In my 88 civic sedan the ECU is, as most honda minded people know, located on the floor board of the passenger side and OBD0 ECUs have the red light..

My CEL comes on here and there and stays off for a while then pops back on here or there...

well when "viewing" the light and watching it blink to determine the "problem" it blinks 17 short blinks in a row... then pauses.. then another 17 short blinks with no pauses in between the 17 blinks. WTF!!

can anyone shed some light?

 

What's so hard to understand 17 blinks means vss. Check the speedo cable, make sure it's on nice n tight

 

What is the problem with the car?
If it is speedo cable, as crx si-r mentioned, then your speedo is disconnected or not working.

 

calm down there, champ.

I was under the impression that it would be 1 long blink.. followed by 7 short blinks.. as I have gotten a CEL for my injector not being plugged up and it flashed 43... 4 long.. and 3 short.. just like the CEL light does on obd1.

So that is where I stand on my confusion.

my speedo works fine.

 

OBD-0 D-series are only short blinks.
B-series have long and short.

 

dude! where did you find that? I ****ING LOVE YOU!!! lol

 

<3

 

"It 'twas on dis neew ding cawld da InterWEbz y0!"

It helps to actually Search. It could also be the pulser on the gauge cluster.

 

I did search lol
I never came across that photo though! everything I searched said LONG blinks with SHORT blinks. Ohwell.

I checked the speedo cable to the transmission and it's solid.
I check the ECU ground wire and the B16 Pin on the ECU which is the speed sensor and they're both solid as well.
cable is also solid on the back of the cluster. I reset the ECU via the 'hazard' fuse. So I'm about to run to my moms house for a bit. I'll see if I get another CEL before I come back home.

 

http://lmgtfy.com/?q=CEL+17+SHORT+blinks

First link

 

I didn't do that exact search

what are the connections at c405 and c710??
all ecu pins are c1-c18...
I checked b16 and c18 like it said..

 

C405 is a 13 pin white and its on top of the dash fuse box.
C710 is the 8 pin on the back of the cluster (the other cluster plug is c709 and 12 pin).

BTW: google again

Could have looked it up in the manual, but I'm lazy like that.


What you want to really do is either do a continuity check or run a test wire to verify the condition of the wire from the cluster to the ECU.

 

wtf! I googled that too... and gave me a pdf document for a dvd player and some pioneer radios.....

 

That is all found in the shop manual, it's your new best friend

 

i'd rather bump an older related thread than start a new one.. but does the ecu HAVE TO see a vss signal? the cluster i'm using is older, and doesn't generate the signal like the oem one did. would this cause any issues, or does the ecu even need the info?

 

Code 17 will be thrown and there will be some performance issues.

 

could you elaborate on that a bit? i didn't notice any difference after i did the cluster swap, but if it's actually hurting it i'll rebuild it back to stock

 

Have you driven the car since the cluster swap?

Have you checked the ECU to see whether any code is thrown?

The speed sensor signal helps the ECU to assign the correct fuel trim.

 

finished the cluster swap a couple weeks ago and have been driving it daily since.. haven't noticed anything different, but of course she was a slug anyway with the dpfi. also didn't see a change in mileage either (i track every tank) before i did the mpfi swap, i was reading two codes.. vss and tdc sensor

i chalked the tdc sensor error up to my bad dizzy. the bearing in it was shot, so it was causing all kinds of issues. that was my main motivation for getting my mpfi swap done. now that it is, and i've put a few miles on the car, the only code i'm getting now is the vss one. she runs like a champ besides that.


so do you think this is big enough of a potential issue to merit yanking the new cluster back out? i mean, i'd be sad about it, but if it comes down to a "more harm than good" kinda thing it's gotta go.

 

The ECU does use information from the speed sensor in the speedometer. That's a good enough reason, in my opinion, to fix code 17.

 

bummer.. but will do. thanks for your help

 

b series swap crx and i played with my cluster, the only time i throw code 17 is when i down shift or ride the gears down obd0