OutdoorKing Repair Forum Forums Repairs and Maintenance Questions on Engines Questions on Other Engines honda 4213

[b][/b] Hi all i picked up a honda4213 today with engine blowing blue smoke and running rough but good compression anyway made a cuppa and had a good look around and found front seal oil leak so im hoping the oil is being blown back by fan and magneto if it has one ...so does anyone have history with one of these guys im hoping the oil smoke isnt an internal cause but will pull it down tomorrow cheers

We need some pictures of the ride-on and its engine to be able to help you with this.

As background for members, the Honda HT4213 (42" cut, 13 hp water cooled GX360 twin cylinder in line engine, OHC driven by rubber belt) was made from 1987 to 1989. A horizontal crankshaft water-cooled engine in a ride-on is unusual enough to be interesting. The engine looks as if it was designed by car-engine engineers: it is complicated, heavy, and looks very difficult to work on without the shop manual. The engine alone has a more complicated wiring diagram than most ride-ons.



Here is the HT4213 owner manual:
http://powerequipment.honda.com/pdf/manuals/31750803.pdf

Grumpy you are a champ thanks mate !!

I can't see how I've helped - that is only the owner manual, I can't find a free copy of the shop manual.

The only way I can help would be to go through this as a repair thread, which means we have to start out with pictures of the machine, the engine installation, the oil leak, etc.

At present the only way I can see a front crankshaft seal oil leak resulting in oil smoke, is if it makes the PTO clutch slip and get hot, so the clutch itself smokes and burns the oil, or just maybe if the oil gets on the muffler, but that has a heat shield and the outside of it should not really be hot enough to burn oil.

The radiator cooling fan and PTO clutch for the cutting deck drive are on the radiator end of the engine, at the front of the tractor. The magneto is on the back or flywheel end of the engine, in amongst the belt drive to the camshaft. That is also where the propeller shaft to the rear drive transmission attaches to the center of the flywheel. That tractor is laid out like a real tractor, or a rear drive car - it is not built like a ride-on. As a result, it is a very heavy machine, and lasts for a very long time, plus or minus regular blow-ups of both the PTO clutch and the wheel-drive clutch. As I said before, I suspect its ancestry is in Honda's car division, not its portable engine division. It must have been horribly expensive to manufacture.

We need to see where the oil is going and where the smoke is coming from: whether it is smoking from the front of the engine, or from the engine exhaust. If the clutch is slipping and smoking, it should be all blackened and covered with oily carbon.

the clutch looks clean and good not at all blackened and the oil smoke seems to come from somewhere below the exhaust manifold and not thru the muffler engine block is thick with grime and the only leak i can find is a small(4"square)housing to the right of the clutch and level with it thanks grumpy

Nice picture. Can you post some more, showing the area around the oil leak? The most important points are that the smoke is not coming from either the clutch or the inside of the engine, either of which would have meant a sizable repair job, and at Honda prices for parts, an expensive one.

1. You have previously reported an oil leak from the front crankshaft seal. Is the one you have just described the only leak, or are there two leaks?
2. We need to see the source of the leak in clear, close-up pictures so it can be compared with the engine workshop manual to work out what is going on. The usual source of oil leaks in a high-quality engine like that one is the oil filter, but it is on the opposite side of the engine from the exhaust, so that wouldn't make much sense. I am in the dark until I can look at pictures that show the whole thing in nauseating detail.
3. Once we know the path of the leaked oil, we need to find the combustion source. It may be spraying or running onto the exhaust pipe/muffler in a direction that does not hit the heat shield before hitting the hot pipe.

It is well worth understanding the problem before trying to fix it. If we can establish what is leaking, and how the leaked oil is being combusted, we can talk about fixing the leak once, knowing that the problem will then go away. That engine is hard enough to work on to make it no fun to pull it out and put it back in repeatedly, while chasing a single fault..

i have one of these motors in a genearator a honda 5500 silent the generator part is shot and the motor i had runnong about 6 months ago was gonna make a go kart out of it then a pressure cleaner then a go kart again but now have givin up on it i would be interested in swapping it for a mulcher or utility mower propblem is you would have to pick up from ipswich qld i also can get a hold of 2 of these rideons all the rubber and plastics are shot and 1 has no cutter deck person was looking for for $400 for both but they will likely take less

[b][/b] hi yeah that sounds good ill know by tomoro if its buggered so will leave a message thanks m8 !!

