My Accord in my signature is the subject. One day last week I jackrabbited away from a stoplight and gunned my transmission/engine in 3rd gear far past the normal shift point. After settling into 4th gear and eventually 5th, the engine suddenly died. CEL first, then BATT and other dash lights popped on as I drifted over to the shoulder. I was able to restart the engine easily and made it another mile before the same thing happened again.

Ever since that day and my foolish acceleration, the Honda hasn't been running right and cuts off randomly while driving. Usually happens after the engine is good and warm. Happens while cruising, pulling off from a stop or slowing down to a stop. Just a sudden and instantaneous cutoff with absolutely no attempt by the engine to hang on. Sometimes I can tell when the car is about to cut off, because it feels a bit underpowered and there is some vibration coming from somewhere. Always able to restart it and get going again, but it always cuts off again shortly. I've actually restarted it again while drifting in neutral a few times and jumped right back into the appropriate gear and kept going. I've also notice when I first start the car for the day, it runs okay, but not nearly as robustly as it did before gunned the motor. It starts up fine, but it's just a weaker running. Not really rough, but just weaker. On a day of about 30-40 degrees, It gives me about 4 miles before starting the cutting off thing.

Thinking I might have fouled a plug, I put a new set of NGK's in yesterday, but no change. Oil looks good, radiator good, and there is no code set in the computer. Going to get into the distributor next. Then compression and leakdown if it comes to that. Maybe I bent a valve or messed up the head in some way that only manifests after the engine is good and warm? Maybe I popped a vacuum plug out somewhere. Maybe the extra demand drew some debris into the fuel line. So many maybes.

Do my actions and their unfortunate results bring anything to mind for any of the Honda owners here? What might I have broken with my little foray into street racing? Open to any and all ideas.

 

sounds like the dizzy is going out. Had this same problem in my automatic integra I once owned. It only cut off on me when it would warm up and like you said would cut out every other mile.

 

If you took it past the normal redline you probably bent a valve to the point that the air flow inside the head is not as it was before thats why your experiencing a loss of power. Buy a stethoscope for engines & see if you hear any weird noises around the head, if so thats def a bent valve.

 

I just let it idle and warm up to fan cut-on while under no load and the only noise I can hear is a an occasional scraping type noise on the drivers side of the motor. My ear on the end of a long screwdriver isolates that noise to coming from in the timing /balance pully area. I just don't know if that noise was there before. It's not continuous, but happens for a couple of seconds then stops for and starts again a few seconds later. That same screwdriver placed on the valve cover reveals the normal ticking as the firing goes along. No knocks, banging or other strange noises.

I'm wonder if it's possible the hard acceleration has thrown the engine out of time with the ignition system. I think that would fit with the less than energetic idle when starting the engine for the first time each day. I don't have my timing light right now (damn lending tools from now on) but I will be checking the timing tomorrow afternoon. Looked at the distributor and all seems to be in order. Cap and rotor look good. The dist is a 1½ year old Dorman OEM replacement and unless I damaged it in this event it should be working fine.

 

You said when it happened it tripped a CEL, should be stored, get that CEL first.

You might of spun a bearing since you over reved it.

 

You could have jumped a tooth. I would pull the valve cover and check the timing. Then I would do a compression test.

 

Sounds like either distributor issue or fuel related. I've had both those issues caused by faulty parts as of these likes.

 

Thanks for the suggestions and ideas. I'm checking to see if it's still in time this afternoon. Runs and idles okay when cool, then falls on its face repeatedly after getting good and warm. Happened this morning, and I was able to restart it, but a couple of times even that was hard to do. Let the engine get cool again and it's good for a number of miles before acting up again. Maybe a temperature sensor somewhere got blown out or pulled loose when I gunned it. Of course, typical Honda, the dash temp needle is in the normal range.

This problem is definitely related to heat, though. Only starts running weakly and cuts off when good and warm. Right now my money is on the pully somehow go past a belt tooth or two and that works okay until the belt warms up. Trouble is there is no backfiring or sputtering at startup and really none when the engine shuts off. It dies just like the key was turned off. I've tried jiggling the key with it running, to make sure ignition switch is okay, and it seems fine. Timing thrown off or a temp sensor I'm not familiar with are my two main suspects now. I've got to figure out what's broke and fix it.

motegicivic, jumped the terminal in passenger footwell with paperclip and checked for codes. The computer is absolutely clear. No codes. OBD-1 will tell a lot of stuff, but misfires and other small stuff is not covered, I don't think. A code would would be welcomed right now.

