ClareQuilty

I'm going to sort of take both Jas21's and WarpSpeed's advice - I'm too broke now (unsurprisingly after a 14,000 baht repair) to do anything more, and the car is going OK in the current extreme hot weather. However, I'll certainly replace the thermostat by about October when we begin to have quite cool temperatures at night up here in Isaan. It can get down to 15 or even less many nights during the 'winter', and I tend to drive the car more at night than during the day.

I very much suspect that there is not a thermostat fitted AND from reading previous I also suspect that there never was a thermostat fitted either. I suspect someone removed it in an attempt to stop the overheating ... get it checked and get one fitted.

Oh, I didn't know it was possible to do without one. The car warmed up correctly before the repair - that is, during the few weeks I had it before it overheated, it warmed up quite quickly and then held at normal operating temperature, so I'm pretty sure it had one at that time. Perhaps he removed it during the repair.

Been driving the car a great deal the last two days, and I can say it seems very good. Funny thing is, it takes a very long time for the car to get warm now.. I guess he may have overdone it a bit, perhaps a lower temp thermostat or something? Now it takes about 5-6 kilometers of driving before the temp gauge even budges at all from cold. It eventually gets to normal operating range, but only after driving a lot.

I'm happy with the repair so far.. if it holds up a couple-few years I'll be very happy. The car's a joy to drive compared to my Soluna.

No, he showed me an enormous sort of very heavy, thick flat grey rectangular thing.. it looked a lot like a perfectly angular grindstone..

Like this ?

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=skimming+a+cylinder+head&biw=1366&bih=640&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=gOZWVZaQCIv28QWYyYHoAg&ved=0CCAQsAQ

No, not like that, it was just a big rectangle of some kind of grey material.

Anyway, happy news, for now - I got the car back, and the job is completed. The car runs fine, drove it around on many errands in 95 degree heat today with the air on continuously, and the temp gauge stayed rock-steady. Power and drive-ability seem unchanged.

Total bill, as promised, right at 14,000..

He even fixed a few little bits and bobs for free - such as gluing down or reattaching any loose interior parts, and fixing (bondo-ing) a minor dent/hole in the front right fender from a small accident. (true, he's no body-man, so the fix was apparent under close examination, but its a huge improvement).

The mechanic.

A head has to be removed and refitted in sequence and stages with a torque wrench or it can bend.

Seems odd they wouldn't know about that - they do these head jobs at least once a month: I've seen them doing them, and had friends who had them done there..

I wonder what that was ... a special machine or apparatus for grinding the block properly... a Black & Decker sander? sorry

No, he showed me an enormous sort of very heavy, thick flat grey rectangular thing.. it looked a lot like a perfectly angular grindstone..

What's the bet crusty the clown bent the head himself ?

By clown do you mean me or the mechanic? Because I thought the head had to be heated to warp. Seems not terribly likely in the shop?

Oh, goodness. Another visit reveals it is in fact not the cracked head - he took it too a more 'high tech' shop an hour away which was able to determine using some special machine that in fact the head was not cracked, and that the problem was almost certainly due to their not having done the head job correctly. Apparently they had not managed to file down the head and the engine block properly, and when they put in the new gasket, it didn't seal well. He sent the head to a better shop for re-grinding, and borrowed a special machine or apparatus for grinding the block properly.

So, at least I won't have to pay for a replacement head, but hopefully he will stick to the 'no further labor charges' promise he made a few days ago. If it comes in under 14,000 I'll be happy, if its more I'll protest.

So then they never really did run it a full 15 minutes even or like I mentioned quite frankly that was never enough time, but so why was it stalling? What relation did that have to the current circumstance of it having a cracked head? Or is it that they discovered it still overheats after solving the stalling issue and running it longer?

The explanation was apparently a communication difficulty - the owner's English isn't that good, and perhaps gets worse when he's befuddled or obfuscating a bit. What was happening (as far as I can tell) is the car was running for 15 minutes and then overheating, not stalling out.

I'm just hoping for the best, we'll see. Hoping he has it right, hoping the second-hand head is a good one, etc.

Got the verdict yesterday - turns out the head was in fact cracked. The mechanic told me that the head shop had told him they thought it was cracked, but he didn't believe it, and in an effort to 'save your money' as he put it, he decided to try it out. Well, as it turns out the head was cracked..

