Well, going to work this morning the car was doing just fine and then all of the sudden the engine went dead and the CEL came on and didn't shut off anymore. The car turns over, but won't fire. It's either a fuel delivery problem or no spark. The car just got new plugs/wires, and a new distributor. I didn't get a chance to actually get out and dig around to see what the deal was because the mosquitos up here are HORRIBLE!!!! I did go and yank the fuse box cover from under the hood and underneath the dash looking for a fuse for the fuel pump. No luck. I hope it's not the fuel pump. I didn't get a chance to check which code the ECU threw either.
I was wondering if anybody ever had a similar problem with their 4th gen. Liek I said, I'm guessing it's either spark or fuel.

 

Sounds like a timing belt or tensioner.

My tensioner went out and it was acting just like yours.

Second time, first time new valve, second time I got lucky, no damage.

 

do you have gas?? J/K
Check the CEL first because that will help out a lot. There are many things that it could be.

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by RacingLude &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Sounds like a timing belt or tensioner.

My tensioner went out and it was acting just like yours.

Second time, first time new valve, second time I got lucky, no damage.</TD></TR></TABLE>

now we can't be assuming anything until he dig sin there, start the trouble shoot process and letus know, if you get stummped, also list some more symptoms once you get in there

 

my friend spun a main bearing with his 4th gen and it was just like your situation. Hope thats not what you did.

 

Hey now, don't tell me timing belts and main bearings. This car was supposed to be my beater car over in portugal for a year.

 

OK, well, I went and got the car a few minutes ago. I brought my buddy with his Sierra to tow it back home. Well, just for ***** and grinns, I tried to start it and it fired right up. WTF???? So I tell him that I'm gonna drive it home but to follow me in case it dies. Well, about 200 yards down the road it does the same **** again. This time I had my CEL list with me and a wire. The ECU throws a code 15. According to the lost I have it's

"Ignition Output Signal
missing or defective ignition output signal"

So no timing belt or fuel pump. I'm releaved. But with my luck this fix is going to cost even more. So anybody know what I should be looking for? Maybe an ignition module somewhere? Help would be appreciated.

 

my 4th gen is doing the same thing as I write..cept it isn't throwing any code. I have no spark to anything..REplaced spark plugs, cap rotor, andignition coil..Still no spark. My car died going down the road several tiems and started right up..Its weird. SOunds like the same situation, cept I have a the vtec lude... I NEED HELP TOO!

 

When the car dies, do you get a CEL? When I went to start the car up when picking it up, there was no Check Engine light. Fired right up. But when it died, I turned the ignition off, jumped those wires out, turned the ignition back on and read the 15 code. All was done within about 45 seconds or so. Maybe the code clearn itself if the car's been off for a while? Somebody should be able to ellaborate.

 

My Si does the same thing but there is no CEL what so ever. I just pop the hood and remove the red battery wire for a sec and he fires back up. It happened twice.

I have to say that my battery isn't charging up anymore (the light on the battery said charge)and i just bought it a month ago. So probably the dynamo isn't as good as it should be.

Hope to hear some more about this problem.

Greetzzzzzz

 

if it's firing up after it sits for a while it could very possibily
be your ignitor, which is in the distributor

 

Not cool since I just replaced the whole damn distributor about 1,000 miles ago. Did the whole thing which ran me a nice $360.
And I'll be damned if I'm paying that again. Honda is gonna bite the bullet on this one if the damn thing is jacked up. A friggen distributor should last more than 1,000 miles.

 

I'll tell you exactly what it is. It's the distributor. HOw do I know, cause it happened to me. I changed the ignitor, didn't work. I changed the module chip, didn't work. Finally I said **** it and changed the whole distributor, its been 3 months and its fine as of now. I was stranded 3x trying to save on money changing other stuff, but save ur self money and just swap in a distributor, new used or rebuilt, change it or u'll be stranded again, cause eventually it won't start. This is from my experience, i'm not a mechanic of some sort, just from experiences, that I'm sharing this with you. Good luck. I spent more money trying other stuff than the distributor itself. I have a 4th gen VTEC with 94 k at the time.

 

Well i do have MSD 6AL, and i've messed a little with the ignitor, but everthing is perfectly done.

I don't have the MSD ignition cap and Blaster Coil yet, so maybe it could be.

Any way i'll see if this problem repeats itself and let you guys know if i find anything.

 

yeah man Honda should replace that for free. Maybe they gave you one of the old original distributors that has the shitty igniter in it. Good luck!

 

When you get the distributor fron honda, it does NOT come with
the ignitor(ignition module) so you can't say that the distributor is
faulty yet, unless your distributor is making the "DEATH SCREETCH"

 

Well, just got back from Honda and asked some of the head tech guys up there what it might be. One of 'em said that it could be a shot coil because when the car runs, that coil heats up. If something's wrong with the windings in there. it might not become obvious until it has enough heat in it. The acr, once it dies, will start up again after about 5-10 minutes. But then when you drive it, it dies again after a short while. Like I said before, the entire distributor assembly in mine is brand new, so I'm kinda ruling that one out. From what the guy was saying, it makes a lot of sense that the coil MIGHT be bad. Hell, the car's got 150,000 miles on it. I guess it's a possibility.