Hitchhiker42

Hello everyone, this is my first post on this forum. I apologize in advance for it's length, but I'm trying to provide any relevant information to anyone who might be able to help. Thanks in advance for reading.

I bought a 2000 civic ex 6 days ago, and as I was driving home at dusk, I realized my instrument panel lights were not working (tried adjusting the dimmer, no luck, headlights were on). I figured this was an easy fix, just a blown fuse. This morning I tried replacing the appropriate fuse and it didn't fix the problem. I looked around and saw some possible issues with aftermarket stereos being improperly installed or just a faulty dimmer, but since it was a used car I didn't know if replacing the stereo had caused the problem, and I decided to leave it alone for the time being and do more research. However, when I was replacing the fuse, I looked over the rest and noticed that a number of them had been replaced at some point with the wrong fuse (10 A fuses where there should be 7.5 A fuses, etc).

While I was replacing one of these fuses, I caused a short near (or maybe in) the fuse box. I'm pretty sure the spark came off the metal piece that holds the engine computer interface (at least, I think that is the plug right there). When I started the car after the short the engine sounded very bad, bad enough that I immediately turned it off for fear of causing more damage. I pulled of the piece of trim that covers the area under the steering wheel to look for exposed wires near the fuse box, and I found one exposed wire (black, coming out of the C913 plug) and a cut, uncovered black wire bolted to the metal piece directly under the steering wheel. When I checked the fuses after the short , the only one blown was to the stereo. I should also note that right after I tried to start the car, I saw some smoke coming from the firewall in the engine compartment on the driver's side. This was 4 days ago

After all of this, I took the car to my mechanic Monday. As he was messing with it it blew the #3 spark plug out of the engine block, taking the threads with it. He says the computer isn't fried, although I'm not sure about this. I took the car to him specifically to keep this from happening, so I'm not in the most trusting of moods. I assume he plugged it in for a diagnostic and noting abnormal came up. Could this mean a fried computer?

So my questions are, does anyone have any ideas about what could have happened here? My plan is to have him fix the spark plug with a helicoil insert, but that doesn't solve the underlying cause and right now I'm operating under the assumption that my short is the root cause of this problem (the cause/location of the short is obviously a problem too, but one for after this is fixed, I think). I don't think it was (only) a poorly tightened spark plug given the short. Could it be a pre-ignition, and if so, what kind of electrical problem could have done this? Bad sensor of some sort? Any advice at all would be greatly appreciated. I would like this fixed without causing more permanent damage to the engine.

Again, sorry for the length. Thanks in advance, any advice/ideas would be appreciated.

Newfiedan

if you saw smoke when you first started the car then thats a bad sign that there is some pretty poor wiring done, it sounds like a hack job and unfortunately this can lead to some pretty bad things. I would start with checking out the stereo wiring as they may have cut some wiring that was totally unneseccary. See if there are any connections that are covered with tape or just twisted together and this can cause a problem with your dash lights if they messed with the dimmer wire which they did not need to. I would also be looking at the wiring going into the firewall specifically looking for diy wiring as a lot of ppl just push the grommet out and stick the wiring in through bare metal which is a very poor practice. Any wiring going through the firewall should be loomed up to the firewall and then run through a rubber grommet. If you saw a spark around the diagnostic connector see if they secured a ground in that area or any stripped wires, sometimes ppl go there for the tach signal for a remote starter or alarm system, which is also a bad idea. The spark plug getting shot out can be from a severely overtightened/loose spark plug which may have already stripped some of the threads thankfully its repairable with a heli coil (ford explorers were famous for this due to a lack of number of threads for the spark plug, repaired the same way with a heli coil) Wiring is one of my areas of expertise so if you need help I will do my best to try and get you running properly and safely.