Replacing bent valve/cylinder on CRX 87. Please help.

[Dimitriy]

Two Things:

There is smoke/steam (anyways its whiteish foggish) coming up from the front of the car. Its coming from inbetween the radiator and the front of the engine. Doesnt seem to be from the dipstick area. Its noticeable but its not too bad. My guess is exhaust??

Two: The car idles good now but when driving it it has a weird.... "feel". I soaked the engine with garden hose hoping to get rid of the first problem and then drove it. My brother told me it probably is the distrubator cap. One way to describe the car is: It cant seem to find its place driving. I never did lower the throttle. Could that affect it?


I know the describtions suck but I might dig around today after work. Any idea of some stuff of should check out?

Lastly, should oil be bubbly? I pulled the dipstick cleaned it and stuck it back in and out and the oil level was decent (2 or so milimeters off the mark; could use some...) but it had small air bubbles. Bad? ok? good? normal?

 

[reckedracing]

air bubbles, not a big issue

steam/smoke = probably caused by fluids spilled during project now burning off of motor/exhaust
is the car extremely loud? could it have a severe exhaust leak in the area you are seeing the smoke?

#2 did you re-adjust your timing? and make sure all plug wires are in correct order?

 

[Dimitriy]

The firing order is correct. 1-3-4-2 clockwise. Car has good start. I dont think problem is there.

Now as for the timing belt.... I did not readjust after replacing those parts. However we did not touch it once it was set. Does it need to be set again? We did manually crank the engine when doing the rocker arms but that wouldnt affect it...would it?

As for the exhaust... Maybe to very possible. The exhaust is OLD. But wouldnt the steam-like smoke be coming from under car? I want to say its coming from the.... here take a look at the picture I just dont know the name of that part. The shiny tube like parts.... Not my car btw.

 

[reckedracing]

the shiny tubes = header = exhaust manifold
thats what takes the exhaust gases from the motor to the rest of the exhaust system...

timing belt won't need to be adjusted, but the actual distributor might need to be...
rotating the distributor/distributor cap = advancing or retarding when the spark ignites the fuel in the combustion chamber...