SO a friend of mine bought a lovely red 01 civic ex coupe the only problem is the VTEC is not engaging. We noticed however that the RPM gauge moves occasionally and on some occasions it doesn't move when it does it jumps to 2000 rpm and stays there. My diagnosis is that the RPM gauge not working does not trigger the VTEC as I have read that bad rpm gauge or sensors will not allow for VTEC to engage am i wrong? what do we do to correct this?

 

Test the gauge assembly. Click this link. https://honda-tech.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2908290

Are the any codes present that indicate a problem with the VTEC system?

Have you checked the VTEC oil pressure switch, and the solenoid?

 

yep checked those too and they are working

 

Checked .. the VTEC oil pressure switch and the solenoid? How did you go about doing that? Please be specific.

Did you check the oil pressure at the switch? What was it?

What about the gauge assembly? Did you put it through self-diagnostic? What happened?

Did you scan for codes?

Have you tried resetting the ECU? What happens? Same thing?

Test the ECU, or swap it with a known-to-be-good one and recheck?