hgem1si

My friend just bought an automatic civic, he says he cant get it to go over 40 MPH without switching to a lower gear..

I have no idea what to tell him.


Car is a '97 EX

hgem1si

bump

Juan_Mitosis

Any CEL's?
Ask him more about how the car feels, if it feels different in any way to how it felt before this symptom showed up.

whitemic

what does limp mode means? would that have something to do with the ecm?

Juan_Mitosis

I changed my mind about limp mode because its very unlikely. But limp mode is this mode your cars' computer enters when something is wrong. It will turn on the check engine light, it will severely retard the engines timing, and lower your rev limiter to somewhere around 3k, 4k ish. Mine has been at 4,200 RPM, and it happened because I had a faulty TPS.

In this persons' case its unlikely because if his car had a lower rev limit, even though limp mode means a huge power loss, the lowered rev limiter would make it almost impossible for downshifting to help gain more mph.

hgem1si

Hmm.. Wouldn't this require a CEL though? He just bought the car, he told me that they test drove it around the neighborhood and it seemed fine. Then they drove it home down the freeway and realized they got jooxed.

Any idea what this can mean with no CEL? I'm sure he would have included that in his description to me. We'll see though I'll ask him again later.

Juan_Mitosis

Yes, Limp mode is ALWAYS accompanied with a CEL. If the engine continues to accelerate but the car won't pickup speed, something is wrong with the transmission or related components.

If it just won't accelerate, then there is something making that engine loose a lot of power. Maybe its running on three cylinders or so? Spark plug cable problem, severe spark plug problem, distributor problem?


EDIT: Ok just re-read your post, and realized. . . distributor problems would be much more evident in high rpm situations. For example, I'm gonna change my distributor today, its half dead. But if I keep it below 3K RPMS, you would very likely never notice its damaged. But if you jag it a little bit more, then it goes crazy. In my case its the entire distributor gone bad, but once the ROTOR came loose and it was the same symptom, nothing at low rpms, wild bull ride at higher rpms. Good luck!



Modified by Juan_Mitosis at 1:12 PM 9/29/2008

jdm-civicEJ1

a woman came into work with an 03 civic coupe dx auto and we scanned the computer and i t through a code imporper gear ratio and they called honda and they sed they were gona do a special tranny flush so iunno ill keep people updated

sageuvagony

Here's an example of when my car was in limp mode.

I recorded this about a year back.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCDrlCfFqqI

If you watch further into the video, it's hard for me to even speed up.

94EG8

Does the CEL come on for a few seconds when you turn the key to on for the bulb check sequence? just wondering if the previous owner pulled the bulb, its not like it hasn't been done before.

sageuvagony

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by 94EG8 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Does the CEL come on for a few seconds when you turn the key to on for the bulb check sequence? just wondering if the previous owner pulled the bulb, its not like it hasn't been done before.</TD></TR></TABLE>

LOL, like many times I'll get into a friend's car and I mention their "check engine light" is on and their same excuse is always "ohh ignore that, the light's broken" and eventually they just pull the bulb.

Wonder if a mechanic has ever done that to a customer, pulling out the bulb and say "ok your car is fixed, no more light, now you owe me $900"