Hello,

I have a 1994 accord 5 speed manual that I aquired a year ago for 1K. It had multiple issues which I am working through as I diagnose.

Things done so far:

- new plugs, wires, Distributor cap
- new o2 sensor
- new clutch cylinders
- new ignition coil
- new door lock
- 2 new window regulators
- 4 new tires
- repuddled the main relay solders after noticing visible cracks and fuel cutoff
- cleaned EGR and egr plenum and intake (car passed inspection with flying colors after this!)
- cleaned injectors and replaced some leaking seals
- cleaned choked up IAC (fixed idle issues)
- odometer broken and stuck at 179K =]
- Steam cleaned the engine pouring water in intake reving at ~2500RPM

Problem that I still have which is driving me nuts and I hope someone can help me diagnose:

The car enters limp mode sometimes. I will be driving down the road at highway speeds and feel a very slight stumble, more often than not I'm sure I do not feel it.

When this happens the CEL may come on but it is VERY dim. Sometimes it is bright but most of the time it will be extremely dim, if lit up at all. Sometimes the car will be in limp mode but no CEL.

If I jump the wires to check codes (I just made a ghetto rocker switch so I can check more easily) with key in position 1 sometimes the CEL is very bright and sometimes it is very dim. Either way, the CEL does not flash with the plug jumpered.

If I restart the car the CEL is gone and the car runs like a champ until the next time it is triggered which may be a few miles or maybe a few days later. Sometimes the car would stall while driving, almost like it was starved for fuel but this has not happened again since resoldering the main relay and installing the ignition coil.

I'm leaning towards a bad ECU or ground. Any suggestions would be appreciated because once I get this resovled the car will be working 100%, or until the next thing breaks on my 19 year old commuter beater =]

Another thing that happens sometimes which may be of some value for diagnosis is that the CEL light does not always light up when I start the car like the other idiot loghts do.

 

Welcome in,did you puul a code or did it set one,I'm leaning toward a bad ground,try taking ever body ground you can find loose and clean the contact,see if that helps. also, you may want to clear the codes to reset the ECM--there is a 7.5 amp "back-up" fuse in the underhood fuse box. Pull the fuse and leave it out for about 3 minutes. Then put it back in. that will reset the ECM in case the ECM just decided to take a break from reality.

 

Hi thanks for the ping back in the low traffic forum. I reset the fuse and messed with the grounds and eventually was able to pull a code. CODE 43, lean. It seems like I am constantly fixing stuff on this car =]. I had a new vacuum leak that sprung up somewhere , bad enough that I had a nice lopey idle. It turns out that there are some blockoff caps on the back manifold that the throttle body bolts to. One of the caps waas missing and it was sucking air. Just blocked it back up with some fuel line and a screw. Loping idle is gone.

The thing with these old cars is that usualyl you are dealing with more than one problem at a time which makes things interesting none the less. Driving one can be an adventure. My kids cross their fingers in the morning before we make our way to the day care =]

 

Yea a code 43 lean is def a vaccum leak.

 

Quick update. Yes got the vacuum leak fixed. I was still having DIM CEL and just strange happenings. Somethings that would occur would be stutter on accelleration, car misfiring dropping into limp mode etc.

I pulled the ECU and noticed some capacitors that took a crap on the motherboard. I have a capacitor rebuild kit on order from madfab site. I am fairly confident that this was causing the erratic and just weird codes that would come out of the blue, when I was able to read the codes!