Okay, so I bought a '92 Honda Prelude a couple months back, and all was well. I needed a few parts, then realized it's a swap from what I suspect is a '94 Accord, so I figure I will post this here. Anyway, onto my problem. My car runs perfectly when cold, but once it warms up (temp. gauge is at the half mark), I can rev it, then instead of idling down and staying at idle, it will idle all the way down until it dies. As long as I'm constantly giving it throttle, it will stay running, but once I let off when it's hot it will die. I also discovered that it's only running on 1 and 4 (cylinders). Could that be why it's dying, or do I have two separate problems, the idle, and the firing? Please help me, I'm absolutely clueless as to what this is.

 

I forgot to say I have all new plugs, wires, dizzy cap, and rotor.

 

Where to start.... First, why do you think it is only running on 2 cylinders?

 

Well, I replaced the timing belt, because I figured that was the problem, but it wasn't. I then proceeded to pull off all my wires, one at a time out of the cylinder, and the engine didn't bog down like it did with 1 and 4 as I pulled out 2 and 3. I then took the wires completely out of the car, restarted it, and it still ran the same.

 

bump..

 

Do the basics. Verify the spark plug wires on the suspected cylinders are working, check resistance with an Ohm meter, if that is not available pull a plug and ground it against the engine while cranking to verify that there is spark.

If this checks out verify that the cylinders have compression. Preferably with a leak down test, but a compression gauge will do as well.

If no compression I then suspect that the cam belt broke, and the valves are bent in those two respective cylinders that offer no power changes. The H/F engines are interference engines, if the cam belt breaks the valves will be smacked by the pistons and bent.

BTW Prelude S models came with SOHC F22A engines. The short block may have been replaced with a F22B unit. B1 is the VTEC variant, does your cam/valve cover have 'VTEC' cast into it?

 

What is a leak down test? and yes,it is the VTEC,it is in my valve cover. Thanks for your help. I will do all of that later in the day,when I wake up.

 

Because I'm too lazy to type...
http://www.mobiloil.com/USA-English/...down_Test.aspx
Tool Tech...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leak-down_tester

 

I did a compression test as I could not find a leak-down tester, and they all came up to around 150. Would doing a leak down test show different results than the compression?

 

A compression test shows that the engine can move air.
The leak down test will show if there are any leakage issues, a bit more accurate.

BTW the engine should be warm when the compression test is done, remove all plugs and plug wires(easier for the starter to spin the engine), and disable the ignition system so it does not cause arcing.

If you have spark and fuel and compression then there is something wrong with the timing. Possibly the two spark plug wires are switched. IIRC the Chilton manual shows the incorrect wiring order on the distributor for the B1 engine.

 

ahh, okay i'll let it warm up and do a compression check again, and I have a Chilton's manual, thats where I got the firing order for it. Any idea where I can find a leak-down tester..? I have had NO luck whatsoever.

 

For the B1 wire positions, looking at the engine from left to right the cylinders are 4-3-2-1. Looking at the distributor, Cyl 1 is at the 9 O'clock position, Cyl 3 is at the 12 O'clock position, Cyl 4 is at the 3 O'clock position, and Cyl 2 is at the 6 O'clock position.
IiRC the Chiltons shows the wrong wire positions for the dist and B1 VTEC.
A leak down tester can be expensive, if you have a working compression tester you are fine. Currently we are trying to find WHY the cylinders appear not to be working. If the compression tester shows the relatively same pressures amongst the cylinders. Then its most likely an issue elsewhere.

We know you have compression and spark. We can assume that you are also getting air as two of the cylinders appear to be working. That leaves one of two issues. Either the Cyl 2 and Cyl 3 have the wires crossed on the dist, or possibly the respective fuel injectors are not firing.

What is the clocked position of the wire leads on the dist now?

 

I put it as you said, and it's as if I'm not getting any spark at all. The only way it will start is when my wires are as follow: Cyl. 1 is at 3 o'clock, cyl. 3 is at 6 o'clock, cyl. 4 is at 9 o'clock, and cyl. is at 12 o'clock. This leads me to another question though, would getting the distributor cap for a '92 Honda Prelude, instead of a '94 Honda Accord have something to do with it? As I suspect this motor is out of a '94 Accord, and when I went to get the timing belt, I told them '92 Prelude and it was the wrong one, yet the '94 Accord was right. Would the wrong cap make it not fire?

 

Compared to what I have on the Ex, you have the correct order of wires, but it seems they are 180* out. That or you are numbering the cylinders 1(closest to distributor) backwards, and having #4 nearest the cam belt. Rather than 4 closest to the distributor, and #1 on the cam belt side of the engine....
IIRC the Prelude S uses an external coil, the Accord EX uses an internal coil.
You cannot interchange the two caps as the coil would not be connected.
The other thing to also consider is the rotor. Caps and rotors are usually built to work with each other. If you have the rotor from one system and the cap from another, they may not work together correctly.
If you still have the cap/rotor that came with the car compare them with what you have now.

I am wondering what distributor you have on the car. Sounds like the Preludes. Which I do not know if Honda would have purposely clocked the rotor to cam shaft interface differently to prevent parts interchange mixup bewtween A and B engines. I'll try and take a pic of the EX engine bay later tonight.

