hmm

RangCRX: We're not too sure, but in the cases of how rare it is either the block of head that's been warped. It's not any hoses liek I described, though, but I will double check the heater hose now that you mention it. We're able to squeeze hoses coming from the radiator and watch water pour out.

oemcivic: It couldn't be the weephole. We just changed the waterpump and t-belt with a type-r one. If you're looking at the engine from the front of the car, the leak is on the passenger side. In my experience, the only place it could be is the thermostat housing, but we've ruled out that it's not (so there goes my experience).

custom240sx: The electic wiring in this car is haunted. It blew the fuses inside the car, yes, but I removed the head unit before letting it go into the shop and come the other day to find out all the relays, fuses and fuse box has been blackened, fried and what not. As for the block, I'm not sure if my technician checked, I'd have to ask. But he described the block as being in fine condition when he saw it with his own eyes. We did the compression test and leakdown, but I'm not sure of the results because I couldn't do the test myself (I have no car to get to the shop.. heh).

Feel free to put your money where ever, because I ran out of money haha.

 

If you are removing the head, check it for warpage. With the exception of hydrolocking or other certain high cylinder pressure conditions, three layer metal head gaskets don't blow when the head/block mating surfaces are near perfectly flat and good head bolts are torqued to spec - unless the engine was superheated. Also check the block's deck surface. Both have service limit specs listed in your Honda repair manual.

Part of the dynamic of a blown gasket and aluminum warpage is water, part of which when superheated in a car engine flashes to steam, the other part remaining liquid, which can never be hotter than 212 degrees (a bit higher with coolant added).

The cool, liquid water is in the block and the steam, as hot as 1500 degrees, is rising/expanding to the head superheating the aluminum there. These two great temperature differences meet between the block and head, causing warpage along that surface. Avoiding these two greatly different temps between the water and superheated metal is why we don't dump cool water in a hot engine. But remember, it is all relative. 250 degree coolant is cool water when you consider the head is superheated by much hotter steam and combustion.

As counter intuitive as it may seem, rangcrx's experience is not surprising. He had no water and thus no conditions for vastly different temperatures within the engine. Running an engine without water causes it to get very hot, for sure, but without cooler (liquid) water from the block to spash up against the hot head causing rapid contractions of the metal, running the way rang did is nothing more than like putting the engine in an oven and heating it up. It isn't going to warp it, it's just going to get hot. It also won't warp as it cools, as long as it is allowed to cool at a slow rate, which I am sure it did after the 45-minute idle and when it eventually stopped running and slowly cooled to the ambient temperature. It was a controlled, slow cooling.

Water is your engine's friend when it is stabilizing temperatures. But divide it into cool liquid and super hot steam, and the two work against each other but by putting the metal in a tizzy.