Rip lsvtec

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M

Mike_995

New Member
Specs are as follows;
B16 Head (port polished, planned 10 thou)
B18b block (81.5 mm bore, shotpeened rods, arps, and GE block studs)
Forged aluminum ITR pistons
Supertech valvetrain
Blueprint STG2 cams
360 cc injectors
(GSR water pump, t-belt, and oil pump)
Full 2.5" exhaust from header back

This is the story of a very short life of a honda motor that couldnt..... my lsvtec.

It all started out as a bleak and long away picture of what could become of my motor. It was first street tuned without vtec, (solenoid screen clogged) we cleaned it, vtec engaged. The car pulled very hard and the bursts into vtec were very short. I get on the local highway to see how it pulled in second gear, revving around 4 grand I punch it.... vtec hits @ 5500, 6000 I hear alot of noise, the horrific sound of pistons clashing with valves..... my jaw dropped in terror, as smoke rose from underneath my engine bonnet.

I shut off the car, until I was towed home where it was stripped apart. Upon removing the head we found all four pistons destroyed, 4 valves completely ripped in half, not bent the stem actually snapped in half, a valve embedded in the bottom end, and cylinder #4's wall was litterally cracked in two, and it wasnt just the sleave that was cracked it was the whole cylinder....... The combustion chambers on the head resembled mashed potatoes, soo bad that the spart plugs were stuck into the head. Our diagnosis, the valves failed, cracked and let go when vtec engaged.....

But my question is WHY ???? the weakest link in that whole motor was my rods, why would a head be ripped to pieces like that ? valves snap off of their stems and cream into the pistons ? even when the timing DIDNT jump, and amazingly.... not a single rod was bent, no bearings were spun NOTHING. The motor worked beautifully before this happened, it wasnt noisy, there werent any warning signs.....it just went kaboom, and when it blew up it REALLY blew up.... let me know of what you guys think went wrong, because I really dont want my brand new b16 thats going in tomorrow to blow up when I put my cams,springs and retainers in.

PS: Pictures will be added tomorrow or the weekend, you will see the destruction of a once prided honda motor.
 
AHHVTEC said:
shit we have a member here by lsvtec i thought you was talking about them geez lol
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LMFAO! HAHAHAHA! That's quite morbid of you.

To the OP, man, I am REALLY sorry to hear that. Wow! I hope that you are able to bounce back and get everything in order. This is something I would NEVER wish on anyone.

I have a question about the head. What do you mean "planned 10 thou"?
 
Thanks man, ive been talking to a few local honda guys and this kind of thing happening is almost unheard of.....I got the head decked so that the headgasket would have a perfect sealing surface, and I told the machine shop to take off 10 thousands of an inch, to give me a little higher compression. The only thing salvagable from the setup is the cams, springs and retainers and vtec hardware, thats why I bought a b16, so I could use my cams, springs and retainers... it still should be fairly quick.
 
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you said you had just had it P&P'd... is there some kind of break in period after you put the head back together? how long after this was it that you smacked on it in second?
 
i'm sorry to hear about the whole thing dude, i hope the next one goes well!!
 
Yea, there was plently of oil in it, it actually made its own oil when the cylinder split in half allowing all of the coolant to drain into my oil pan..... the head was port polished about 3 months before the motor was put together, it was fully cleaned out several times.... I think that the clearances in the motor were just a little too tight, the plane on the head just made it so when the motor went into vtec, the valves just barely touched the pistons causing fractures in the valve stems.... that would explain it blowing up 15 km's down the road. But it still doesnt explain how one cylinder is a million times worse then the rest, the damage you would think would be similar, unless that cylinder was tdc when the valve broke off from the stem.
 
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When something is pumping up and down 9 thousand times a minute, a very minor failure becomes very major.

You mentioned springs and retainers.. Were they all in good shape? Good brand? I'm wondering if you floated a valve just enough to make contact with the piston.. One little whack could set off a chain reaction like that under heavy acceleration / high RPMs. If your engine was tolaranced that close, a whack could have stretched the timing belt just a tiny bit, and caused everything to come crashing down.

Either way, sorry to hear that.. Best of luck on your next motor.
 
The valve springs and retainers were brand new just out of the box, and they were the supertech SPR-H1002D's so they are a good spring.... they are going in my b16 in a couple of weeks, same with the cams.... I just got that up and running last night the thing pulls pretty damn good.

Adding pictures of the carnage tomorrow night... its pretty bad...
 
sorry to hear all of that bro. its an engine builder's worst nightmare especially since most of what you had into the motor is now toast.
 
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