Lost motion assembly, they look kinda like lifters.
They sit under the rocker arms that contact the vtec lobes on the camshaft. What they do basically is apply constant pressure to the rocker arms so when they're not bridged to the intake/exhaust valve rockers the rocker arm doesn't just flop around freely and damage the camshaft.
If you don't understand that then you should read up on how vtec works and you'll understand.
Intake side sounds like a pissed off type writer. Will go away for a few seconds then cone back. The head was at the machine shop. Replaced everything but those apparently. For $100 I can get the springs from skunk2. Or pay $280 from honda.
Valves were adjusted to spec from the machine shop. I didnt pay $600 in head work with new valves, seals, retainers and springs to not spec everything. Only thing that wasn't replaced, apparently, were the lma's