Uan

New to the forum.

2001 Honda Civic EX 1.7L 4 Door Sedan with approx 125,000 miles

I degreased and washed the engine, as have done previously, trying not to get obvious electrical items wet.

After rinsing with a garden hose (not a jet spray), I let the engine run for ~30 minutes.

Following morning, started car and drove about 50 feet then engine died.

Attempts to restart the engine resulted in engine starting for a few seconds, revving to about 3000 RPM, then dying.

Did the following, so far:

1. Cleaned and reseated battery terminals. Charged battery to full charge.

2. Checked fuses in engine bay and inside vehicle.

3. Sprayed LPS 1 on all obvious electrical connections, and where reachable connections were opened and sprayed.

4. Checked for spark on all ignition coil modules/cassettes. Cleaned and resintalled ignition coils.

5. Spark plugs were due for replacement, so they were changed (NGK Iridium plugs replaced OEM plugs). Used anti-seize lube on threads and dielectric grease on the terminals. Hand tightened and torqued to 18 N-m.

6. Engine starts right up and revvs for a couple of seconds then still dies.

7. Used an Actron OBDII scanner, which gave the following codes:

Here are the DTC codes (?) from the OBDII reader device:

---------------
P1259
VTEC system B1 Failure (device)
Manufacturer Controlled Air & Fuel Metering (device website)

P0420
Catalyst System Below Threshold Bank I (device)

P0133
O2 Sensor slow response (device)

P1457
EVAP Control System Leak (EVAP Canister Area) (device)
Manufacturer Controlled Aux. Emission Controls (website)
---------------

8. Erased codes using the scanner and tried a few more starts. Reading DTC codes again results in nothing being reported. Not sure when the codes above were "thrown" but nothing is being reported now (does the engine needs to run for a while to "throw" codes again?).

9. Disconnected O2 sensor cable and tried to start vehicle. Same behavior. Reconnected cable.

So, not sure where to go from here. Perhaps, removing air filter housing and looking underneath at various connections, EVAP valve, etc.

Please help!

Thanks!

ezone

I assume all 4 coils produced spark?

Were the plugs wet or dry?



Does it run for 2 seconds then stall?
Does it run longer than 2 seconds?
Does it rev up on its own then stall?

If it stalls at 2 seconds, is the green key symbol on the dash flashing angrily?
Or not?

Is the oil level full?


GOt a spray can of anything flammable? (carb and throttle cleaner) Have someone start it then as it stalls spray a spritz into the throttle and see if that keeps it running

Uan

Hi Ezone,

The coils all sparked. The plugs were dry when we pulled them.

Does it run for 2 seconds then stall? - I'd say that's about right.

Does it run longer than 2 seconds? Not really, but if I rev the engine (floor it) it will for an extra second or so, then it stalls.

Does it rev up on its own then stall? On its own, it starts, doesn't rev more than normal (unless I give it gas), then the rpm's drop way down (around 500? - just above the first line), goes up just a bit then stalls.

If it stalls at 2 seconds, is the green key symbol on the dash flashing angrily? It does. About 5 blinks if I recall correctly.

Initially the oil was halfway between the two marks, but then we topped it off. Still stalled.

When the engine runs, all the lights go out, after it stops, the battery indicator light goes on, then a second or two later, the oil light comes on.

I'll need to pick up some carb cleaner to try spritzing it into the throttle. Any issues with fire when we do that?

ezone

K
K
??......It should blink about 5 after you shut off the key. I meant to see if the light is flashing at the time the engine stalls before you touch the key.

Low oil is the leading cause of and first thing to check for the P1259 code.
Those lights should come on.
Yes, it's flammable.

Before you try that.....



Unplug the cam sensor and see if that allows the engine to run longer than 2 seconds.

If no, then see if water got into the plug for the crank sensor.

Uan

If I don't do anything, just start it as normal, it turns over normally than after two seconds it dies. If I recall, it fluctuates slightly at a very low rpm, like it's trying to rev itself back up, but it fails and stalls.

The green key doesn't appear when it stalls, only when I turn the engine off. So no.


Excellent, we'll try those tomorrow and see what happens. We'll report back - hopefully that one of those things worked!

Thanks!

emich

Check your fuel ingectors electrical connections.