So, he said he would go back and get a second-hand head from the same shop where they ground my head, for 2,500, plus an additional 500 for another gasket set, and he wouldn't charge me any additional labor as it was his mistake. He showed me the bill so far was about 10,900, so with this additional 3,000 he promised he wouldn't charge me over 14,000. Should be finished in a few more days.

So, as it turns out there was something wrong with his repair, but perhaps I'm partly to blame for giving him the impression I am so parsimonious that he should take risks with the repair..

You do seem to be getting a bit defensive in your responses when people here are taking their time to try to help you with solutions and advice though. In order to give proper advice it's necessary to have an exchange of information, especially when you have so little knowledge on the topic, it's not an interrogation, well it is of sorts but not intended to be judgmental at least not in my case, can't speak for everyone.

Thanks for your help WarpSpeed, and I apologize if I seem defensive, I don't intend to. I just keep making the point that there was nothing wrong with the car prior to the recent work other than the overheating problem. Thus, it stands to reason that whatever new problems have popped up after that work were probably caused by that work.

The fuel pump, carb, etc, were all working perfectly before, and the overheating was so momentary and mild, that it would be an incredible coincidence if they just happened to go out while the mechanic had the car for one week. More likely is that some aspect of the head gasket repair they have done has caused the current problem.

Remember, the head gasket problem is probably very old - dating from the severe overheating the previous owner did years ago, not the 30 second close approach to the red-line I did a couple weeks ago. The car was running and driving perfectly during the several weeks I owned it, until one day the water finally ran low enough that it overheated.

The car's no longer overheating. I've neither the time nor the knowledge to micromanage this work. Regarding this new problem - the main point is that it is an entirely new problem. The carburetor, along with every other aspect of the engine, was working perfectly before this repair, other than the overheating.

When I overheated the car just a couple of weeks ago, it was only for a few seconds - I immediately stopped the car when the needle climbed into the danger zone. Not so the previous owner, who had overheated it severely many years ago, and supposedly avoided subsequent overheating by assiduously adding water ever since (also he drove the car very little in the last 4-5 years). Thus, if 'everything in the car was cooked' it was odd that the car ran perfectly prior to the work just done.

Is the car still getting fixed? Just wondering.

Yes, it was finished with the original work a few days ago, but I was out of town.

The mechanics started, ran, and used the car occasionally while I was gone to test it out. The engine runs fine, doesn't overheat, except that it has a new problem - after it has been run around 15 minutes it begins to die out. They theorize it is a part in the carburetor involved in fuel supply - he showed it to me, a kind of little metal tube about 1.5 inches long with two little rubber washers that go along with it. They've ordered the part from Bangkok so I haven't paid or gotten the car back yet.

To be honest I have a lot of doubt about this as they didn't seem very sure about this diagnosis. Personally it sounds to me like something worse.. like something wrong with the work they did. Who knows.

CQ , is this the mechanic you also take your bikes too ? . Sounds like the "old" man knows your budget , and is working to it .Not always the best way to do things , but you are correct to not spend too much on a cheap car .

My goodness no - car mechanics and bike mechanics don't mix. His prices, though reasonable, are many times what I'd pay for a bike repair. The little bike shops I use are super cheap.

I tend to like older people and suspect they do better work, understand old machines better, and perhaps even understand extreme impecuniousness better. Besides, he speaks a rough and ready English from many years of working in the middle east.

Should be just another couple of days till the job's finished, I'll report back.

If all is well after this you've still probably got a bargain.

Those extra parts should include a new timing belt and tensioner, which will please some members. Whole head gasket set, valve seals, oil, filter and coolant as well.

And water pump...

Actually I was just over there looking at the open engine, and just as Honda said, the timing belt looks almost new. This mechanic, like Honda, said that it looks like it was replaced fairly recently and doesn't need replacing. He said he would check out the water pump.

Basically he's looking to do what needs to be done, but not more, recognizing my extremely tight budget. His middle aged son was there, and he suggested putting new valves at 800 baht each, but the elderly father insisted that merely 'fixing' the old valves was fine.

By 'valves' I mean the fluted stemlike things, they look like little trumpets.

Guys whatever the problems are, they date from before this specific overheating episode! As I stated above the previous owner had similar problems.

No doubt the lack of water and thus the most recent overheating was the result of head gasket issues dating from before I owned the car. In addition, I only allowed the car to reach the hottest temp on the gauge for less than a minute - the previous owner apparently drove quite some distance with the engine hot.

