I have a 87 Civic that just recently quit on me and I have no clue what the problem is. The night it quit on me I was driving home and about halfway there it starts to hesitate when I push the gas, so I try to slow down and as soon as I press the clutch in the car cuts off. (The car has been cutting off frequently since I put some fuel injector cleaner earlier that week) So I try to kick start it and nothing happens, I then turn the key to start it and all I hear is the engine spinning fast. I then pull over to investigate and I see quite a bit of smoke. So I got a friend to help me get it off the road.

Upon further inspection we notice a lot of things that don't make since. (or at least to me they don't) First thing we notice is when we try to start it, it sounds like this but here's the part I don't get, in the video you can see the cams moving but on my car they don't budge just the cam gear spins with the timing belt on and intact as far as I can tell. Another thing that puzzles me is that the bolt on the cam gear is loose, so we tighten it and tried to start the car and it just loosen back up. We checked the spark plugs and at first there was spark on all four but after checking it a while later only getting spark on one.

I've searched all over the web for answers and even ask a couple of guys I know who work on Hondas and they were even puzzled. I'm hoping that someone can help me figure it out otherwise I'm getting rid of it.

 

Broke the keyway?

Broke your cam?

Something is physically broken, you have to disassemble to diag.

 

Squirt a teaspoon of engine oil in each cylinder and re-try. I've seen this several times where no compression is occurring allowing engine to fast crank like timing belt is broken.

Then you'll be able to diagnose your problem. It may even just start up and run again if it was the rings sticking.. But best to perform your tests regardless.

 

Doh. I thought that video WAS your engine... The above would work for that engine, but you've got more serious problems my friend. I'm afraid you'll need to dis-assemble and inspect.

Something is broken.

 

Does the cam turn with the distributor removed?