Rep Power: 0

ok to start off i have a 2001 Civic LX 4dr automatic transmission. this car has given me a rough few weeks so bear with me. I am giving the whole story so as not to leave any questions. it all started with my car overheating to what i thought was my water pump( i first heard from a mechanic that it was the head gasket and i remembered wrong and replaced the water pump instead) a friend of mine who works on cars did the job for me. when i was picking up my car he let me know that i would probably need some new spark plugs and i have a bad temperature sensor( the one that it located right next to the thermostat.) so the car drove fine for two days and then one morning before work i was starting the car and it wasn't starting. had another friend with a scanner check my cel light and it came up with the bad sensor and 3 cylinder misfires. the guy told me the bad sensor could have messed up the spark plugs. So we went to the auto parts store and bought a new sensor and plugs. Replaced the sensor just fine and while replacing the plugs when i came to cylinder 3 the plug was really stuck in there, like it was rusted stuck. After much tugging we finally got it out. when we came to cylinder 4 the threading+the tip of the last plug broke off inside. towed the car to my buddies recommended shop and they told me it was the head gasket that let steam into the cylinders which made the plugs rust. So i paid for them to remove the broken plug and rebuild the head or whatever. Let me remind you the car ran perfectly fine up until the point that it didn't start. fast forward a few days and the car is back and now they tell me my car is having transmission issues and they recommend a rebuild. the "D" light on the dash was blinking. I diagnosed the problems using these forums and found that it is a bad solenoid. also it couldn't be mechanical because the transmission was rebuilt in Feb of 2012. The friend with the scanner is gonna come scan the car for me tomorrow to be sure. To give you an idea the "D" light is flashing, the car kind of "clunks" into gears when i shift, and when i drive in D or D3 it revs and slowly speeds up until it hits 25ish and it drives fine. i have learned to counter this by starting off in "2" and it picks up like normal and then i shift to D. Also my gas pedal is REALLY stiff, it presses down a quarter way through and then it becomes really tough to push further. wasn't like that before. so here are my questions:

- Could the work on the head gasket have somehow resulted in my gas pedal being so stiff?
i asked them and all i got was that they were no where near the stuff that goes to the pedal.

- What could have resulted in the bad solenoid?
could the mechanic have messed with it even though they were nowhere near the transmission. or could it be a effect of the bad temperature sensor messing up the electrical system.


thanks for any help i am new to all this but i am trying to learn as i go.

 
Rep Power: 187

After reading this novel, it's sounds like it had some severe neglect at some point from somebody. Not pointing fingers at this point.

How bad did it overheat and how often and long did it run like this?


So you didn't really address the problem because you misunderstood what the mechanic was telling you and mistook a head gasket problem for a water pump problem?


So how was that diagnosed as being a "bad sensor"? In that general area, one sensor kicks the fans on and the other sends temperature info to the gauge cluster. Was this just guess work or actual troubleshooting of the problem?

So what were the codes that were read and what was identified as a bad sensor?

What sensor did you replace?

So....severe overheating caused by a bad head gasket and continually running the car while it was overheating may have destroyed your head? Is your cooling system filled with water or actual correct anti-freeze?

So you really don't know what work was done on the head? Based on your description thus far, the head may be severely damaged from overheating and my need to be replaced.

Is it possible it overheated enough to the point that it wouldn't start? If so, that is total destruction of the engine as far as I understand it.

Really? It couldn't be a mechanical issue? Who rebuilt you tranny and what was the warranty on it?

Sure sounds mechanical to me at this point, but maybe ezone can enlighten you on the issue.

Miss adjusted throttle cable when they reinstalled the intake?

See above.

If that's the case then they just shoved the intake assembly as a whole out of the way and didn't bother touching the throttle cable, otherwise, if they removed the intake completely, the throttle cable would have been disconnected.

I'm thinking a head job shouldn't have touched your tranny and would have no idea what would effect your tranny.

The temperature sensor should have nothing to do with the tranny and may not have been faulty to begin with.

 
Rep Power: 519

LOL

Yeah, I noticed something in this line here:

You needed a sarcastic question mark after the word "issue".

Hope that helps.

 
Rep Power: 187

Edited and it did help.

 
Rep Power: 0

Ok looking back maybe it was too much. I have no idea who rebuilt the tranny the previous owner told me it was rebuilt a few months before i bought it. It was my girlfriends aunt who sold me the car so i dont think she would shaft me. The fluid in the tranny is clean its just it isnt working properly. My buddy still hasnt comed and scanned it so i dont know what the specific code is or where to go to get it scanned. The car is still drivable to a degree it just starts off like im starting from 3rd gear . Then after a few minutes of driving it will start overheating.

 
Rep Power: 187

Well, if possible, you should try to get the tranny rebuild info from your gf's aunt. That might save you if she has paper work and any warranty info. It really sounds like a mechanical problem, but you need to get any and all codes read to further diagnose it.

Your overheating issues, based on my experience in this forum, is one of four things:

1. You have air in your system for some reason, which could be caused by the next two items if you know the system has been properly bled and you're using the correct coolant.

