'91 Civic Si problems...

  • Thread starter Thread starter Jason Faas
  • Start date Start date
J

Jason Faas

This is an ongoing problem that until today has appeared to be main relay
related. It has been acting up intermittently for about 2 months.

What happens is that the engine will cut out while driving. The first time
this happened it restarted after sitting for a couple hours. I purchased a
new main relay and the car has stalled with that. The new and old relays
have both been resoldered and it has stalled with each of them. The reason
that I keep working on the relays is that it has always started and never
stalled (until tonight) when I have put jumper wires in place of the relay
(connecting 1-3 and 5-7).

I have not been able to discover any wiring faults. The wire to ground and
the wire to the ECU test fine.

Tonight the car stalled and would not restart with jumpers in place. I can
here a click from the ECU when I install one wire, and with the other wire
in place I can hear the fuel pump hum when I put the switch in the start
position.

So, I have to conclude that it is not the main relay, since both necessary
circuits have power and the car is not running. What am I missing?

I have noticed that when the engine stalls the tach drops to zero while the
engine is still spinning. This suggests no spark. Could this be a bad
igniter or a bad ECU? Could it be the ECU ground? I've been trying to
check it, but I can't find it. Anyone know where it is? '91 Civic Si
hatchback.

Any and all help will be greatly appreciated.

Jason
 
Tonight the car stalled and would not restart with jumpers in place. I can
here a click from the ECU when I install one wire, and with the other wire
in place I can hear the fuel pump hum when I put the switch in the start
position.
Click to expand...
Correction: I hear the fuel pump when the switch is in the "on" position.
I can only assume it runs when I turn it to start.

Jason
 
I had some similar issues with my 91 Si a while back, check the coil inside
the distributor, as well.

Good Luck!

JW
 
Jason said:
This is an ongoing problem that until today has appeared to be main relay
related. It has been acting up intermittently for about 2 months.

What happens is that the engine will cut out while driving. The first time
this happened it restarted after sitting for a couple hours. I purchased a
new main relay and the car has stalled with that. The new and old relays
have both been resoldered and it has stalled with each of them. The reason
that I keep working on the relays is that it has always started and never
stalled (until tonight) when I have put jumper wires in place of the relay
(connecting 1-3 and 5-7).

I have not been able to discover any wiring faults. The wire to ground and
the wire to the ECU test fine.

Tonight the car stalled and would not restart with jumpers in place. I can
here a click from the ECU when I install one wire, and with the other wire
in place I can hear the fuel pump hum when I put the switch in the start
position.

So, I have to conclude that it is not the main relay, since both necessary
circuits have power and the car is not running. What am I missing?

I have noticed that when the engine stalls the tach drops to zero while the
engine is still spinning. This suggests no spark. Could this be a bad
igniter or a bad ECU? Could it be the ECU ground? I've been trying to
check it, but I can't find it. Anyone know where it is? '91 Civic Si
hatchback.

Any and all help will be greatly appreciated.

Jason
Click to expand...
===============
Jason,

It soulnds like your ignition switch is failing to keep power to the
main relay / tach. there was a rtecall of about a million Honda ignition
switches in North America.

You could do a Google search. The symptoms sound exactly like we
experienced on our '97 CRV, with 200.000 km on it. It dies in traffic,
and on the highway. Tach / cruise dropped first.

'Curly'

=================
 
On 1/19/04 12:07, in article [email protected], "'Curly Q.


[original post trimmed: car stalls, now won't start]
Jason,

It soulnds like your ignition switch is failing to keep power to the
main relay / tach. there was a rtecall of about a million Honda ignition
switches in North America.

You could do a Google search. The symptoms sound exactly like we
experienced on our '97 CRV, with 200.000 km on it. It dies in traffic,
and on the highway. Tach / cruise dropped first.

'Curly'

=================
Click to expand...

Okay, that might be something to check, but right now the car won't start
when I can verify that the main relay is getting power--unless it is getting
power in "on" but not in "start". A possibility.

I was able to pull some fault codes this morning. I got a 15 (ignition
output signal) and a 20 (electric load detector). I have the Honda shop
manual and I'm following the troubleshooting in there. I think I'll have
some answers pretty soon. Right now I've got a charger on the battery (I
wore it down a little bit trying to get it started...)

I was wondering if the code 20 could be related to the battery being almost
dead?

Jason

Jason
 
Is it normal for an ignition coil to have cracks in the plastic casing?
Just kidding, I'm sure they shouldn't be there. More importantly, the
resistance measurements are WAY off, so I'm replacing it this afternoon.

Is there anything else that tends to fail along with a coil?
 
Good to hear you found the problem. The other pack inside the distributor,
sometimes fails as well. BTW red shavings or dust inside the distributor,
are signs of the shaft is about to fail. After my first distributor died,
the second one had the same problems you described. Luckily I had salvaged
the coil and the pack from the old distributor. If this coil fails, I'm
switching to an MSD Blaster Coil and Cap with a tower.

JW
 
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