Please help - 1998 Honda Civic 1.4 cranks, but won't start

[stams]

Our 1998 Honda Civic (D14A4 engine) had only done 65k miles and was running smoothly until... One day while waiting at the stop lights, the engine hesitated, the speedometer went up and down and I turned it off. When I tried to start it, it would crank, but not start. It hasn't started since then.

We towed it to our mechanic and he did a couple of tests, changed the distributor and cables but it still wouldn't start. There are no CELs on the dashboard. Here are the FACTS:

1. Fuel - the fuel pump is priming, but no fuel is coming out of the injectors

2. Air - no obvious issues. However, several months ago some hairlike stuff started coming out of the exhaust. It turned out it's the back box wadding. This didn't prevent the car passing its MOT with flying colours months later.

3. Combustion - Cylinders 1 & 2 have normal pressure, while the pressure in 3 & 4 is low... Could this be a blown headgasket? It ran really well up till the day it stopped.

4. Timing - we bought the car 10 years ago when it had done 40k miles. We've had it for 10 years and done nearly 25k in it. We have no record of the timing belt ever being changed...

5. Spark - tested and all ok. The battery is nearly new and fully charged.

The car has an aftermarket Gemini alarm system with immobilizer, which had been fitted before we bought the car. Could this be related to the immobiliser?

Any suggestions what might be the most obvious cause of the problem? The car is not worth spending lots of money on and has only been a second car. But it's a shame to just scrap it... with such low mileage and otherwise in good mechanical condition, etc.

Edited by stams on Wednesday 10th October 14:29

[Om]

We had a similar problem with our old civic 1.4 (97) at about 90k miles. A few random stops/restarts then a complete failure requiring recovery to the local Honda dealer. The car would turn over healthily but with no attempt to fire but fuelling ok. Honda dealer did all the diagnostics they could and tried lots of things with no success over the course of several weeks, to the point they were suggesting replacing the ECU "to see if it's that". At which point we decided on a second opinion from another garage who in one day diagnosed and resolved the fault. Turned out it was a corroded earth connection to the main fuse box in the engine bay. Needed cleaning up then it started fine with no recurring issues. Ran for several years after they. They suggested it may have been exacerbated from driving over rough ground as we have to drive on a farm track to get to our house.

Could be totally unrelated obviously, but the symptoms sounded familiar...

[Krikkit]

Does the car have an immobiliser? Is that showing any errors?

I ask as I've run into a similar problem on a car with a faulty manufacturer's immobiliser which disabled the fuel injector relays. In that case it was a tiny break in the inductor coil around the ignition barrel which read the immobiliser chip in the key.

[Mignon]

Well your obvious problem is 1. No fuel coming out of the injectors. There's not much point in worrying about anything else until this is fixed. I'm not sure how someone has decided the pump is priming if no fuel is coming out. Maybe they mean it sounds as though it's operating but it could still be faulty. It could also be a blocked fuel filter I suppose.

How low is the pressure in 3 & 4? Some actual readings would be helpful.

[Ellb123]

Not sure what your suggestion by low pressure in the cylinders, have you done a compression test?

If you've got no fuel, the "main relay" could well be at fault (I had this happen when switching the D14 in my old to a B16). It is located on the passenger side kick panel to the left, check if its getting power when turning over. Thats what my money would be going on.

[ALawson]

Could it be distributor of crank position sensor related?

[Sardonicus]

Are you sure the inj power fuse hasn't blown? ECU failure on this era of Honda is very very unlikely IME, you say the fuel pump is running/priming as the fuel pressure at the rail been checked?

[stams]

Ellb123 said:

Not sure what your suggestion by low pressure in the cylinders, have you done a compression test?

If you've got no fuel, the "main relay" could well be at fault (I had this happen when switching the D14 in my old to a B16). It is located on the passenger side kick panel to the left, check if its getting power when turning over. Thats what my money would be going on.

Hi, thanks for the suggestion. The pressure in cylinders 3&4 is only 4!! Cylinders 1&2 are ok.

I’ve located the main relay - the mechanic thinks that the relay is fine as the fuel pump can be heard priming..

[stams]

ALawson said:

Could it be distributor of crank position sensor related?

We’ve changed the distributor but it didn’t cure the problem.

[Pothole]

Try the earth connector fix above. That should be simple enough to do.