OCEJNA

Hi all, I have been lurking here for some time now after I purchased a 98 civic ex coupe a few weeks ago. The car was involved in an accident but the crash wasnt that bad or so i thought. Replaced front bumper, front bumper support and headlights. No CEL was on at the time of purchase but after I got an oil change, approximately 60-70 miles after CEL came on. I used my friend OBD scanner and found the error code P1259 VTEC MALFUNCTION. I never really pushed the car since I am currently using it as a daily drive just to work and back (16 mile commute RT) so I never really pushed it into VTEC. Once CEL came on, a friend of mine asked me if my VTEC was working. When I pushed the car from 1st -3rd at around 5k rpm the car would bog down meaning, no VTEC. Also, i believe my input shaft bearing is also bad since I hear a lot of vibration/noise when clutch is engaged from 1k rpm - approx. 4500k rpm in 1st - 3rd gear. I found a guy selling his vtec solenoid on ebay so i purchased it for $42. I swapped out the solenoid and now VTEC does work. However, the CEL light has not turned off. My friend says that I would need to drive approximately 50miles or so for the ECU to realize the VTEC is working and that it would shut off the CEL on its own. Since the install of the working VTEC solenoid I have driven over 100 miles but CEL is still on. Could this be another problem other than the vtec solenoid? Yes, i have searched the forum on this topic: yes, my oil level is good. Any help advice would be appreciatted. Thanks in advance.

HondaPartsHero

Try this:

OCEJNA

Thanks for such a quick response! I do have 1 question. By doing what you have shown me does that reset the ECU? or just reset the CEL light? The reason why I ask this is because i need to get the car smogged. When technician smogs a vehicle they will plug into the ECU and if they see that there was an error code that was never fixed but CEL disabled by detaching the ground cable from the battery or the fuse method, the ECU would still show the error code on the technicians screen. I dont care if he ECU is reset and if the CEL comes back on after the vehicle is smogged. My plans for this car is to swap out motor in the coming months but I do need to register it asap since due date is 9/27.

HondaPartsHero

Resets the ECU, but if your friend has a scanner he can erase it as well.

OCEJNA

How do you erase it using the scanner? Ive been told thats not possible.. maybe i was told wrong..