Hi Grumpy heres some more fotos of harry360 the oil leak is from a housing above and behind of chassis beam foto isnt great but difficult .. yeh this thing is a bit complex but real good stuff methinks like other hondas ive had 125 trail and 900 bol dor bikes im gonna see if i can download the workshop manual or exploded views of engine tonite thanks for yr help arthur

[img]https://www.outdoorking-forum.com.au/forum/uploads/usergals/2013/06/full-6632-11117-pic_0286.jpg[/img heres the foto of chassis beam front of camera and above it and forward of the crossmember is a small ally housing but very difficult to see dunno if it helps much ... dont seem to be able to upload 5 fotos atta time .. operator error i guess cheers arthur

tizza a bugger even trying to get the mag cover off !!! i can peek in and its really filthy so ill fix that and then ill pull off the manifolds and check thru those do the carb and im hoping it will run fine ... pistons look a grey brown but plugs are black n wett cheers mate hope evry1 hadda gud drink for d-day !!

ooh what a bugger pulled the battery tray out to get magneto cover off and turns out to be a one piece affair with driveshaft thru the centre so to clean mag u need to disconnect tailshaft thought honda a bit smarter than that .. thought about cutting plastic mag cover half way thru and then weld it back together err umm any thoughts ????? gonna take a break and download exploded view or workshop manual n regroup at dawn !!!

damn forgot to load foto of mag cover n tailshaft ....what do you reckon hey ???

First, if you remove the radiator then unbolt the engine mounts you seem to be able to slide the engine forward on the frame. The flywheel is not attached to the prop shaft, it just slides out of it. Then you can remove the cam belt cover and have a decent look at the magneto, if you really want to do that - I'm not clear on why you want to. The alternator is back there too, but it is separate from the magneto and is a bit more difficult to get at.

Are you saying the oil leak is coming from the area in the yellow circle below?

And is that the bottom of the engine? I think it must be because the cutter drive belt runs vertically downward, and that's the way it seems to be going in the picture. I'm having trouble working out what the pictures mean. It would be best if you could put an arrow or circle in this diagram (using MS Paint is the easiest way) to show us where the leak is:


I think you need to wash down the engine so you can see the underside of it where you seem to be saying the leak is coming from. Bear in mind that the oil pump is right near your leak, and if its gasket is leaking, that might be the source. However I don't see yet how it would get onto the muffler.

wish my motor was as new as that ...ta ...yeh i have to get into the mag peeking in its full of crap grass rusty n crusty and a bloody mouse ran back in to the engine bay this aftanoon!!! yep clean up in the morn n then ill see could be the main seal behind the clutch or .. that exploded view looks so similar to a girlfriends 1980 honda 250 motocycle internals yet this one liquid cooled .. think if i get it right its gonna be a good one for long time !!

It is easily the most complicated, highest design-quality ride-on I've ever seen, but that makes it difficult and expensive to maintain, like a car. However it should last like a car too, if you maintain it like one.

Incidentally I've seen what seem to be two separate reports on the internet of mice or rats making a nest inside the flywheel of that machine (back of engine, where the propeller shaft attaches). In both cases the rodent fared poorly when the engine started, because of the toothed belt drive for the camshaft, which is adjacent to the hollow side of the flywheel. Poor little guys went between the belt and the toothed pulley. If you've got a mouse infestation in your flywheel too, you need to attend to it. You may need to pull the flywheel to clean out its interior. It is drilled for a three-hole flat plate puller, and that is the right way to take it off. The starter ring gear is machined into the exterior of the cast iron flywheel, and if you try to use a gear puller there's a good chance you'll break off some teeth.

While you are there, be sure and check the tension on the toothed belt. If it is allowed to get slack it will jump teeth, and you'll have to pull it apart again to replace it. You adjust the tension by sliding the water pump outward:



Note that the water pump seems to be held by four bolts, one of which has to be approached from the back of the water pump (that is the one furthest to the right). If the belt is slack it is sure to be worn, and it would be best to replace it rather than go through the whole process again when it wears a bit more and jumps its timing.

Howdy Grumps ... thanks so much thats great mate !! cant go wrong now.yes it is a good machine and i always throw a new belt on with a job like this years ago wen i was a yung fella i worked for a ferrari dealer in adlade n had a call one morn from an owner his 348gtb made sum weird noises n then wouldnt turn over n wen we looked at it the mice n rats had chewed the timing belts and it had crumpled half the valves ...i figure if this beasty was built in 1988 or so and its lasted this long with little maintenance its gotta be a good bet with a few bucks spent thanks for the great info

Arthur if you can post some updates, with pictures, as you go through the tidy-up of that machine, it would make a really interesting thread for our members. We can also try to help if you have any questions or issues along the way.

No probs Grumps wiiltake step by step fotos as i go thru cheers mate