Well, I finally got my hands on a compression tester. Couldn't find one to rent so I spent $25 and bought a fairly decent one. The results weren't very pretty...
Cylinder #1 30PSI
Cylinder #2 170PSI
Cylinder #3 170PSI
Cylinder #4 170PSI
With those results, I rechecked cylinder#1 just to make sure. Yep, 30PSI. Ouch.
I went ahead an added a bit of motor oil to the cylinder and rechecked it to determine if it was valves or rings. The reading climbed only by about 10PSI, to 40. This would be a pretty clear indication that I have a severe problem with the #1 cylinder valves. Most likely it is the exhaust, because as I mentioned in another post, Honda up and changed the service interval for valve adjustments from every 105,000 miles down to every 30,000 miles because this is a known and recurring issue for them.
Anyone with a little extra time on their hands is welcome to help me find a junkyard cylinder head or even motor for cheap. Alabama Cylinder Head appears to have a $505 solution (with a year warranty too!). I'm certainly going to shop this one around!
13 years ago