Star1967

Most likely you have cracked a vital sensor, got water on/in an ignition coil, or you got water in the fuel system. Possible a bad sparkplug when were they changed? I have a 2001 and so far I never cleaned the full engine just drove slowly over the first set of sprayers in the automatic car wash.

Uan

thanks for the responses!

Here's an update - had the car towed to Honda. The timing belt slipped. Last week I watched a video on Youtube about a 2001 Civic with very similar symptoms and it turned out the timing belt was off one tooth (they had changed the water pump or something.)

So the Honda Master mechanic is 90% sure that I bent my valves. But if the timing belt slipped, it would have been when I was around 2000 or so rpms. I had just pulled out of my parking lot and was just shifting into 2nd when the car stalled.

I asked them to confirm the valves are bent. Otherwise they are talking $2800 parts and labor. (new valves, timing belt, water pump, head gasket and tensioner).

Any thoughts on possible options? How likely would my valves be bent?

If they are, would it be better (or cheaper) to get a new engine? I don't really have 2800 laying around.

Thoughts would be appreciated!


Thanks

ezone

Did they say what caused it to jump time? Tensoner spring broke?


If the belt jumped one or two teeth (or more) the PCM can shut the engine down at the 2 second mark because it detects the cam-crank signals are out-of-sync..
That sounds like what was happening to me.
(If it would stay running when the cam sensor is unplugged, timing was the next thing to check)

If the belt was more than a couple teeth out of time, it may not have been able to start at all....

I know they don't run great when it's one tooth out of time, but some people cannot notice it.
I know they run really crappy at two teeth out of time. Gutless, no power at all.
They are hard as hell to get started when they are 3 teeth out.

It's got to jump several teeth before you bend valves (I seem to remember 5 being the magic number? IDK). Just one or two teeth does not (my experience).

As long as the tensioner and spring are not bad/broken and water pump is not loose, I'd slip a new belt on (or simply correct the timing) then run a compression test. Or maybe just fire it up and see if it runs smooth.

Uan

You rock ezone!

I'll give Honda a call first thing in the morning. I had a really bad connection when I was talking with the service manager. I believe she was going to have them do a compression test to check the valves. I didn't think to ask her how many teeth it jumped when I talked with her. I can also ask about the tensioner as well - she was recommending replacing it, but I don't if that meant it was bad/broken.

Fingers crossed.

I'll report back what they tell me.

ezone

tensioner replacement may be S.O.P. with a timing belt job.

I was more interested in finding the root cause of jumping time, along with figuring out if there really is a valve problem or not.

Uan

So I found out what was wrong.

According to Honda the tensioner spring broke and the timing belt slipped 3 teeth. The Master mechanic was 90% certain the valves were bent. I wanted to confirm it, so spent 250 for them to do a compression test. Yes, the valves were bent.

So here's the recommendation:

1. new timing belt and water pump
2. new tensioner
3. new valves
4. new head gasket.

They want $2800. I'm looking around for something a bit cheaper. A local shop with a good rep said it would be about 2000 at their place. My understanding is that a huge chunk of the cost is labor and just getting into do all the work.

Anyway, thanks to you all, especially ezone for your help.

If you have any ideas on how I could may cut the cost a bit more, that would be great (cash is a bit tight right now).

I am having Honda do some recalls I had on the car (air bag, and seat belt locking mechanism).

ezone

Breaking a tensioner spring at only 125k seems like awfully low miles for that to happen.
Was the timing belt job already done once, with a replacement (maaaybe aftermarket?) tensioner pulley?

=====

Search around, but be careful.
An idiot with a wrench can ruin the car in a heartbeat. (cause more damage than the car is worth, and the current engine mess is probably already approaching that point as it is.)
Don't forget to figure a price for towing it to another shop.

I expect the current shop put on a new tensioner pulley with spring, and new timing belt in order to do the compression test? So those 2 items are already covered and paid for.

======

Options I thought of:

Pull the head off DIY, and stuff valves in DIY, lap them in by hand
Pull the head off and have a machine shop do the valve job
Get a used cylinder head
Get a remanufactured cylinder head

Pay someone else to do it all

You can probably get a good used engine dropped in for less, but you would not know anything about the used engine....and of course it needs a head gasket job before it goes in LOL