I finally got my new piston rings but was quickly disappointed when I tried installing them today. Before I removed the pistons and old rings I noticed oil left behind on one section of the #4 cylinder wall on the down stroke. There is light vertical scoring on that section of cylinder. The other cylinders did not have oil streaking or scoring.

While checking the end gap on the new rings I noticed there is still oil leaking past the second ring (the 'wiper' ring?) on cylinder 4, while the other cylinders were scraped clean by the ring.

Is it possible that the new rings will mate with the cylinder wall and fix the oil leaking?

If I hone the hell out of that cylinder can I fix the scoring? The scratches are light enough that I can only feel them with my fingernail... not with my fingertip. I already used a 3-stone hone to 'deglaze' but it didn't seem to do much for the scoring.

Or... is it possible that cylinder 4 is out of round? I don't have fancy measuring tools so I'm just guessing. I don't want to put this engine back together until I get this fixed.

 

I'd either rent/borrow the proper measuring tools (bore mic) or get help from a machine shop. You already have a bunch of time invested, so you might not want to mess it up.

 

depending on the depth of the groove, you might be able to hone the cylinders and be ok,,
I would hone the cylinders first and chk it out......,, when you do,, have the drill go at a very slow speed but have a fast up and down motion you will have a very nice cross hatching , when done honing make sure ( very critical ) to properly clean the cylinder walls,, use some soap and hot water, get a finger nail scrub and clean those cylinders to properly remove all the grit from the honing stones,,
rinse the cylinders with hot water,if you got compressed air blow them dry ( do not use a rag to wipe the cylinders dry ) .. once done, oil the cylinders .. If the groove is still pretty deep , block needs to be re-bored and bigger pistons will be needed

 

I decided to try something unconventional while using the cylinder hone tonight and finally just started improvising.

First I wrapped a couple pieces of emory cloth, coarse grit, around the stones on the hone, hoping to take some metal off the cylinders. It didn't seem to do any good though... even after 15-20 minutes I could still easily feel the scratches. I have an identical engine in the garage so I figured what the hell, might as well try some valve grinding compound on the stones. So I ditched the emory cloth and honed for a good 5 minutes with valve grinding compound instead of oil. It didn't seem to do anything though so I pretty much gave up and started cleaning. After much rinsing and scrubbing I oiled up the cylinder and slid in a wiper ring for a test. Lo and behold, the ring now wipes the cylinder clean.

After the test I rehoned the cylinder using just oil and cleaned it again. It feels about as smooth as the others... however I was never able to get a decent crosshatch in any of the cylinders. Just looks like a bunch of randomly angled streaks.

I had pretty much conceded defeat and figured I would end up swapping the block with my other accord, so I was completely surprised to see that cylinder wiped clean. Here's the question... with the emory cloth and valve grinding compound could I have roughed up the cylinder so much that my new rings will disintegrate or somehow not wear in properly? It seems like I committed a big no-no when I added that valve grinding compound.

 

I got the car all put back together last night and it DOESN'T SMOKE!!!! I'm so happy... i just hope something else doesn't go horribly wrong. I'm keeping my fingers crossed until I've driven it long enough to determine how much (or little) oil it uses.

thanks to everybody for the help!