Hadi585

Bought a honda recently. My first actual car in my name so it's pretty cool.
Few problems.
Main ones.
Over heating
No start/ hard start.

Here's what I did to the car for the no start.
Checked fuel pump. All good.
Changed fuel filter (today)
New plugs
New wires
New cap
New rotor
Tested ignition coil. All good.
New battery ground and terminals for both.
New engine ground.
Opened up the computer and saw no burns or anything to suggest it's bad.

Now... Car starts SOMETIMES... Either it starts right away, starts hesitantly after pumping the pedal a bit, or starts (if at all) after rapidly pressing the pedal multiple times.

As far as the over heating goes here's what I've checked.
Filled the car with coolant, drove it for a while and it sprayed everywhere. Replaced the radiator.
Fan didn't come on (car came with it hooked up to a switch) so I wired it to the acc wire and it turns on when I turn the key. (So it's always on)

I can drive it for maybe... 2 hours... And it will be at a normal temp. Then the heat will turn cold and it'll start steaming.
I found a hose under the distributor to have a hole in it so I cut it down a bit (a tip from this forum! Yay) and put it back on.
Last night that hose popped off.

The car shut off on me last night at a light.
Pushed it into a parking lot, tried jumping it.. And that didn't work. I was gonna leave the car over night but I ended up starting it and it worked weirdly the whole way home.

Hopefully I can get some help. I really don't have much money to take it to a shop so any help would be appreciated. I did all that work myself so I'm learning my way around the car (which is good)
And I apologize if my post is confusing.

Hadi585

Also, I checked the oil and the radiator fluid both look normal. (No signs of head gasket)
To add, the car has a minime swap with a p08-5 head (94 si z6 vtec)

bamaland601

iTrader: (1)

heater hose, heater core, heater valve,
that hose that popped off goes to the heater valve then into the heater core, out the heater core into the waterpipe coming off the back of the block. so start pulling them off make sure they can be blown thru, make sure valve is still opening and closing, easiest thing to do with the heater core is hook water hose to one of the inlets and turn your water on, if it comes flying out the other inlet/outlet then your all good there.

Hadi585

That does make sense because there does seem to be too much pressure in the system. (Coolant blown in my face and burnt up radiator caps) So a clog somewhere would make sense.
Do you have a diagram of the hoses? I know there is a hose on the bottom of the dizzy but is that the inlet or outlet.
If there is a write up or a link could you direct me there?
I appreciate the help. Gives me something to look into instead of just guessing. (Like I kinda have :/ )

cksnah252

If its overheating, I would try to do a leak down test..

Hadi585

what is a leak down test?

bamaland601

iTrader: (1)

hose that popped off:


heater valve the above hose connects to:


better look at heater valve, and shows it looping up to the heater core:


where the other heater hose connects to on back of the block above to the left of oil filter:

Hadi585

Pictures helped! i appreciate that you took the time to do that for me.
i did check the hose. it did have good clean flow through it. so I'm assuming that means that it was not clogged. i flushed it from both sides. hopefully if it did have any back up then it won't be there anymore.

Hadi585

As far as the starting problem a friend who's really really good with hondas said that it would be a throttle position sensor problem.

bamaland601

iTrader: (1)

go rent a compression tester from an auto store, check and see what it is on all 4 cyl's.
remove all plug wires before spinning the motor for the test.
also try changing you thermostat for the hell of it.

and no prob on the pic i got my motor ready to pull so was easy access

Hadi585

thats for the quick replies. i think at this point I'm gonna take it to a mechanic. (I'm not that mechanically inclined)
i know I'm throwing money away but i really need the car running good :/ it sucks but its gotta happen. i dont have my other car at the time.
hopefully the bill isn't too bad >.<

bamaland601

iTrader: (1)

well google around for a tuner shop near you atleast you'll have a better feeling of getting it done right.

Hadi585

yeah my mechanic should know what he's doing. he's pretty smart. lol
hopefully he doesn't look at it and look confused.
i just wanna walk back into the garage and hear it crank and start right away.
then drive it back home and see the coolant temp stay where its supposed to.
then wake up the next day and do that all over. lol
once again, thanks. i really appreciate it.

Hadi585

So I took it to my mechanic. He was a bit busy today but he said when he cranked it that the compression was low. (It cranked way too easily)
Could that be a head gasket? That's what he was saying. That or a cracked head. I changed everything I could expect the water pump and it still over heated and ignition related as we'll.

TomCat39

Have you bled the system? Air pockets can cause idle issues and overheating issues. I skimmed over your posts so could have missed it. Am at work so can't spend a whole lot of time reading it all so I will ask, have you replaced the thermostat with an OEM one? If your bottom hose never gets warm it indicates the thermostat isn't opening to allow coolant flow and would cause over heating.

The other check for your overheat is the head gasket, a simple block tester will be very informative whether your head gasket, block or head are bad.

Low compression could be a cracked block, burnt valves, cracked head or bad head gasket or any combination of the above.

Block tester, dry and wet compression tests and leak down tests will tell you volumes about the condition of your motor.

As for bleeding your system, I just had to replace my radiator last night and here is how I bleed the system:

You didn't put your car information so I don't know if it is the 5th gen or 6th gen. The only change that does for bleeding is the bleeder screw. 96-00 don't have it so don't need to try and find a bleeder bolt.

So after getting everything back together onto the installed radiator, I filled up the radiator and coolant recovery to the full marks. I then put a little extra coolant in the funnel on the radiator and cracked my bleeder screw until it flowed nothing but coolant then tightening it back down. I then put my radiator cap on, screwed it closed then unscrewed it until I hit the child safety like catch (where you have to push down to unscrew it more).

I hopped into the car turned the heater temp control to max heat (did not turn on the heater blower/fan) and started my car. Hopped out of the car and jacked up the front end as far as my floor jack would lift it (this part is not in the FSM but helps a lot). Then just let it idle.

This is the part I think people go in haste. My engine was still slightly warm so only took about 10 minutes for the temp guage to get to normal range. However it still took another 10 minutes at least for the Radiator fan to kick on the first time. Just let her keep idling and monitor your temp gauge, it should never go above operating tempurature if all is well.

Before the fans kicked on I would periodically check the bottom radiator hose to see if it became hot, it did so I knew my thermostat was working. For good measure I idled it until my radiator fan kicked on three times, this must have been 30 minutes of idling at this point. After it (radiator fan) shut off the third time I twisted my radiator cap closed, lowered the car, checked my resevoir (still full) shut the car off, got my wife, went for a decent drive and had zero idle or temp issues.

This morning after the car had cooled off overnight, it sucked up some of the coolant in the resevoir so I topped it this morning to the max line and it's been good all day.

Hopefully this information is helpful for you.