes. Sorry at the factory before we ship them to the assembly plants.
Basically any internal repairs we do an engine during inline assembly or when completed before we send them to be installed in a civic or cr-v.
We have what is similar to an engine dyno and we can hook the engine up and run it to verify the repair.
No noises etc.
As far as repairs go we have checks inline to to check how easily the engine turns when just a short block.
If it is deemed as being stiff we separate the lower block and inspect all the bearing for any contamination.
Something as small as a human hair will cause an engine to fail our test.
We also have pressurize the oil and water systems with air and a machine that determines leak rate.
The bulk of our repairs are leaks prior to having oil or coolant installed.
Misset gaskets, fingers in the sealant, contamination on sealing surfaces.... the list goes on.
Kinda long winded.
Sorry

 

Awesome insider perspective! TY!

 

Thanks @jaymz , nice insight! Since the engine is a sub-assembly (relative to the entire vehicle), we'd expect more total engines to be produced than cars, and in fact I've found that it's much more common for our engines' serial numbers to be slightly higher than our cars' VINs. Remarkably, though, the overall average difference in my sample set (~150 cars across all years) is only about 6, indicating that all but a handful of "problem" engines each year were ultimately salvageable.

My own car's an exception: the VIN is #0814, while its engine is #0805. Still, though, not enough of a difference that I'd have expected the engine was ever delayed for a quality fix during production. (Honda was cranking out at least 30 U.S. S2000s a day in June '99, when my car was made.) On the other hand, it's still a very early motor overall, so perhaps more of those units than usual were getting a special look -- and earning that sticker!