hey guys my names Alex. This is my first post so bear with me. Ok, so i have an automatic 98' civic ex 1.6 vtec (d16y8). Just recently i took my car to get a head gasket done due to coolant leaking into my cylinders through a pin hole sized hole in my gasket. Anyway the mechanic couldnt get it to start and basically screwed me saying that there was nothing else he could do to get it to start and returned a couple hundred bucks back to me. Now im stuck with my car turning over but not cranking. I cant figure out whats wrong.I have compression, spark, and fuel.
ive checked my ignition coil, spark plugs, spark plug wires, main relay, timing, and can hear my fuel pump priming.
Im not throwing any codes at all.
need this fixed asap.
Any help would be much appreciated

 

Others will know better than me, but my first guess is that when he removed the timing belt and cylinder head, he didn't set the timing right when he put it all back together.

If that's the case, these are interference engines, and if it's off too much, there could be problems with the pistons hitting the valves. Then you have all kinds of issues worse than a head gasket.

Other than the head gasket, it drove fine when you brought it into the shop, right? Personally, I'd take it to another shop to figure out, then send him the bill. That's terrible service.

 

you say you're getting spark and fuel right?

I'm just making sure you're 100% sure on that. Did you have someone try to start the car with the fuel pump fuse removed while you pull each spark plug wire and hear it tick inside the tube leading to the spark plug?

And just to verify the plugs are good just insert them in the plug wires and rest the bottom of the plug on the valve cover, you should have a clean bright white spark.

And for fuel did you remove the fuel rail and see the injectors spray when trying to start?

Also check your air filter for being badly clogged, really really dirty if it's not starting and everything else is good.


Try a compession test WITH A FULLY WARMED UP ENGINE if all the above checks good. Remove fuel pump fuse under dash, remove every spark plug. Torque the hose to the adapter fitting before hand tightening it in the spark plug hole. That way when you go to back it out the hose doesn't back off the adapter with it threaded in.

Get back in the car, foot on gas pedal all the way, try 5 cranks per cylinder. Write down what the gauge says per cylinder. 135-184psi is what you should get, maximum difference between any cylinder should be no more than 28psi. You could have 150, 155, 145, and 149 and that would be fine. It says 28psi variation is ok, but to me that is a problem if one of them is way off like that, or your piston rings are just worn badly.

If one of them is way out of the threshold you have internal damage, either a headgasket, a bunch of bent valves, cracked sleeve, really bad piston ring, warped head.

Do not try to torque spark plugs back in the head with the engine hot, let it sit for a couple hours otherwise you risk stripping the threads.

 

First off yeah that mechanic shop had the worst service. Theyre peices of you know what.
But anyway the valves are fine the mechanic had me take the head to a machine shop to get a complete check and adjustment of my head.
I got a spark plug tester from autozone and they each lit it up just fine but I also tried grounding them out on the valve cover to see what color the spark is. About the fuel I'm not sure how much pressure there is coming out of the injectors but they are working because I removed spark plug cables so that it wouldnt spark in order to see if my spark plugs would come out wet. They came out with black residue from the fuel so i know they work.
Compression isn't that great before we took the car in to change the gasket it was about 150 ish for all 4. Now it reads cylinder 1- 97 cylinder 2-106 cylinder 3- 110 cylinder 4-150
I know compression isn't great at all but it should still try to start. It doesn't even sound like its going to start it just keeps turning over with no attempt to start