I am a Honda Accord EX man. But my 1991 Honda that I just bought shakes a bit at the stop light

Dear all:

Here are the four cars that I have owned in my short 32 years of
life: 81 toyota corrola station wagon; 88 toyota corrolla station
wagon; 96 Honda Accord LX Station Wagon; and now a 91 Honda Accord EX
four door sedan.

I love this 1991 Accord EX. It is the first car with a
sun-roof/moon roof that I have ever owned. I love it. I bought the
car for $900. It has 123,000 miles. For a Honda Accord, that should
be nothing in terms of miles.

I have gotten a tune up which included an oil change and spark
plug change. The car runs great when it is on the road. However, I
do feel a shake when the car is stopped at the stop light. When I am
at a complete stop and I have my foot on the brake, the engine shakes
and the dash board shakes at a frequency of about 120 Hertz. But if I
put the car in neutral, the shake goes away. Does anyone know what I
can do to get rid of the shake. More important, is it something I
need to worry about? Is it going to shorten the life of the car if I
don't get it taken care of? One person said that it may be that the
cylinders don't have equal compression and the only way to get rid of
the shake is to buy a new engine--NOT. . . not going to buy a new
engine!

Other than this little short coming of the shaking at idle, the
car runs like a champ. It is steady and just hums at 80 mph on the
highway. I love this purchase.

This car was bought as is and I don't know if the car has ever
had a timing belt or a water pump changed at all. I am tempted to
tempt fate and just say that this is a $900 car that I am going to
take a risk and see how long it will go for without throwing the $$$$
to change the timing belt and water pump. I figure that the chances
of the belt going out on me is slim and I am hoping that I will get
some sort of warning signs if the belt is about to go. In terms of
risk and benefit, I figure that spending $600 to change the belt vs
the risk of the belt going at an inopportune time and blowing the
engine are about equal. What I mean is the the benefit of throwing
$600 into a this car may not be cost effective. What does everyone
think of my thinking? Is it sound or is it kinda foolish? I am
asking about honest opinions and I would like to hear input on this.
I guess the question is: is it worth it to spend $600 to change the
belt on a $900 car when maybe the belt it has on it can go for the
rest of the life of the car as is?

sorry for the long post. I appreciate any input. Thanks in advance.

 

I'd check base idle speed and engine mounts.

 

Re your car's age:
Yes, pretty much. I factor in how much the Honda has been driven under Northern
U.S./Canada driving conditions, where the weather is harsher and the buildup of
rust etc. may take a greater toll. I say this as a former Northern U.S. driver,
now living where it's much warmer and sunnier, and observing the rust on my car
vs. others' cars. As well as what others have said here at the newsgroup on the
subject.

I'd be curious about what year you bought the 1991 Accord and how many miles it
had at purchase.

(I am a 1991 Honda Civic owner. I purchased the car new. 148,000 miles. Planning
to take it over 200,000 miles, at least.)

Re the 'Shake':
I doubt the timing belt has anything to do with the shake when at a stoplight.
But I am not the expert on symptoms like this. FWIW: I'd suspect at first blush
a misfire of some kind. That is, incorrect timing or a cylinder not firing at
all. You said you had new plugs put in. How about new wires, new distributor cap
and new distributor rotor? If you're a little ambitious, you can do these
yourself. Probably make sure at least the wires are OEM (that is, Honda) parts.
I estimate a shop will charge you $150 or so for parts and labor. I'd want to
check the timing, too. (But that's unrelated to the timing belt needing
replacement in my view.) I am doubtful the cause of this 'shake' will require a
whole new engine

Do you monitor your gas mileage? Does it seem like it's been bad lately?

Re the timing belt:
As you seem to know, if your timing belt fails while driving, it may very well
do serious damage to your engine. Do you really want to risk the engine being
destroyed (or at least needing a repair over $1000) on a car that is capable of
years (and maybe 100,000 miles or more) more service?

As we seem to agree, 123,000 miles is young for a Honda Accord, assuming, as I
say above, adverse weather driving hasn't causing it to rust out everywhere. If
I owned this car, I would definitely put a new timing belt and water pump in.
While doing so, see if the shop will give an opinion on your car 'shake at
stoplights' problem.

$600 for the new timing belt and water pump replacement? That a dealer price?
Seems not unreasonable. But there can be a lot of variation. I have had mine
replaced for around $250, but this was several years ago and *not* at a dealer.
Plus, mine's a Civic, not an Accord.

I'll add that some shop that put in a new timing belt dented my oil pan. I now
understand this is a common problem with non-dealer shops that do Honda timing
belts. I'm inclined to spring for the dealer doing it next time.

Updates are welcome.

Good luck.

[snip for conciseness]

 

(HondaAccordManEX) decided to join the conversation

Got ya beat ... I'm only 23 and I'm on car #4

1) 1987 Honda Accord LX-i Hatchback (RIP)
2) 1990 Honda Prelude 2.0S (RIP)
3) 1991 Honda Civic LX Sedan (currently my wife's car)
4) 1996 Honda Civic EX Coupe (currently my car)

Having driven and learned on a stickshift.. I miss having it.. it's so
boring to drive (3 & 4 are automatics)

--
-Chris

http://www.ChrisGarcia.com <- My Homepage
http://www.chrisgarcia.com/cars/ <- *NEW* My cars
http://www.chrisgarcia.com/dogs/ <- *Sort-of NEW* My dogs
http://starwars.chrisgarcia.com/ <- Centerpoint Station, the "ghost-
town" of the Star Wars Universe!

 

Hi: The year which I bought the car is this year. In fact, it was
just one week ago. It has been driving great on the highway and
locally! (except for the said shake at idle). The gas mileage seems
good. I went so far 160 miles on a half tank. I will calc. the
mileage after I have to fill up again.

