"other" toy back on the road

[Banjo]

YEEEE HAWWWW! Ok,Ok it's only a Honda Civic.(the three door model, I call it my counterfit Mini) But I burnt a valve in it a month after I got it last fall, and it's been waiting patiently for repairs all winter.
I was going to just replace the valve, but the rings were bad also, so the repair cost kept creeping higher. I contacted a friend who had done a couple of "tuner" upgrades and had 2 engines sitting in his shop, and he said I was welcome to one for $100 bucks. Cool! Until I got there and they were the 8 valve model (mine is the 16 valve).
So there it sat, while I tried to find another motor. Fast forward to two weeks ago. The local u-pull-it had a 50% off anything in the yard sale! Bingo, a motor for $65. My dad and I went over first thing and selected one that gave every sign of being "OK", pulled it, and looked the car over to see if anything else was any good.
We found the instrument cluster in the trunk. Cool, I thought, I wonder how many miles? Welllll 262000 !
Oh man! Well we took it any way, and, with a fresh timing belt, I finally got it all buttoned up yesterday and took it around the block!
No real bad smoke, and it's running on all 4 cyls. I guess it's ok
So I got my cool little bomber back, so I can have fun while the TR4 is out of commission.
Not bad, an engine swap for around $150 total. That's what I call cheap thrills!
Wish me luck with the "broken-in" Honda plant /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

 

[Guest]

Hey, don't sweat it. Those Honda mills are like energizer bunnies, they just keep going, and going....

My buddies 91 Accord had well over 200K on the clock, still pulled like a champ, quiet as a mouse, and blew no smoke at all. Only thing he had to put into it that was a bit involved was a clutch. He finally got rid of it because the rust holes in the rear wheel arches got so bad they wouldn't pass him through inspection. My brother-in-laws 91 Accord is qucikly approaching 200K and he's still driving it every day, absolutely no problems other than the paint completely peeled off the roof a few years back. Those cars have always amazed me, although some years they were not the nicest things to look at. Especially now, the new ones are boooooring, but they always had fantastic motors.

Man, I wish we had a you-pull-it around here, especially one that had 50% off days. All the good salvage yards around me seem to have disappeared over the last few years. Congrats on your refound toy!