My 92 Accord has 105k miles...tranny fluid changed a few months ago. About 4 months ago, it acted up in a similar manner. It was hard to start and then felt like the tranny was slipping when I took off. The light around "D4" on the gauge cluster was lit up also. I shut the car off, re-started it, and it was fine. So I blew it off...

Fast forward to last week. Pulling up to a stop sign and it just dies. Re-start it...fine after that.

Now yesterday. Died just like it did earlier in the week, but did it several times. It was only dying when I was stopped...once I was going it was running fine. UNTIL, I got on the hwy and gave it some gas to kick it down to 3rd. When it hit 3rd, the check engine light came on and it felt like the tranny was slipping (RPM's kicked up, but no acceleration). I eased off the gas and slowly gained speed in 4th gear. While cruising in 4th, it seemed like the car was surging back and forth, but from the drivetrain (ie, transmission) and not the engine. Taking off from a stop was tricky because I had to run it through each gear slowly to make it accelerate...sometimes even manually shifting to help it along. I had to stop for gas, but then the car wouldn't restart. It just chugged and bucked and wouldn't stay running (sounded like it was out of gas but that obviously wasn't the case). I just left it there last night.

I know the first thing to do is check the check engine code and see what it says, but does anybody have any other thoughts?

I'm hoping that it's a transmission module or something simple (not the transmission itself!). Why else would it throw the code the second it kick down to 3rd and felt like it was slipping?

The fuel filter probably needs to be changed and it needs new plugs, but I don't think those are the problems here.

Thoughts??

Thanks in advance..

 

you said the tranny feels like its slipping, so its probably not the cap and rotor. that was the problem with my 92 ex last year, the car would just randomly die on me when ever i was stopped. the car would also idle funny, it would jump up and down while sitting at a stop sign. but i would say pull the CEL, then go from there.

 

Update...

Code 4: Crank sensor circuit
Code 9: CYL sensor circuit

Reset the ECM and it at least started (barely!) but ran like crap and was jumping all over the place.

I guess I'm going to have to go through this big long flowchart in the Helmes manual and try to track down the problem.

It looks like distributor, a short in the sensor wiring, or the ECU according to the chart.

Anybody had this before?

Thanks,
Hank

 

where do you look to get the ecu code?