 

If it is heat related, could be as the oil heats up and the engine surfaces heat up, could be internal engine failure, the more you run the more chance of additional damage.

Do a compression check at least.

 

A rod bearing failure would be VERY noticeable. I've had plenty of first hand experiences with rod bearing failures, and all of them except for one I was still driving without the engine cutting off, and the one time it would not run was when I physically broke a rod. I highly doubt bearings are the cause.

 

Productive last couple of hours. Found the problem. Temp sensor for fan not working up to spec and making fan come on when it's supposed to. Replaced it with the quickest I could get hold of (BWD from Advance Auto) and so far all is well. Drove 10 miles and engine didn't cut out a single time. The mental note I am making is that the fail safe that protects that mostly aluminum engine from cooking to death can and will shut down combustion if the engine temp gets high enough, regardless of what the dash temperature gauge shows. The sensor I replaced is the one with the lavender plug.

I'm not sure what role my hard acceleration played in throwing that sensor out of spec, but I think it was involved. Needless to say, I won't be driving the Accord like that again. Thanks for all the suggestions of the possible problem. I'm lucky it wasn't anything major.

 

You can test the sender unit for the dash gauge.

 

That will be mentally noted in my book. Glad you got it fixed!

 

I find it hard to believe that that was the underlying issue. But if it's fixed it's all good.

 

That was the issue. I just got back from another long drive with no problems. Earlier today, prior to replacing that sensor switch, the engine shut off 7 times in about 2½ miles. Not sure if the hard acceleration, meaning huge rise in engine temperature all of a sudden, simply overwhelmed that sensor and basically killed it or threw it so far out of spec that is simply could no longer do the job properly. I do know that there is some other system that kills ignition if that fan doesn't come on at the coolant temperature that it's supposed to. It's damned dangerous driving to have your motor shut off all of a sudden, but the alternative would be to literally melt the block.

A lot of extra systematic care goes into protecting that block. The fan even comes on sometimes after the car is cut off from a hard run in warm weather in order to cool the block down and not allow pent up heat to damage it in the motionless car. I had replaced that switch one time before, but the coolant fan switch I just replaced was nearly 20 years old. The whole incident does make me wonder how many working distributors, fuel pumps, main relays etc. have been replaced by Accord owners along with that $20 switch.

 

And you were right. A couple of days later the sudden cutting off resumed. I put in a placebo switch, it seems.

Sunday, I contorted my way under the dash, took out the cruise control box and got out the main relay. Solder joints on that 20 y.o. relay look brand new so I ruled it out as the culprit.

Next took distributor apart, including removing the stripped rotor retainer screw in order to get under the cover. Had to chisel a groove in it and then use the perfect flat head screwdriver to get it out. Honda definitely designed that screw to stay in! Metered the ignition module using the Haynes tests and voila!.. It was way out of spec. Replaced the ignitor yesterday and NOW I can say for sure that the problem is solved. The engine even starts more robustly. The kind of weak feeling starts last week were all due to the ignitor.

Going back to the ridiculous motor gunning I did.. that must have somehow overwhelmed the ignitor by sending too much juice or demanding too much juice. I now have the ignitor noted as a sensitive part of the ignition system that can be responsible for all kinds of trouble.

Sorry for the bad information I gave earlier in this thread. I guess I wanted it so badly to be something cheap like that sensor.

 

You pointed me to the solution 17 minutes after I made the OP. I should have listened. Anyway, in retrospect, Thank you.

 

This sounds like something mine did a month or so ago, but the compression test showed 30psi in cylinder two and I bought a head & rebuilt it... then the trans crapped the bed Tuesday before I could get to it this weekend!

 

Back in the day i took my 92 Infiniti G20 to redline hardcore and raced someone and the next day my fuel pump went out,maybe your fuel pump is getting real weak after that or is on its way out ,i could be wrong but just a thought

 

Been running great about a week now with the replaced Ignition Module (Ignitor). That is what I overloaded that day when I gunned the motor. Immediately after that is when the car first died, and it died the same way until I really fixed it. Prior to replacing the Ignitor, I checked compression, and all four cylinders read 150psi. Thankfully the engine is in good shape.

 

No problem glad to help.