jeremiahm

I have a 1998 LX (EX lower end, but not important to this thread), that won't start. For a few weeks, it would die coming down from hard acceleration, like coming to a stop on an interstate exit ramp. It would always start back up though. Other times, it would die if, like, I got caugt at a red light all of a sudden and I had to hit the brakes hard. It would just idle down to zero and die.

This week though, I started it up (after three days of not moving the car) and backed out of my driveway only to have the car die before I got on the road. It hasn't started again.

I replaced the cap/rotor, plugs and wires last fall to try to fix these problems, but to no avail. Is it time for a new distributor? Or is there something else to replace before going there?

Thanks.

ezone

I'd SWAG the coil if it lost spark and never ran again, but you said yours ran sporadically so I'm thinking igniter is probably the culprit.

Got any codes? If it has codes, check into that first.


For a no-spark check, this is what I do:

Get a dwellmeter, the type used for setting distributor points on an OLD car. (I have this on my volt meter.)
Remove cap and rotor.
I set up a plug wire so I can watch if the coil is making sparks or not during the tests.
Connect dwellmeter to coil neg wire and battery ground.
Have someone crank it.
Read meter while cranking.

If there is ANY reading at all (even 2 degrees) but no spark, then the igniter is trying to fire the coil but the coil is bad.

If you crank it and the meter stays on 90* or 0*, the igniter is not even trying to fire the coil.

At this point I would stick in one of my test igniters and see if it has spark now.