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Hello fellow TL lovers and Acura admirers.
I’m a new memeber here and was not sure where to post my thread, so if it is in the wrong place, I wont be butt hurt if some who DOES know, moves this post to the appropriate area.
My affair with the TL started back in 06 in high school, when I first saw the 3G TL and it was love at first sight. I decided that I WILL have that car as soon as I got a job.
Fast forward to April of 08.
I had a 99 Honda Accord Coupe that kept on having a new oil leak, even after all the seals and gaskets have been replaced, so I got fed up, went to the local Honda dealer and traded the Accord in for an 05 6MT TL. I bought it with roughly 36k miles in mint condition, and have not looked back since.
It was the first car that I bought on my own and from day 1 she was treated like a queen.
Mods started happening almost instantly. Windows were tinted to 20% 3 days later and an Injen CAI was installed 2 weeks after the purchase. The worst mod was me, being on a budget at the time, I cut the springs, instead of byuing coilovers or lowering springs (dont ever go that route) and immediately regretted it. 6 months later the cut springs started sagging and the ride became unbearable, so I purchased some H&R Sport lowering springs, Skunk2 upper control arms up front and ACP rear camber arms to make sure my camber was adjusted along with the lowering.
The ride quality was instantly better, and the car stopped bouncing uncontrollably in corners and on bumps.
Next, I opted for the lightweight Underdrive pulley by UR. I have heard many mixed theories and debates on that mod, but, today my TL has just under 195k miles and I have never had an issue with the car itself. EVER.
Other mods on this car are RV6 high flow cats with a catless RV6 J-Pipe, 08 Type S struts, CT rear sway bar, CT short shifter, Type S rear taillights, Type S rear side markers, A-Spec lip kit all the way around, 07+ front bumper, fogs and grilles, aftermarket headlights with white side reflectors, custom paint job, and last but not least, staggered wheel setup using Varrstoen ES2 wheels with Continental DWS tires.
The main reason I still have this car, is simple. Its reliability and its looks. 10 years after they stopped manufacting this car, it still looks good inside and out. Many friends and family members of mine had many different cars in the same time period (mostly european cars with me being a rushki) all have replaced at least 2-3 or even more cars within the last almost 11 years. I am alittle different, as I tend to be a little sentimental with all my things, but if something gives me too much headache, I will replace it too. This car, is simply so reliable that I had no reason to want to replace it.
Let’s move on to the fun stuff.
Roughly at 191k miles I let a good friend of mine drive the car. He has not driven a manual car for some time and we just decided to remember the good ‘ol days when all we drove had a manual trans in it. He ends up mis-shifting. Put it in 3rd instead of 5th near the top of 4th gear and, you guessed it, bent my exhaust valves. I couldn’t be too mad at him since I was in the passenger seat and was ok with him putting her through the paces. Besides, I have had a bug in my head for a while about doing some work on the heads to extract a little more power from the engine anyway, so what better excuse than bent valves huh?
This is where this thread really begins. The rebuilding of my engine and transmission. I will post a new thread to continue the details of the rebuild.

Hey Seroshka serduchka, you live in Washington/PDX? Let’s get together sometime. I’ll show you my builds!

yes I do in fact =] why do I get the distinct feeling that I might know you?

Sorry I haven’t been as active as I would have liked to be, but I went with J35 heads with a mild P&P. I must say that after the 2k mile break-in period, I am very well satisfied with the result.
I have yet to put it on the dyno, but my “seat-of-the-pants” dyno is telling me shes a bit snappier and has an overall better pull throughout the entire rev range.
I will post a more detailed rebuild process with pictures soon.

I used the J35A8 complete heads off of a 2007 Type S. I randomly came accross a complete engine with a busted block because the car got wrecked badly and the passenger side engine mount broke off the block, taking the water pump with it. Couldn’t pass up a deal on a complete Type S engine with heads and cams for $450, so I went that route, even after spending about 12 hours P&Ping my original heads.
By the way, if anyone is interested, I have my original heads that I P&P’d that have been just laying there. Highest bidder takes em.

