commguy

I went on a spirited drive in my car (00 EJ8) after I got it home from being shipped, and it stuttered a little bit in the neighborhood on the way back to the house and shut off on this hill right down the street. It was pretty low on gas at the time, so I thought maybe the hill had put the little remaining fuel out of reach of the sending unit. I waited a moment and it started up and pulled into the driveway fine, no biggie I thought. I came back out to start it up the next day, and it just turned and turned and turned, no start. I pulled all the plugs and found no gas on any of them, and then thought perhaps the hill of my driveway had done the same thing, I dumped 3 gallons from a gas can into it, and still nothing. I undid the banjo bolt at the fuel filter to check for pressure in the line, and there was plenty of that, then I went ahead and just changed the filter, still nothing of course. I then became suspect of the injectors themselves, thinking perhaps some nasty, cruddy, dregs of the bottom of the gas tank had somehow clogged them up or stuck them shut. Before I started pulling injectors out and all that mess, I put a test light on the injector pigtail clip, cranked it a bit, and got nothing on the light, then I thought well, the pulse width a idle speeds is probably only like 10ms, the light may not be able to light up with that fast of a pulse. Then, seeing no other way, I pulled the rail off and zip tied the injectors into it, primed the fuel system (certainly thats not what its called, thats just what I call it when you let the fuel pump relay run for 5 seconds or w/e in the run position), checked my little zip tie injector rig for leaks and put a shop towel in front of the injector nozzles, then went and cranked on it, came back to inspect it and indeed I did not have any gas sprayed onto the shop towel. Then I used two leads directly from the battery to the injector pigtails and PSSSSHHHH they sprayed away. Then, thinking maybe I had just cleaned them of the suspected gunk, reconnected them and tried turning it over again, and no spray. Then, completely frustrated, I came inside and started searching, and found the attached fuel system wiring diagram, which sent me back outside to put the multimeter on the yel/blk side of the pigtail clips with the key in run to see if the fuel system is getting power, and it is in fact getting full battery voltage. Then I went and popped the hood on my EM1 and connected the test light to one of its pigtail clips, since I know it is working fine, and got some faint, but very consistent flashes on the light. I went back and re-did the test light on the EJ8 to confirm, and there were definitely no flashes

So, finally, after lots of troubleshooting, I am convinced that INJ-1,2,3,4 at the ECU are not functioning correctly, and that my ECU is bad.

I am here at HT to check my theory and troubleshooting steps against those minds with greater knowledge than my own before I proceed to buy another ECU.

Thanks for taking the time to read through this and if you have any thoughts please reply ASAP.

Former User

Good job with the troubleshooting.

Do you also lack spark at the plugs?

Does the CEL remain on steady with the key in ON(II)? If so, are any codes retrieved?

commguy

Thanks.

I am getting spark. I have an O2 bank 1 sensor 1 low voltage code that was there before this problem came up, I haven't checked for new ones. Maybe I'll go see if autozone will let me borrow their code scanner.

Former User

You don't need an OBDII scanner to check for new CEL codes. Click here.

Note whether, after jumping the service connector, the CEL blinks codes in a continual repeating pattern or blinks codes and then remains on steady.

civic_r87111

Must congratulate u on the trouble shooting as well. After doing all that all I can recommend is try ur ecu in a buddy's car first b4 buying a new one and c if it does the same thing in his.

commguy

Cool, I'll check the CEL out as soon as it stops raining.

I'm thinking about trying to run it with the P2T from my EM1, anyone see a problem with that? Obviously its not going to run very well, but I should be able to start it with the P2T if I am correct about the ECU being bad, right?