I visited the mechanic today and he was well along the way towards finishing the process, having ground down the block and sent the head for grinding to the machine shop. He's also doing the valves - grinding and reseating or something like that. The same shop recently did this same work on a friend's mid-1990s Corolla and the total ran to 14,000 baht, which sounds fairly reasonable to me (but my friend didn't remember if there were additional parts fixed beyond the head gasket and valves). My friend has been driving that car for a few months since the job and says its quite good.

As I stated, lostinisaan, the radiator was very far from full - hence my refilling it with a hose - a process which took around 15 minutes with the car idling (as I think is the recommended method). However it didn't seem to be completely empty. As for 'how hot' the engine got - it got as hot as the gauge would go.

I have had fairly good luck with the 'shaggy' mechanic in question, and I don't really see any need to go to the dealer for a 22 year old Civic.

They didn't have a chance to investigate yet, as I said. He said they were (as of yesterday) still very short staffed after Songkran. He said that Thai mechanics tend to take a lot of time off for Songkran.

I personally haven't noticed any white or other smoke coming from the tail-pipe, but then again I am usually the one starting the car. We'll see.

Hearing water/steam hissing is a pretty good sign of a failed hose somewhere or like mentioned possibly a radiator puncture hopefully and not something more serious, not so good to hear after the fact from the previous owner who I understood was a trusted work colleague that it has a water loss problem for some time, that's rather crap.

Actually the car that you're remembering coming from a 'trusted colleague' was a Toyota Soluna I bought at about the same time - it has been reliable. This Civic is from a foreigner who had to leave suddenly, who offered me such a good price I couldn't refuse.

Now the car has been at the mechanic's for a day or so, and he hasn't had time to really investigate it, but when I visited him to inquire about it this afternoon he said his first guess was the head gasket.

Today got the car filled up with water from a hose, both radiator and overflow. Managed to drive almost the whole 8 kilometers home before it began to get just slightly hot - that is, not hot, just slightly above its normal operating temp. When I raised the hood at home, however, it did have a hissing noise of escaping steam or water, and I did see some water on the ground.

Anyway, its now within a few hundred yards of the mechanic, so I'll just have take it in and see if they can do anything with it. The previous owner told me that this is a continuously recurring problem and he said he used to check the water level every time before driving the car - said when he kept radiator and overflow very full at all times, he had good luck.

Well there was no noise associated with the mishap, so perhaps that suggests it might not be the water pump(?), and the fan is an electrical fan, so no fan belt. Timing belt is obviously fine at the moment, as the engine can run without any other problem except for the overheating.

I tried starting it again later in the evening and it did absorb two large bottles of water (I poured it in slowly while the engine was running, as I believe is recommended?). It still got very hot within 2-3 kilometers, so I stopped at a gas station. Will try towing it tomorrow.

A recent purchase of mine, a 1993 Civic, has suddenly begun to overheat. I had driven it many time for one hour trips around the area in 40 degree heat, without any problems, but suddenly today it overheated very quickly after start-up, after a week sitting. I immediately parked the car alongside the road for fear of damaging the engine, and will probably have it towed tomorrow, but I'm wondering if there's anything I should/could check on my own, at least to make the car drivable for the 8 kilometers to a repair shop.

What would have made the car suddenly begin to overheat after 2-3 weeks of good cooling performance?

I've never been in any car that wasn't effected by turning on the air. It always sucks power. True it wasn't a big deal back in the States driving big V-8s, but on these tiny motors sold in Thailand, of course its going to markedly reduce engine power, even in a new car. I usually turn off the air by pushing the 'compressor button' or turning the cool dial to zero if I have to do some momentary accelerating.

Well my goodness, I will definitely have to put it off if it is that expensive. I could have gotten a whole new engine for the KE70 for 10,000!

The car just cost 50,000, I guess I could just drive it and see what happens. Hope to get a few years out of it of course, and it drives so nice. I have to say in my humble opinion this 'interference' engine design seems a frightful mistake on Honda's part.

Well, I had the car in at Honda today, asked them to check the timing belt.. they removed the valve cover and part of the timing belt cover, and we took a look at it. About 3-4 of them took a gander, and all agreed the belt was fine for now, they stated it seemed fairly new.

They also checked the oil, the air filter, and the radiator fluid, adding only to the latter, and not suggesting replacing or changing anything. I was surprised. The whole visit was free.

I suppose I should trust their judgement, but I think I may go back and change it in just a few months, after the budget busting time of income-tax and visa-renewal...