1995 EG Civic Breeze

D15Z2 engine - Single Carb

Hello Honda heads, I’m at a bit of a loss with my EG and hoping someone here can point me in the right direction. Thanks in advance for any help and insight.

Bought the car with a blown head gasket and a no-spark issue. I replaced the head gasket, as well as distributor ignition module, and ignition coil. After that it ran perfectly for a few days.

Not sure if this may be related, but note that when I put the distributor back together, I accidentally rebuilt it 180° out. Fixed the issue temporarily by mirroring the plug positions on the distributor side (rotating two slots down) made it run fine for a few days.

The engine suddenly died on the highway with a complete loss of power. Tried to bump-start it with the momentum it had while rolling but no luck.

Fuel gauge was showing half a tank but I wasn’t 100% sure if accurate, so I added ~10L just to rule out a dodgy fuel gauge. No change.

Car cranks strongly (car is back home now, battery fully charged and hooked to a charger) but absolutely refuses to fire.

What I’ve checked so far:
• Seems to be getting fuel. Plugs are damp and smell like fuel. Starter fluid into the carb makes no difference.
• Looking down the carb throat, I can see fuel squirting when I open the throttle.
• Mechanical pump is working — disconnected the fuel line before the carb and fuel gushes out when cranking.
• All spark plugs have spark. Tested individually by grounding and cranking.
• 180–185 psi of compression across all four cylinders.
• Verified timing, looks spot on.
• Tried adjusting distributor timing by rotating it both ways while cranking, absolutely no change.
• Even tried swapping the plug order back to the “correct” setup just in case it magically fixed itself... no luck

As far as I can tell it’s got fuel, spark, compression, and timing is right, but it still won’t even cough, sputter, or try to start.

Any ideas on what I might be missing? Appreciate any help!

 

My experience is 90 percent of mysterious running conditions are electrical in nature. hand crank the engine over until the marks line up and it's at TDC on #1. Then pull the distributor cap and verify that the rotor is still pointing at #1. If that checks out I would pull the cover and verify that the timing belt hasn't jumped a tooth or two.