ahhh....right when i get my motor swap done and am finally enjoying it....BAM....head gasket is messed up. like when i turned it off for a while and turned it back on a big ass cloud of smoke came from muffler....it wasnt like that little bit of smoke that u can still see through...this was a thick could of white smoke ..and there was lots of it. im asuming its the gasket cause ppl been saying that coolent is leaking. i just wanna make sure that it is the gasket and nothing else. im gonna take it off tomorrow but while im doing that...i wanna know if it could be something else.???

one more thing...this motor is fast as hell....well atleast for the little while i got to enjoy it till the massive smoke started to come out. o well...it'l get fixed and ill be on the road once again.

Sorry to hear about that, I blew my motor by running into a huge puddle. three weeks ago. I had a long cold air intake. I guess your repair isn't very costly or is it?

WHat car do you have and whats the engine specs.

Josh

dang..that sucks. its a b16 in a 96 civic. i just recenlty finished the swap. i have headers, intake, exhaust, and a few other things. it wont be that costly....i spoke to the guy i might be buying the gasket from and he'll sell it to me for like 70 'ish dollars. which is not that bad.

The head could be cracked.

dammit, don't jinx it! ahhhh!
shit, that sucks to hear. At least it sounds like it's only the head gasket though, so though it's going to be gay working with the timing belt, it shouldn't cost that much to repair before you're back on the road. Great to hear you are enjoying your new swap though, before your bit of bad luck.
An idea though: as long as you have to replace it, why not run a thinner head gasket? like one from TODA or Spoon? by putting a thinner head gasket on there you will slightly increase your compression ratio because you are putting the head closer to the piston but you will also retard your cam timing a little bit too, which works good for high rpm power. Just a thought that might give you a few ponies.

well the only cost were spending is on the gasket....im doing the repair my self. this is my first time repairing a gasket and all couldnt be going any better...ive learned so much doing all this my self. dont worry..i didnt take off the head bolts randomly...i did it according to this grid...ive done everything so far the precise way it should be. the only hard thing is putting the bolts back on..i need to go borrow a torque wrench. i didnt know that...it works good for high rpm...what about just regular driving..not racing..how would the timing affect with low rpms.

The way cam timing (ignition timing as well) works is if you're retarding the timing, you'll usually make high end power. If you advance the timing you'll make low end power. In most cases you can only have one or the other.
In a test done in one of my honda books, they tested the effects of cam timing on a B16 with a slightly milled head. This is what they cam up with:
With 2 degrees of retard they made 5 more hp, with 2 degrees of retard and 4 degrees of ignition advance they made 10 more PEAK hp. They lost no bottom end hp. But with the timing advanced 2 degrees they lost 3 hp, however they made some low-mid end hp over the best pull when it was retarded.
It all depends on where you want to make your power. If you want low end hp or high end (VTEC) hp. For the cost of the thinner head gasket though, i would probably just get the stock one unless you plan on doing alot of work to the head any time soon, cuz the gains won't be that noticable, but gains none the less.

k i ran into random problemm....well might not me random....i replaced the gasket and mounted everything back on...even making sure that the cams were still set with the top dead center. when it came time to crank it up it automaticaly went to 2000 rpm and just rested there....no going up or down..just staying there. so i figured i go adjust this rpm by adjusting that screw on the throttle body. well after i did that i cranked it up again and this time it would not only go high but also go low...all on its own...even if i did hit the gas peddle on my own it would still be in control after i let go...going from 2-3500 rpm..back and forth ..back and forth..not staying at a steady 1000 rpm.
im not good with a problem like this so i need help.

That...is not good..

bad vacume leak?

i also read something that tranny fluid might be leaking into the intake manifold. something about the tranny modulator valve(could that be it?). aparently it wasnt the head gasket. its weird though...after the engine is been on for like 10-15 min and is pretty hot.... dense white smoke still comes outta muffler. its not over heating or anything cause the fan kicks in and the gauge for the temp reads normal. so its gotta be internal.

ok took it to the shop today to get it pressured tested and they said that it seemed good. their gonna go ahead and hold it overnight and run some more tests tomorrow. hopefully all goes well.

where did you get this motor from? have you compression checked it yet?

i just said i got it tested. and it passed. i guess i just have to break it in.

pressure testing is not the correct word, use the term compression check