Hello all, there is much knowledge on this board and I am hoping you can help me.

Last week, I noticed my 1996 Honda Accord LX was turning over slower than usual during starting. I also noticed that my radio presets were gone every day when I'd drive to work in the morning So I went and replaced the battery (myself). Everything seemed to be fine-- and the car was turning over as normal.

However, the next day I noticed that while I was coasting on the freeway (~45mph), the speedometer needle suddenly dropped to 0 then shot back up to normal (looking almost like a manual transmission's tachometer needle while shifting gears). This happened a couple of times in a row. The "check engine" light did NOT come on. This went away for a few days, including a 100 mile drive where everything was fine, then it came back again today.

First, I noticed all my radio presets were gone when I started the car in the morning. Then, while coasting again around 35 mph, the needle fluctuations happened again-- I hit the gas, let go, and the needle dropped to zero then shot back up.

To make things even MORE weird, when I finally parked the car, I turned the key from ON to ACC and EVERYTHING shut off-- the radio, the headlights, everything-- there was NO power even though there should have been. Then about 5 seconds later, everything shot back to life without my doing a thing.

Did I mess something up with the battery install?

As background, about 6 months ago I self-installed an aftermarket in-dash CD player and was not able to establish a reliable ground connection... but that never gave me issues.

Thank you SO much for any help you can give me to minimize the time and expense of fixing this problem. I'm on a tight budget (That's why I drive a 96 Accord!) and cannot afford to just leave this car at the dealer for exploration.

 

i had a car that the gauges would do that same thing and i had a bad ground so i would check all my grounds and make sure your connections at the battery is good if you dont keep the right amount of volts for the ecm that could be a problem it has to keep battery volts to operate properly

 

Thank you SO MUCH!
one more question: Since that time when my car completely shut down (when the key was turned from ON to ACC and there was no power to anything for about 5 seconds) I could not even get the headlights to turn on. Since the headlights are powered whether or not a key is in the ignition, does that eliminate the ignition switch as a possible source of the problem?

 

check your grounds and your connections to the battery. if that doesnt work, have your alternator checked, you can take your car to napa, autozone, to have the alternator test.