Rep Power: 0

New to the forum, looking for help.
Bought a wrecked 2000 Civic DX 4 door auto for $50 with 140xxx miles. Drove it for about a month after i repaired the bodywork and suspension (left front outter rail damage), and began to have starting, misfire problems (no CEL) so I performed a tune up (plugs, wires, fuel filter, air filter). A week after the tune up, i found a hole in the exhaust pipe directly after the manifold. Went to replace pipe, and found the catalytic converter material was falling out and the manifold was cracked. SO now i have a brand new exhaust from manifold to muffler.
Within the week, the engine would be hard to start, about 30 seconds of cranking to get it to fire off. I have an hour commute, about half way through the commute, the engine would start to misfire, and stall and take about 30 seconds to start again. Got a P1399, p0300, p0301, p0302, p0303, p0304. I checked the plugs and found the #1 cylinders spark plug electrode to be melted away deep inside of the ceramic. I put another set of plugs in, NGK V Power, and im still having these issues.
Does anyone have a clue, im pulling my hair out. This was supposed to be my cheap car, that i already have $2000 into.

Forgot to add, it appears that the distributor is new (put on before i bought the car)
and compression in all 4 cylinders is between 150 and 180 psi.

Thanks in advance for the help

 
Rep Power: 189

run fuel injection cleaner through the fuel system, clean the throttlebody and then take it on a good run. I highly recommend seafoam for the injection cleaning, its great stuff.

 
Rep Power: 0

already tried a fuel injector cleaner, I religiously use Lucas. This didnt help at all.

 
Rep Power: 189

I would replace the cap and rotor in that case, appearing new and working like new are 2 different things. Recheck the spark plug gap as well, if that is off it will run like crap.

 
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the cap and rotor were off to verify that the contacts were clean, no major ware on the contacts. The plugs were just replaced and correctly gapped at .044 less then a week ago.


This seems to be more of an intermittent problem, but does occur during each leg of my commute.

 
Rep Power: 189

hmmm well, in that case I would have to go with blocked EGR passage or valve clearance out of range. You can download the manual in my sig and get the vavle adjustment procedure with that kind of mileage its possible that the valve clearance is out of range. However in your case I would be more inclined to think egr passage is getting blocked up.

 
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My civic dx is a US market vehicle with the D16Y7 motor. These motors do not have EGR valves.
I checked all the valves, there weren't too far off. I adjusted them, and the engine still stalls under power, with all the previous symptoms.

Would a crank shaft sensor cause intermittent problems like the ones im experiencing?

 
Rep Power: 189

yes it is possible, check the wiring to it and if you have a spare swap it out.

 
Rep Power: 0

when the car sputters and stalls, there is no spark at the plug wire.

New plugs, wires, distributor, what should i look for

would the crank position sensor cause this,
it is an intermittent problem

 
Rep Power: 313

Lucas is JUNK.. stop using it alltogether. Trust me there has been research done and that stuff is total garbage, it causes your oil to foam up and stop functioning. (Look for bob the oil guy who ran tons of studies on it). Even though you have no CEL you should get it checked, the car may have stored a code in there somewhere thats not showing right now. How did you verify that you had no spark. As mentioned above you need to clean your throttle body.

 
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ive checked for codes with my code reader. nothing comes up.

i check spark with something similar to this

http://www.amazon.com/Lisle-50850-Ig...260119&sr=1-13

 
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all the problems stem from no spark.
it is an intermittent no spark issue.
I used the tool mentioned before. You pull one plug wire out, and connect it to the tool,
this happens to all cylinders

 
Rep Power: 0

Hes talking about the injector cleaner/upper cylinder lube, not the oil additive..

 
Rep Power: 189

Remove the crank sensor and check it to see if its still magnetic, or if there has been a buildup of junk on it. Check that plug for any corrosion and the wiring to it. If you want take the coil out and have it tested, it may be loosing power hence no spark on the plugs.

 
Rep Power: 313

I'm saying it's all crap