I'll try to make this as simple as possible. My 2000 Accord 4cyl is acting like it has a bad battery or anlternator. I just had the starter rebuilt, and it fires right up, within a second or two of cranking, and will drive for a few minutes, then all electronics start flashing, tach & Spedo come on and off, lights on dash flash off and on, then radio shuts down completely, but as long as I am driving it keeps going. During this time the battery light comes on, and all of the door open indicators are on. After a couple more minutes of driving, everything turns back on, gauges work properly, radio runs fine, and the battery and door open indicators are shut off. From then on, as long as the engine is warm, everything is fine. When I get out and check the battery voltage, its steady at 12.6, and the alternator is putting out 14.1 volts. If I slow to an idle during the time the gauges are off, the engine wants to die. It did it again thsi morning, and as soon as I turned the heat off, everything came back on and it ran like normal. Turning the heat back on didn't effect it at all. Is there a component in the electrical/ignition system that would cause these symptoms if it had a bad solder joint, or was intermittently failing? I previously had to replace the fuel pump relay for intermittent problems starting.

 

It is likely still an alternator /charging issue.

 

How would I determine that? Even if I keep a charger/maintainer on the battery overnight, it still does this when I first start up, and once everything warms up, it goes away.

 

A battery minder or charger still won't help if the cells are dead inside. But it is a little weird once warm it's fine. I mean, that could be an ECU that's going bad or a relay somewhere not working right any longer. Other than throwing some parts at it (like an ECU and programmer), I think you will have to spend some time with the manual and voltage check all the wires to see if they seem off.

 

Just wanted to close the loop on this. It ended up being a bad alternator. It was a rebuilt one. When I took in back to the parts store, they didn't believe it could be bad because of the age, but when they hooked it up to their tester, it was the only time the tech had ever seen an alternator fail all 3 of the tests they perform. Got it replaced, just hard to believe twice in less than 24 months.

 

Doesn't surprise me at all. I've seen chain store "remanufactured" alternators fail right out of the box. If they are "good" they still usually have issues within 6 months. I never recommend them anymore. I will preferably buy a used OEM out of a junkyard and rebuild myself if necessary.