Another Coupe limps into rwheadon's place

[4HondaOwner]

And how would you suppose the cooler line was severed?

[rwheadon]

Originally Posted by 4HondaOwner

And how would you suppose the cooler line was severed?

You know those splash shields many of us leave off because we're lazy?

Thus enters the possibility of severing the exposed cooler hose on a curb or parking tie or whatever.

Needless to say my splash shield is going back on ASAP.

rich

[4HondaOwner]

My splash shield didn't go on immediately after my new radiator install recently. I wanted to make sure I didn't have any leaks.

Then I "Tysoned" it with Aerospace 303 protectant before I put it back on. It was a beautiful piece during the re-install.

Sounds like the previous owner did some interesting things to the coupe with the funny wheels on it.

[rwheadon]

As I work through getting this L coupe on the road I continue to run into things I had not thought I would find. I stopped bringing the Rebel into my garage and am just keeping the iPod handy for quick shots so bear with the grainy pics.

I was removing the intake manifold and I didn't like leaning hard on the fenders to pull it out. Being the "get it out of my way" kind of guy I just went ahead and pulled the radiator out so I could stand on the frame directly over the intake and yank it out of there. A couple interesting things I found along the way:
That beautiful blue silicone top radiator hose, though I knew was not made for a Legend, was installed in a very innovative way.
The hose was installed on top of a hose!




The HUGE relief hose that runs from the radiator neck to the reservoir was routed strangely (notice how the relay boxes aren't mounted properly).


Upon pulling my radiator out I see the fan blades have a thick coat of paint on them, I've never seen the fan blades painted before now. Perhaps I'd like them better in yellow... but I digress.


With the radiator out of the way I jumped into the engine bay and pulled out the intake for a good cleaning. Along the way, when I loosened the EGR tube to take it off I found it was just stuck in the hole... broken off. I found one in my junk bin so that's one less thing to worry about now.


As I took another quick look around I thought "maybe I should go ahead and check the thermostat" :hgeez:: It definitely had a thermostat in there, but not the way you would have thought:



While I marvelled at the thermostat install quality I glanced back at where the heater hoses enter the firewall and got another chuckle. There was a beautiful envelope of silicone protecting the hose from leaking. "But Why?" I asked myself. The answer was not long coming.



I was in a pickle until SR5Guy suggested a way to fix them with sockets! It worked:


...EDIT: At this time I am going to implore EVERYONE to stop using vise grips and pliers to remove hoses. Just get a razor blade and slit them longwise and replace the hose. It's far less frustrating (and possibly cheaper) in the long run. Another alternative is to get a pair of correct size hose pliers... but in the case of cars with those screw type clamps you are pretty much "hosed"... just cut them.

Now back to the previously scheduled program....

So the intake was off and along the way I had a little fun with inventive repair tactics... and I am getting quite a pile of stuff on the floor:



About now is when my buddy Living the dream (matt lane) showed up to help pull a busted transmission out of my car. I didn't have time to snap any pictures yanking the trans out but it was pretty uneventful. The standard broken rear trans mount and the obligatory tool falling on someone's head. It was a wooden shim (4x4 block) that fell on matt's head thank goodness!

Looking up with the trans out I saw 2 things of interest.
A yellow pressure plate

and


I hadn't planned on pulling the clutch so it's a good thing that diff seal was leaking because it forced me to tear the clutch down and the clutch is toast!



About this time I'm thinking that I might as well just pull the engine out and replace it. (half kidding here) Instead of yanking the engine out I decided to just go ahead and pull the heads first to see what I've got there. I was getting my tools set up when I glanced at the heads and noticed they are clean... like REALLY clean.




Obviously the heads have been off the car and not very long ago at that. I called Eric and he said he had the car 4 years and there was never any engine work done to it while he owned the car. So here I've been mulling it over for a week and still haven't decided whether to pull the heads or not. I have a pair of head gaskets handy... we'll just have to see how I feel about it in a couple weeks when I am able to carve out some more time to work on this car.

Just a little update on the (non) progress.

rich

[4HondaOwner]

Pull the heads and replace the head gaskets. From what I've seen, I wouldn't trust anything Eric has told you.

I'm glad tools are falling on Matt's head instead of mine!

[SickSUN71]

That's pretty good progress.. Is that a T1 engine or a T2???

[rwheadon]

Originally Posted by 4HondaOwner

Pull the heads and replace the head gaskets. From what I've seen, I wouldn't trust anything Eric has told you.

I'm glad tools are falling on Matt's head instead of mine!

No, Eric has been straight up with me. We talked for a long time about the car on Saturday. Some of this is possibly Eric's doing... but for the most part he had someone else doing the work for him.

And Matt didn't even let on to me that he got clocked by the block. It was two days later when he mentioned he had a lump on his head from it that I found out. He was totally repped in my opinion, I would have not been able to keep my peace had it happened to me.

Originally Posted by SickSUN71

That's pretty good progress.. Is that a T1 engine or a T2???

It's a T1 engine. Eric has a t2 intake and DV8 block plate he wanted to sell me but I have too much mandatory stuff to buy right now.

rich

[ActionJackson]

Originally Posted by rwheadon

I was in a pickle until SR5Guy suggested a way to fix them with sockets! It worked:

So Rich, what is the socket trick to round out the heater core inlet/outlet tubes?

[rwheadon]

Originally Posted by ActionJackson

So Rich, what is the socket trick to round out the heater core inlet/outlet tubes?

Per Matt: With 1/4 drive sockets start small and tap the socket into the pipe. Work your way up one size at a time until you reach 11mm. Done

I actually have a set of intermediate 3/8 drive sockets that taper up at the drive end, so I used them and didn't have to fish a 1/4 drive out of the hole.

It's tight work, pulling the valve cover off really helps.

I should have done a DIY but I was a little frazzled in all the excitement.

rich

[rwheadon]

While getting the pigtail off of this lush's 3.2 so I can install the 3.5 I found that a previous crank/cylinder sensor swap appears to have par-for-the-course quality work.



EDIT: Progressing right along now










rich