Alright, my car wont crank now.. It keeps gettign worse, from poor running to finally not crnaking.. I am abuot to replace my ignitor as this seems to eb the problem.. I tested what i could and a lil mor econfused now though, so if someone could clear this up I would appreciate it... When cranking my car the external coil does not give off any spark at all... Is this because the ignitor is malfunctioning telling it not too.. I am not getting any codes either.. But my external coil works on another car.. I shoula tested my distributor too now that I think about it, but that wouldnt have worked h22a to f22... So, problem is external coil does not spark, yet works fine on other cars.. What would cause this.. Previously the car was dieing and running poorly.... Now, it wont crank at all... No spark anywhere..

 

When you turn the key to the ON position you should see the CEL light up and hear a click as it shuts off. This is the main fuel relay working. It controls the coil and the fuel pump. When my ignitor went bad I could drive for 2 hours straight and then it would cut the spark. I'd wait 30 minutes, it would start, drive 30 minutes, and it would die again. Then I'd wait an hour, it would start, and then it would only run for 20 minutes and so on. After I let it sit overnight it would run for another 2 hours just fine and cut. Replacing the ignitor fixed this problem.

 

So before it would run fine then start to run rough and die? Then it won't even turn over??? Sorry I am not 100% what you are talking about. If that's the case sound more like a alternator problem to me. Or have you just been trying to start it for so long that the battery is finally dead? When it was running like **** did you notice if the tach was screwing up??
I know in the earlier 4th gens they had a shitty faulty igniter but I can't remember the brand right now.

 

Alright sephro... I think you know whats going on.. I am almost sure its not the alternator... I havent had a battery issue until now because I woke up to find my A/C fan running full blast w/ no keys in the car, A/C button not even pushed in, and the car had been sitting for a week.. Since then my battery has been weak, but I havent charged it.. Ya, my list of problems keeps growing... Laughing, thanks bud you have really tried to help me out through all of this and I appreciate it.. Anyways, My CEL comes on and clicks like it should and I get fuel fine... So, theres no issue there.. But the coil doesnt get power as far as I cna tell.. I cant make it spark worth a damn on my car... I am kinda wondering if the ignitor is hooked into the ECU and tells it to send power or what the deal is there...

Anyways, my tach did jump!!! It went randomly off while my v-afc said it was normal.. it never jumped.. My car dies while idling.. Sometimes it cranks back up fine, others it just floods and strongly smells of gas.. It was running either really rich or not getting a good spark and only half burning the fuel(makes alot of sense to me now that I think about it.. It was spitting flames and dieing on me...) This is a 4th gen.. I dont even know what yr the distributor is from cause I got it froma junkyard about 1.5 yrs ago cause mine went bad... I have 2 extra distributors just laying around.. Ones from a jdm h22 so internal coil junk and the other is a h23... I cant get the rotors off of either to try and change out my ignitor for testing purposes.. DOH.. I am plannig on buying a new on if this seems ot be the issue anyways though...

Cliff notes: Car ran like ****, tach jumped all over the place (v-afc didnt report this jumping at all), it spit flames out the exhaust, intake backfired when it would quit on 2 occasions(thats a wild experience, like boom there goes my baby)...

 

When you say it jumped all over the place did the tach drop suddenly and then jump back up to cruising speed or was it all types of haywire?

 

You can't get the rotor off the dizzy
**** the what?

 

sounds like u might have a ground problem

have u been messin with anything lately??

this problem seems very familiar. Cranking, cranking to no cranking. Tach was goin nuckin futz.
I swapped distributors, coils, relays, blah, blah, blah....
Turned out that the harness ground was just sittin there under a bolt at an angle. I cranked it down like 8 or 9 times, started the car, and drove away.

Hopefully this is your problem but its just a shot in the dark

 

its an occasional surge and a drop everytime it would die... Sometimes it would kick back on while sputtering about to die, but the tach seemed fairly accurate there.. Its just it woudl be ilding at abuot 1100 rpm and then the tach would occaionally surge to about 3k or so...

 

It definately sounds like the ignitor or coil
same thing happened to me

 

I got a smart idea and put my old distributor that throws a CEL back on to check and see if it was the ignitor.. Car has been running for 30 minutes now... It stalls on initial reving cause of CEL, but its running like a champ.. Itll rev past 4k! ya.. and it hasnt died yet.. Im hoping this is the end of my running issues and now I cna focus on getting the rims and tires fixed... I cnat weait to test out my 4bidden short shifter on the road instead of just while in the driveway...

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by JTCdudeman &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">I cnat weait to test out my 4bidden short shifter on the road instead of just while in the driveway...</TD></TR></TABLE>

You got the used one off of the guy on PO, right?

Hope you enjoy it. Keep the console off until you figure out which setting you prefer. It feels a lot different while driving.

 

main relay, mine ran, and jsut got progressivly slower, as in to where i would hit the gas and it would be like slower then a civic.
i dunno, check it out its cheap.
my main relay went bad and it sounds like that as you described

 

Very interesting. Can you describe how it was slower than a Civic? The main relay is usually associated with the car not starting, but you are saying it made your car keep getting slower? Almost sounds like the H22 hesitation problem so many of us have....

 

Yeah, when i hit the gas, it would get progressivly slower and slower until it didnt go at all when i hit the gas. When the car stopped, it wouldnt start again.
i mean id definatly check it out, its a fairly cheap part