2. You have a leak somewhere which causes your coolant to go low and thus you overheat.

3. Blown head gasket. So coolant is either being burnt and/or being pushed in to you water jacket and most likely out of your overflow tank. Once again, causing your coolant to go low and thus overheating.

4. A combination of any of the above.

Based on what you're saying, I'd say the head/engine was running hot and was constantly overheated for quite some time. It's sounds like the head is completely warped. It also sounds like somebody was using water instead of coolant because they kept having to fill up because they were loosing coolant somewhere and didn't bother to get it fixed, thus rusted out spark plug you spoke of. Just my thoughts and speculation on the matter since I not at your car.

From my experience on these forums and with a properly maintained vehicle using the correct fluids things like thermostats and temp sensors don't go bad in this generation of civic. And I will only speak to this gen because it's what I have the most experience working on and reading about.

HTH

 
Rep Power: 0

ok i took the car to a transmission shop and the problem was the transmission clutch converter solenoid. I told them to replace it and it turns out the solenoid wasnt bad, the wires on the harness were disconnected. also the guy told me that the car is still overheating because thehead gasket job wasnt done right on the car. so now im stuck. I'm pretty sure the shop who did my head job pulled those wires out but also i want them to fix the head job. so what do i do? how do i approach this?

 
Rep Power: 519

Warranty.

 
Rep Power: 0

ok thats what i was going to count on. but also how do i go about the problem of my solenoid wire being removed. obviously they were nowhere near the wires when they did the work and the transmission worked perfectly till the day the car did not start. because i'm out $80 on another shop having to put the wires back in.

 
Rep Power: 519

Biggest problem with this will be if they really couldn't get it right the first time, what makes you think having them do it all over again (FOR FREE) is going to make it any better?

Think hard before you bother to answer that.

OTOH, even the best of us have bad days (and **** happens), and we deserve the opportunity to make it right for you.




"A moron with a wrench can completely ruin any car. It only takes a minute."
And it can take a loooong time before YOU have any clue the car was ruined.


Problem: Seems that YOU decided to replace the solenoid when all it needed was the wire reconnected. Right? You own that part IMO.


You don't know that. Apparently they were near the wires.


You can't claim they unplugged the wire, then say they didn't touch the wire in the same breath.

That TCC solenoid wire alone wouldn't keep the engine from running.

Though if the wire was only partially connected, it could just pop off at any time.

I don't get the part about "car did not start", what was wrong and who fixed that? Could that person/shop have unplugged this wire?

SOMEONE had to figure out what was wrong. They need to be paid for a correct answer.

If you didn't want to pay, then you should have done it yourself.

Warranty? Talk to the shop about it. Will they admit fault? Will they reimburse? I can't answer this stuff, this is your baby.

 
Rep Power: 0

well thats what im planning to do about the head gasket job

I didnt know it needed the wire connected. when that was found out the solenoid wasnt replaced at all, the wires were just put back.


i meant it sarcastically. the job they were doing put them nowhere near the solenoid, yes. but apparently they went out of their way IF they did it. also when i got my car back from them the guy just said my car was having transmission issues and the shop recommended a complete rebuild.
That TCC solenoid wire alone wouldn't keep the engine from running.

old head gasket in the car allowed steam to rise and corrode my spark plugs which caused in misfiring cylinders. found this out when replacing the plugs myself and one broke inside. so i took it to the shop currently in question. this is the only shop to touch my car in the last 6 months.

 
Rep Power: 519

Ok, I didn't recall seeing that written anyplace.

It would really depend on what was done and the person doing it.
Not everyone does identical work on an identical job.

I can think of 3 or 4 different ways *I* might take the cylinder head off of a 7th gen, depending on how bad things are, and maybe my mood on that particular day.

Caused by disconnected wire......
Accident?
Ignorance?
Malice?
IDK
Did they suggest their own shop to "fix" this "new" problem for you too, or did they send you to the transmission shop for second opinion?


This isn't passing the sniff test yet, although I've seen far worse in the way of "generating more business".

OTOH, it sounds like nobody in the shop could have driven the car for evaluation prior to the indicated spark plug repair, so likely that any problems noticed after repair were assumed to be previously present.
Does that sound feasible?

 
Rep Power: 0

The manager just told me my transmission was messing up when i came to pick up my car after the gasket job was completed. on the receipt he wrote that the shop recommends a transmission rebuild. only after browsing the forums here( which were a great help) i found that it was the TCC solenoid, not the whole transmission. i brought my car to a transmission shop with that info in mind and they ran the CEL and it was correct.

And that was my problem. drove the car home with the bad solenoid and it was still overheating so i brought it back into the shop and talked to him again and he had the mechanic inspect it and he told me it was only overheating because the transmission was overworking the engine or something like that, shows what he knows. after i had the solenoid fixed car still overheated of course. so i got in contact with the owner and explained everything to him and he said bring it back and he will see to it that the gasket job is redone. brought my car in to the shop yesterday. so we will see how this goes but this is definitley my last visit to this shop i can tell you that.