Car: 1994 Honda Civic EX
Engine: D16A (The stock engine for this car is a D16Z6 but that's been switched out)

This thread might earn me a few laughs considering the situation I've put myself in; However, I'm looking for a little help and any suggestions or advice to help me out.

I was placing my engine in TDC on the side of the road. My distributor went bunk about six miles from my house and I wanted to avoid paying the towing fee. I didn't have anything long to see sticking out of the engine when turning the crank so I taped a pencil to a pen and stuck in piston hole #1 pen cap down. Well the worst happened and my tool got crunched when turning the crank. It got bent so pulling it out was nigh impossible. With a bent coat hanger, I fished out most of the tool. The only thing that got left behind is the pen cap. I can't quite see it in there though because the hole is so small. I also can't feel it with anything I'm able to stick in there.

Now I received a suggestion from a friend to just leave it in there because it will melt and be harmless. I'm worried about the pen cap damaging the internals.

Am I worrying over nothing? Should I remove the cylinder head to get the cap out?

Anything helpful would be greatly appreciated.

 

Extra plastic in the cylinder could be messy.

Vacuum cleaner? Duct tape on a coat hanger?

 

That sucks the vaccum sounds like it might work

 

At your suggestion about the vacuum cleaner, I went ah-HA!

I immediately retrieved a shop-vac and tried it. After trying however, I am sad to report no success. It didn't come out, I couldn't see it in there afterward and heard no noise to cue its existence.

Is it possible it might have become stuck in one of the valves in the process of pulling out the pencil-pen combo tool?

I cranked the engine more than a few times so I wouldn't think so, but I'm not really experienced with cars.

 

if its plastic it will just melt and burn off, you should be fine,

 

I dunno if you'll need a valve adjustment on that cylinder afterwards...