You stated you saw 150Psi across the board with the compression test.
With the engine warm, ignition/fuel pump disabled, plugs removed, throttle body wide open, what exactly are your numbers after the needle has jumped 4-5 times on the compression gauge?

 

I am not 100% sure, I will have to go borrow my friend's compression tester and do it again, I will post the results after I do so. Another question I have.. could my distributor just be going out, and or went? and that's why it is doing this? Because this all happened out of no where, I pulled up to a stop light and it just died.

 

I was thinking this initially, but I find it odd that 1 and 4 are not effected yet 2 and 3 are consistently. Even if there was some kind of fault with the distributor, be it the induction pickup, coil, or bearings, the fault usually would not be THAT consistent. Looking at it from the firing order it seems every 90* there is issue. Fires on 1, not on 3, fires on 4, not on 2, but fires again on 1. Coil saturation issue maybe? Can you test the resistance of the coil itself? Maybe it is an issue with the igniter?

If the car was running fine prior to the tuneup and you still have the older parts I would reinstall the old parts one component at a time until you fix the problem.

Don't dismiss that just because something is new its not faulty. I've encountered a brand new NGK wire set that had a bad wire, it tested fine on an Ohm meter, but there was a small razor slice on one cable causing it to arc to ground, and giving me a dead cylinder.`

 

My coil is fine, as my friend said it was tested and all, and he's deep into Honda's so I'm trusting him. I'm speaking with you, as well as him on this. Sadly, I don't have the old parts.. my wires do all look good though. Oh, and I compared the two rotors, as well as went to the local auto parts store, they say the part number for the 92' Prelude 2.2 and the '94 Accord rotors are the same.

It's really got me puzzled, and kind of ticked that I don't know what's wrong.. I mean, everything worked completely fine for a couple days after I installed the new distributor cap, and rotor. Then as I said, I pulled up to a stop light and it just died, would it take two days for them to just basically..crap out?

 

Only thing I can think of would be if you disturbed any wiring on the car when you did the tune up, you may want to recheck all the connections, and the wires that are in those connections. Monotonous, but you might find a loose ground or power wire somewhere, or possibly a loose screw.

And it could possibly that there is some component that is faulty that just happened to crap out on you two days after the fact.

Is there a snow ***** chance that your friends car uses similar parts? I would at the minimum try another set of spark plug wires, or even rotate the spark plug wires from 1-4 to 2-3 and see if the same problem persists.

 

Okay, I will go try that now and let you know how it all goes.

as far as the question to if my friend has the same parts..well, honestly. I don't know. It's a guy that works with my mom, and he's into building up Hondas, and racing them. I haven't the slightest clue what he's running, but I don't think he does because I already gave me the coil, and I think he would have let me try other parts as well, if that were the case.

 

Okay, so I tried doing a compression test, but some things came up and I had to stop early. But in the middle of doing it, before I stopped.. I heard a *pop* come from cylinder 3, or so I think.

and also, when i switched the wires from 1-4 and 2-3, the car wouldn't start, so i'm not too sure.

 

If the spark plugs were all removed you may have just heard the movement of air from in/out of the cylinder. As long as you are not hearing clicking/clacking/knocking/smacking sounds you should be fine.
Just to clarify you tried the # 4 wire instead of the # 3 wire just to test the wire itself. You kept the firing rotation and order. This was just to test the wire itself. If Cyl 1 works, then swap the wire for Cyl 2 or 3s wire to test it on 1. Since you know 1 and 4 are working. Just trying to eliminate the wires as a problem. If the wires were fine the engine should still run the same as it was before.
Are the wires snapping onto the plugs?

 

Oh! I feel dumb, ha. I'll do that in the morning, once it's warm out.. and I'm not too sure about what you mean by, "snapping onto the plugs".

But, when I took the plugs out, I did notice that the plug for cyl. 3 had no signs of firing, and 2 had very little signs of firing, if that helps at all..

 

The spark plug wires have a connector that snaps or clicks onto the spark plug wire securing the wire. There is the rubber boot that slides into the tube, inside that rubber boot is the termination at the end of the wire. When you press the boot into the tube, you should feel a slight click/snap as the wire connector latches onto the spark plug, if you just feel the boot sliding int without any click/snap the wire may be too far recessed into the boot and not making the connection.

Your wire set should look something like this...


Inside the black boots that go into the valve/cam cover tubes are female connectors to receive the spark plugs. They will look something like this...


If the wire is not far enough down in the boot to make the connection onto the spark plug, it will not fire or be very weak. You need to make sure there is a connection.

What I usually do on all wire sets is push the wire towards the bottom of the boot so the female wire terminal will connect to the spark plug wire. DO NOT PULL ON THE TERMINAL INSIDE THE BOOT WITH PLIERS, more than likely you will pull the crimped terminal off the wire. If you feed too much wire and the boot does not sit flush on the cam/valve cover, you can hold the wire and gentle push the boot down over the spark plug. This will give the correct fit on the spark plug and cam/valve cover.

The spark plug wires are mass assembled and the terminals may not be the correct depth needed for precise fitment. Just stabbing the boots in does not always create a useable connection.

 

that is indeed what my wires look like, and yes they snap down.

 

Joel,
Are you sure when you changed the timing belt, that everything was properly aligned? Tension was proper and couldn't have skipped?

Nope sorry, I just read that it was running fine for a while and then died. Probably is in distributor area.