I had a tune up done at a none-honda shop. They were the ones who put
in new MDG (sp?) plugs. They did mention something similar to what
you said: ie it may be the distributor cap, the wires and such. They
also, however, said that it could be that the engine's compression is
not equal (ie four cylinder may have discrepency in the compressions).
They suggested that I could take it to a shop which does measurement
of compressions to get it measured. If the cylinders measure out
equally strong, then the next step is to change the wires and
distributor cap. However, if the compressions do not measure out
equally, then there is no need to go further because the only way to
fix the compression is replacing the engine

The above info was what I got from the shop. If anyone can verify the
info or add new insights, please chime in .

By the way, the shop did do a timing (spark/distributor timing) as
part of the tune up, therefore, I think the timing is okay.

Now on to the subject of the timing belt itself: It is interesting
that you say non-honda shops can do it for substantially less than
$600. Now, you did mention that the oil pan was dented. Did that
affect the way the car ran? Did you have to get a new pan or it was
more/less cosmetic? If it is only cosmetic, then it is not a big
deal. This 91 Accord of mine has back end damage (which does not
affect the way the car runs, but did reduce the price). I was
actually looking for a car with some dents so as to get a bargain. It
worked out perfectly that the back end damage (some bumper crack and
the trunk is misshapened--but no leaks in the trunk) does not affect
the performance of the car but did lower the price of the car ;-)




And to Chris: Wow! Four cars by age 23. That is cool. You must have
started driving at an early age. I see that you are married as well!
Congrat!. I didn't get married until I was twenty-seven . I am in
a very happy marriage where my wife has unconditional love for me and
accepts me as I am, which has been very helpful to my self-esteem and
to my healing of my child-hood hurts. I have been married five years
now ;-) Life is grand!

 

my 2002 CRV-EX shakes a bit at the stop light, honda said its normal.

as I let off the brake just a little the shaking stops

 

Thanks. I was curious if you got this car for what may have seemed like a
bargain but, because of engine problems, was not. I see what you say below about
the car having back end damage. I just checked for the car's blue book value at
www.nadaguides.com . It gives the following for a 1991 Honda Accord EX 4-dr
Sedan with 123,000 miles on it:

Low Retail Base Price = $2650
Average Retail Base Price = $3650
High Retail Base Price = $4,400

Maybe you knew this before you bought the car. From your whole description,
sounds like you did your homework, excepting maybe having a mechanic check it
out before purchase?

With the rear end damage and no other problems it sounds like a fair price.
Unless the guy who sold it to you knew more about the engine and wasn't letting
on... As you probaly figured out.

That sounds about right for an Accord in good repair; but again, I am not an
Accord owner. I am going from memory of Consumer Reports claims on fuel mileage
and an approximation of your tank size.

www.fueleconomy.gov says your car should get 22-29 mpg, depending on whether
you have a manual or automatic and are driving in highway or city.

They know better than I. I doubt they're BSing you, except I think I'd first go
ahead and change out the wires and distributor cap and distributor rotor and
eliminate them as a cause of the problem. It's cheap enough to do this.

On the other hand, I have no idea what the charge is for checking cylinder
compression. Might be cheaper than wires, cap, and rotor.

Not definitely. Maybe. Again, this was a few years ago (2000 or 2001, and it was
for a 1991 Civic. But it seems like there shouldn't be much difference in the
prices for the two models. Others here will know better.

You could call around. Shops (independent or dealer) generally have estimates
for such jobs readily available.

Not at all.

Correct. It's only a sign of a sloppy shop or one that doesn't do Hondas much.

Okay. Hope the shake turns out to be something minor. Hopefully a few more will
post here with a few more things you can check before getting serious with
another shop to do the checks the first shop suggested. I think I'd probably
trust the first shop, though.

If the shake is easily fixed, and you cannot get out of the previous owner when
he last changed the timing belt and water pump, I'd go get them changed.

G'luck.

 

I had this "shake " problem and went to the dealer, who told me it could be
the engine mount and I got it replaced, after that it was fine for a few
thousand miles but again the same problem comes up and now the vibration is
even more worse than the last one.

 

Maybe you have a new problem.

 

I've had 2 instances of rough vibration with the brake on, at idle:

First Time: 2 Motor mounts were cracked/broken. The wife had had a
wreck a few years earlier and I knew one was broken, but I guess the
stresses finally built up on the other. This vibration was
moderate..smaller compared to #2 below.

Second Time: A spark plug wire was shorting out against the valve
cover(deep well spark wires). When the problem first started I checked
the plugs(nicely coated) and glancingly noticed the scortch mark but
disregared it. The car ran well at speed so. My father-in-law noticed
it later(the wire had really downgraded by the time he saw it)and we
replaced the wires and it worked fine.

Right now I'm investigating rather loud drive train/belt noise(water
pump?)

Good luck!

 

I would also look at the outer heat shield on the headpipe. Apparantly, the
shield is not essential for the car's performance. Rather, it is to prevent dry
grass from catching on fire if you go off road. If the shield starts rusting in
just the right way, it will sound like the car is about to fall apart. If you
have an auto. trans, see if your noise is different in Neutral than in Drive.
If that is the case, take some tin snips and cut if off.

Jimbo
JIMBO

 

Hello, i have a 1987 honda accord LXI and i to have the same problem, how
ever spent a bunch of money at the dealer ship to find out nothing i have
put 60,000 miles on the car since i bought it with 150,000 on it I have
had no problems I just put it into nuetral at lights and it stops the
car as now 208,000 on it the shacking has so far not hurt anything
Petterabbit1