After 214,000 trouble free miles, my 2004 civic threw a rod. The car is still in great shape, and I still love it, so I went looking for a replacement engine. My local salvage yard had one from a 2001 civic, and their interchange list indicated that it would swap with my engine.

I finished the swap yesterday, and found only one thing that didn't match between the two engines: the donor engine has no EGR valve, so I have one electrical connection hanging loose, with nothing to connect it to.

The engine started right up, and seems to run beautifully so far (I've only driven about ten miles so far).

So here's my question: What should I do about the missing EGR valve?

1. Ignore it, leave the electrical connector hanging there, and drive the car like it is, with no EGR valve.

2. Swap the head off the old engine (after rebuilding it, probably) so I will have an EGR valve in place.

3. Do some magic to convince the computer that the car has no EGR valve, so I can safely drive without one.

As you can guess from my questions, I don't know what the lack of an EGR valve could do to my engine. The point of htis thread: I don't want to find out the hard way.

I understand that the function of the EGR is to pump some exhaust gas into the intake during steady cruising, in order to reduce combustion chamber temps. What I don't understand is what would happen if I don't have one, and more particularly, would the lack of an EGR valve have any appreciable effect in the cool temps and thin air where I drive. (I live at 7000 feet above sea level, and I almost never drive lower than about 4000 feet.)

Any thoughts?

 

I think you're talking about the VTEC valve. It appears you may have gotten a non-VTEC engine. If you were to take the one off of your old head, you would find motor oil inside it, not exhaust gas.

The EGR valve if it has one would be mounted on the intake manifold, not the head.

 

No. My old engine was non-VTEC. My new engine is non-VTEC. Neither of them should or does have a VTEC valve. I'm talking about the EGR valve.

No, the EGR valve is mounted on the transmission end of the head.