Sorry for the long question, I tried to write everything I knew/tried with the car.

I bought this car a couple months ago to save it from the scrap yard, got it running and drove it a bit in my field (about 3 miles over the last month). Im making it into an auto cross car for a local fair that is next friday and Ive been doing a lot of work to it and it has recently been giving me trouble starting, it would crank for 5-7 minutes, start with starter fluid but not run on its own, and then start all of a sudden and run like a brand new engine. That stopped, it will not start at all now, it has spark (will kick over with starter fluid) and it has gas to the throttle body. Now the fun part, I got the car almost stripped, and then engine had been swapped from a d15b1 to a d15b1 several years abo but it looked like it was never completely finished, some wiring in the interior has been cut (mostly just plugs to heater, doors, lights, nothing to the ECU), what I believe to the the MAP sensor (it has a lot of vacuum lines and is on the top of the firewall near the center/passenger side) is missing 3 vacuum lines, it has one running to the throttle body. I recently did a tuneup (cap, plugs, rotor, wires) and it ran after that but still was hard to start.

From the searching I've done on here Im planning on checking into the following tmrw morning:

1. Ground wires- the front engine ground wasn't hooked up, but I've fixed that, and the clutch/trans ground isn't either (the battery cable use to do this but its been moved into the interior)- what other grounds are there? I found a white plug that had 6-8 black wires coming out that were attached to the mounting bracket, so I grounded that out too.

2. Timing is possibly off, although the distributor and belt haven't been touched

3. MAP sensor is bad or needs some vacuum lines hooked up

4. Fuel isn't making it through the Dual Point Throttle Body

5. Injectors are not functioning- no idea how to check

6. Compression issue

What I need:

1. Any advice, tips or input

2. Diagram of the MAP sensor/vacuum lines

3. How/what to set the timing to (I think my Dad is going to help me with this)

4. How to test the injectors or how to test if the fuel is making it through the throttle body

5. A list of all of the grounds, I have found 3 so far (clear plug with black wires by drivers side headlight, top of engine ground, clutch/trans ground) Ive heard theres one on the thermostat housing but not sure where

Spec on the car:

1990 Honda Civic Hatch - super base model
d15b1 with 75,000 miles
4 spd manual trans
stock ECU

Any help would be awesome! And the car is located in Dryden, MI, about an hour north of Detroit incase anyone wants to come and help! lol

 

So first question: It seems you are saying the car ran fine before, without these things hooked up right? If that is the case, then ignore them. You would be getting a cel and the car flat will not run if the map sensor is not hooked up. The timing should be set to 18 btdc.

You can do a fuel pressure test by locating the fuel filter on the fire wall. there is a bolt on the right side of the filter that will allow you to test the fuel pressure. it should be about 36ish psi near idle. the dpfi setup has 2 fuel injectors, a small, low range one for fuel trim, and a big one. I have seen them both go bad, so that might be your problem. as far as testing them, you can check them for resistance between the 2 posts, and if the resistance is higher than about 4-5 ohms, one or the other might be bad. There is a guy in the marketplace that does fuel injector cleaning, and it is always cheaper to send them to him to have them cleaned than it is to buy new ones.

there are 2 ground junctions, one on the right front fender wall and another that looks similar on the left front fender. The thermostat housing ground is on the back side of the engine on the passenger side and comes out of a pretty big wire harness loom in that area. That would be the one i would suspect if the fuel injectors aren't functioning, as that is one of the grounds for the fuel injection system.

 

Im going to look into a few of these things after this post, but I had one other question I forgot to mention, the dash never worked so I have no CEL, but the red light on the ECU flashes, Ive seen codes for the flashes but Im not sure how to correctly read them and Im not sure if they will come on without it running, whats the best way to check these?

Thanks!!

 

They will come on without it running. The ecu throws codes through that light, so hit up the faq on how to read them and come back and report what the lights are.

My opinion is the car is having a hard time as a result of whatever CEL you have.

 

Its a code 16 - Fuel Injectors, Im researching about it right now, but my concern is that they might be ok but not getting power, after I did the tune up the car was hard to start, but ran excellent once started, wouldn't a fuel injector be a slow problem that you would notice with lagging engine performance or could it be sudden like this? Im not sure what plug goes to the injectors on the TB but the lowest one was 8 ohms, if this means its bad can it be fixed by cleaning or does it need replaced?

 

do an MPFI swap

better for autocrossing, more respondsive, and it pays for itself in gasmileage

To this day I dont know WTF honda was thinking using dual point in any vehicle, its only efficient at keeping the car slow and unrespondsive

 

Id like to go MPFI, but I don't want to put anymore money in it, Im not sure if the car is even going to survive the first race! And Im running out of time too for this first race

I tested the Ohms, the auxiliary one was within the right range but the main was around 17, the manual I got with the car said it should be 0.6 to 1.6, so does this mean it needs to be cleaned or replaced? or could it be an issue with the wiring to the injector?

 

Ive also read about the main relay going bad and needing to be replaced or resoldered and that its suppose to click once or twice when the ignition goes on... mine use to but I dont remember it doing that anymore, so Im going to look into that too since it may be a power issue

 

test the resistor box


resistance doesnt matter too much since the box is what creates the proper amount of resistance for the system

 

Got it running!! The Main Relay had two spots that needed resoldered and it fired right up! Thanks you both for your help!!!