Blowing an engine

[clawhammer]

I heard the term blowing an engine, but what exactly does it mean to blow an engine? Ruin pistons? Crack the block? Or can it be many things? What about adding too much boost to the engine?

[1990civicdxhb]

my stock d15b2,went out on me,(I dont say blow up)
my #1 piston ring burned up & I had blowby,(blue smoke)
soon my idle wouldn't idle,to make a long story short,
I soon had to raise my idle to 2000 - 2500 rpm,on steady idle,or my car
would stall,I was running on 3 cylinders,1 more & it wouldnt of started,
so thats what I practicly call a blown motor,
but I have seen videos of cars drifting & burning out & spinning around & repeating,then white smoke coming shooting out from everywhere from the front of the car & the car just stopped,
(that also could be called a blow the motor up)
but when I hear someone say they blew their motor up!
its just a problem in the motor,
wheather its all pistons went out,cracked motor,rods,new block,
it can all be fixed,same as anything else can be fixed,

(a blowed up motor,wouldnt look like a motor,it would be in pieces)

but thats my opinion.

[RedRacerCivic]

usually "blowing up the motor" is throwing a rod or simply blowing a head gasket.

[clawhammer]

Ok, so suppose you were to go way beyond redline, what would happen?

[travagliante]

past redline. Most likely a rod out of block. Meaning you'd have a big hole in it!

Well hmmm...

Ive had a dohc zc that had a major valvetrain issue and a rocker arm broke with the timing belt-happens when engines get overrevved.

hmmm.. the b16 had a major overrevv problem-"friends dont let friends drive each others cars!" Well he took it to at leats 9grand before #1 rod went out side!

hmm blowing engine-also could be cracking 2 pistons @11lbs of boost!

[clawhammer]

Originally Posted by travagliante

past redline. Most likely a rod out of block. Meaning you'd have a big hole in it!

So the block would be ruined, or just need new rods?

[travagliante]

Originally Posted by clawhammer

So the block would be ruined, or just need new rods?

Depends on the situation sometimes the rod will come partially out and just scrape the cylinder walls. You can then get the block bored out and fix it. Otherwise if its a hole in the block 99.99999999999% oh well All the time you have to throw the block away and start new! Why did this happend to you?

[clawhammer]

No, I'm just wondering. I'm in a dilemna here. I'm saving up for a nice RWD car that will be race only, but in the meantime, I have a CRX as a daily driver, and I'm probably going to take that out to the track a few times, just for practice, and was wondering what would happen to the engine, if it "blew". I would like to rebuild it soon, because it has close to 200k on it, and if I were to spend $200 (I would do the labor) I could hopefully put another 100k on the engine.

[travagliante]

Well no matter how hard you drive it at the track as long as you dont do something stupid i doubt you blow your engine!