I never know he CEL will blink. For some reason it is. Anyone know why it would start flashing?

Background:
99 Civic hatch with B18C5 swap. Running an older ITR ECU with a Kenji OBD harness. I was getting cylinder misfire codes at idle. It's been lit for that reason for a while. Motor sounds fine. Still wants to idle low..... if I turn on the AC, idle sometimes compensates.... sometimes it won't and acts shitty at 500rpm. On the highway its fine.

Any ideas?

 

what is it blinking?? it will blink out numbers then a pause (like 2-3 seconds) then blink some more. count them and let us know

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by civictildeath &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">what is it blinking?? it will blink out numbers then a pause (like 2-3 seconds) then blink some more. count them and let us know</TD></TR></TABLE>

Umm it will only blink like that if you use the jumper. I dont think this is what he's doing.


I imagine there either some sort of wiring problem or bad sensor (o2 maybe?). I know that my CEL used to come on for little while and then go off. It was giving the code of a bad cat converter (or secondary o2, can't remember). Check to see if you can pull up the code by any chance (get the P code from autozone) and that'll help out to diagnose the problem.

 

It is a steady flash which is why I found it strange.
My car is so frankenstien I'm not sure which scan tool to use

 

ECU thread.
https://honda-tech.com/zerothread?id=682412

its the third thread in this forum.

 

I have seen my CEL blink when I was getting misfires due to worn out plug wires. The guy at the Honda dealership told me that a blinking CEL means to pull over and shut the car off immediately. I have not verified this statement anywhere, so take it for what it is worth.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by mct121 &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">The guy at the Honda dealership told me that a blinking CEL means to pull over and shut the car off immediately.</TD></TR></TABLE>
he probably said that because a CEL could mean a lot of things. if its something major and you keep driving on it, then you can seriously damage your engine.

 

my CEL started blinking and then 2 days later....POP...there goes the motor...

 

Blinking CEL is random misfires.

 

search it, i've seen tons of posts on it.... it also happens if you leave the paper clip in your ecu when your scanning for codes.... bump

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by XX Boosted Si XX &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">my CEL started blinking and then 2 days later....POP...there goes the motor...</TD></TR></TABLE>

Don't tell me that!!!

Random misfires. Crap. What would cause that? It's always done it since I've had the car. Just the idle has been funky. New cap, rotor, plugs and wires. Could the timing be screwy?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Ricey McRicerton &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Blinking CEL is random misfires. </TD></TR></TABLE>

When I put my spark plug wires on in the wrong order it did that (constant blinking) scared the **** out of me, I turned the car off quick, all I was thinking is 'Blinking CEL... that can't be any good'. I would suggest double checking you timing and firing order with the dist.