The most common cause of Honda engines getting rebuilt is the infamous timing belt breaking. When your engine is running, the bottom half (block, crankshaft, and pistons) and top half (cylinder head, Valves, springs and retainers) are synchronized to make sure that the valves don’t hit the pistons. When the timing belt breaks the top half (valve train) stops working and some valves maybe left in such a position that when the pistons comes back up to TDC (TOP DEAD CENTER) they make contact. The piston is much stronger then the valves so usually what happens is that the valves get bent in the valve guides and you may have a good mark left in the top of the piston from the valve head.
If you would like to know more about this subject I found a great post at D-Series forums today that describes everything in detail. Click Here for link.
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