I went with the reliability route using OEM or better parts, but while I was rebuilding everything I figured I might as well open everythin up a bit for a little extra oomph. I’m a bit of an “anti forced induction” guy. I love fine tuning NA motors, but that said, I do thoroughly enjoy driving/riding in turboed/supercharged cars, but I dont like to own and maintain them 😄

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By the way, here is a shot of her shortly after I finished the rebuild

Perhaps because we are both Russian(to build our cars). :)

Your car looks beautiful! Let’s get together for a show this summer.

Is that a silver 3G behind your black TL??

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hahah no. That would be the silver bullett...

Perhaps. What do you dd?

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So anyway, I guess I’ll go into the rebuild a bit.
I got the idea to post about my rebuild when I was already on the “putting together” phase 😁 so forgive me for not having pix of the “conditions found”.
What I can say for sure is that when I popped the heads off my block, I was not expecting what I found. I WAS expecting to find bent valves and marks on pistons where the valves hit them. But I WAS NOT expecting to find cylinder #4 to have gouges in the walls. Gouges so bad, it looked like that cylinder was oil starved for a long time. The piston AND the cylinder wall was very badly worn and I thoughy I wouldnt be able to save my original block. That scared the living hell out of me because I always made it a point to change my oil at 4k miles. Religiously. But then, I also drove her like I stole ‘er about 70% of the time 😁
I was also very surprised at the condition of the rod and especially the main bearings. Maincap bearings had literally 0 signs of use. Not 1 scratch line or even a “shadowy” texture that most used bearings show. I really wish that I had thought of writing about the rebuild earlier in the process. I was really tmpted to save them and actually reuse them, but in my mind I was committed to do a 100% brand new rebuild so my OCD mind didn’t allow me to reuse them 🤪 I’m really anal when it comes to certain things. Like, my cars and my guns.
Anywho. The rod bearings. Those showed signs of use, but normal use. Easily had 100k more in them if not more.
Keep in mind, as you are reading this, that I bought this car as a birthday present for myself shortly after I turned 19. The first 3 months of ownership, the car “idled” at 3k rpm and was constantly above 4k while driving. As any 19 yo, I admit, I drove like someone was after me everywhere I went. But I always took good care of the car by way of using only Chevron gas, put fuel system cleaners into every 3rd tank of gas (literally had a bottle in the glove box and trunk AT ALL times) and changed my oil at 4k like clockwork with Castrol Edge.
At 193k miles, looking inside the engine, I’m certainly pleased with Acuras build quality. I’m not even surprised to see many TLs out ther with 250k+ miles anymore, their auto trannies are the only thing that is having issues it seems, although I went through 2nd gear 2 times now on my 6MT.
So, here are some pix of the assembly process and some P&P progress pix.

I just remembered that I saved all the original pistons.
guess which one is #4 😄
I forgot to include the fact that cyl #4 AND #5 were bad. But 4 was “a bit” worse.
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All the pictures of the piston skirts are taken from the exhaust side and it seems that cylinders 1-3 all show “normal” wear and cylinders 4-6 are all excessively worn.

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Weather was beautiful today, so here are some fresh shots

This is a completely custom color. I wanted a carbon look. I think my cousin nailed it 😉

I believe the original color was called Anthracite Metallic which is like a gun metal color, but it had too much green in it so after 5 years of ownership I got bored with it and decided to give it a more carbon look

By the way, I need help wiring up my fogs.
I can do body work and mechanical work all day, every day, but I’m completely retarded when it comes to electrical stuff.
I read post after post and even watched vids on various sites, and STILL those fogs wont light up.
I bought all wiring harnesses from Acura, ran the wires like the multiple write ups said to. Nothing. Frustrated AF at this point.
If anyone has good electrical knowledge and has done these fogs in the SW Washington area, hmu.

Thank you. These are Varrstoen ES221s. Its also a staggered setup with 18 x 8.5” wide fronts and 18 x 9.5” rears