Any ideas? 1990 Civic is using oil maybe 1 quart per 3 to 4 hundred miles, but doesn't seem to be leaking or smoking. It may be that radiator fluid is slowly depleting, too. 95,000 miles only on engine. Is there a history with this engine of head gasket failures? Any ideas greatly appreciated. Johncathleen

 

there isn't a history of engine failures but that car is 13 years old and has 90k miles on it (though most hondas require little maintenance inside of 150k miles).

honda did update the headgaskets for the 88-91 d series engines (which is what you have) with a slightly stronger headgasket and head studs...you can buy the new updated headgasket and studs from manchester honda (online store) for much less than the dealer would charge and have a trusted mechanic do it (i've done about 5 headgaskets in my time 1 for me and for 4 other friends...it's not that hard...a helms manual (factory service manual or shop manual) at www.helminc.com will show you how to do everything (it is what the dealer uses)

good luck

 

Thanks much for this info. Offhand, can you think of other reasons why we might be losing oil. I am going to check oil-sender unit, seals, etc. but there are no stains under the car where it sits, so if there are leaks, they are only while it is moving down the highway.

 

the best way to check a headgasket is to get a compression test...this will tell you what max compression you can get from all 4 cylinders...since you are losing both coolant and oil it is most likely an internal leak into one of the combustion chambers

take out each spark plug and look at it...if there is white residue on them then that cylinder is where the leak for the coolant

another more thorough test you can do is a leakdown test that will give a more accurate test on how well your car handles compression...it can tell you if you have a leaking piston ring or a damaged cylinder wall (allowing oil in the combustion chamber)

but is is most likely a headgasket as you are slowly losing both fluids...i'd suggest repairing it as it could go anyday with average driving...causing the engine to overheat the warping the cylinder head (getting it to hot so that it is no longer flat)...while that is being done i'd get the thermostat ($30), water pump ($50) and timing belt & pretensioner ($70 together) done at the same time as they will have easy access to it

 

will do, thanks much.