Honda Civic EP3 Type-R Won't start...
Discussion
Hi all,
Really at the end of my skull with this one, for about a month now not been able to get my CTR to fire up. I can't say what's caused this specifically but thought I'd try a few forums. It's currently in a garage and even they can't explain it! Here's some facts:
Car turns over just does not spark, also back fires a bit.
Compression is good
Spark plugs and battery have been changed
No fault codes (had 3 diagnostics done)
Getting fuel and air
Immobilizer and keys check out
All fuses checked
Just won't for love or money fire up. Me and the garage are speculating it could be an ECU fault, they have tried resetting it but we think it may be something more severe. Obviously this gets into costly territory... I am currently trying to source a replacement ECU with barrel and keys, but I was just wondering if we are missing anything?
Really at the end of my skull with this one, for about a month now not been able to get my CTR to fire up. I can't say what's caused this specifically but thought I'd try a few forums. It's currently in a garage and even they can't explain it! Here's some facts:
Car turns over just does not spark, also back fires a bit.
Compression is good
Spark plugs and battery have been changed
No fault codes (had 3 diagnostics done)
Getting fuel and air
Immobilizer and keys check out
All fuses checked
Just won't for love or money fire up. Me and the garage are speculating it could be an ECU fault, they have tried resetting it but we think it may be something more severe. Obviously this gets into costly territory... I am currently trying to source a replacement ECU with barrel and keys, but I was just wondering if we are missing anything?
SootyR said:
Hi all,
Really at the end of my skull with this one, for about a month now not been able to get my CTR to fire up. I can't say what's caused this specifically but thought I'd try a few forums. It's currently in a garage and even they can't explain it! Here's some facts:
Car turns over just does not spark, also back fires a bit.
Compression is good
Spark plugs and battery have been changed
No fault codes (had 3 diagnostics done)
Getting fuel and air
Immobilizer and keys check out
All fuses checked
Just won't for love or money fire up. Me and the garage are speculating it could be an ECU fault, they have tried resetting it but we think it may be something more severe. Obviously this gets into costly territory... I am currently trying to source a replacement ECU with barrel and keys, but I was just wondering if we are missing anything?
If there was no spark at all...it could not backfire.Really at the end of my skull with this one, for about a month now not been able to get my CTR to fire up. I can't say what's caused this specifically but thought I'd try a few forums. It's currently in a garage and even they can't explain it! Here's some facts:
Car turns over just does not spark, also back fires a bit.
Compression is good
Spark plugs and battery have been changed
No fault codes (had 3 diagnostics done)
Getting fuel and air
Immobilizer and keys check out
All fuses checked
Just won't for love or money fire up. Me and the garage are speculating it could be an ECU fault, they have tried resetting it but we think it may be something more severe. Obviously this gets into costly territory... I am currently trying to source a replacement ECU with barrel and keys, but I was just wondering if we are missing anything?
So is there spark or not ?
Is there a signal to the coils ? Is there power to the coil ? Are you seeing a proper rpm signal ?
You say it has fuel....how are you confirming this ? Fuel is actually spraying from the injectors ?
And history, or did you simply park up one day, and next time you came to the car it would fail to start ?
stevieturbo said:
SootyR said:
Hi all,
Really at the end of my skull with this one, for about a month now not been able to get my CTR to fire up. I can't say what's caused this specifically but thought I'd try a few forums. It's currently in a garage and even they can't explain it! Here's some facts:
Car turns over just does not spark, also back fires a bit.
Compression is good
Spark plugs and battery have been changed
No fault codes (had 3 diagnostics done)
Getting fuel and air
Immobilizer and keys check out
All fuses checked
Just won't for love or money fire up. Me and the garage are speculating it could be an ECU fault, they have tried resetting it but we think it may be something more severe. Obviously this gets into costly territory... I am currently trying to source a replacement ECU with barrel and keys, but I was just wondering if we are missing anything?
If there was no spark at all...it could not backfire.Really at the end of my skull with this one, for about a month now not been able to get my CTR to fire up. I can't say what's caused this specifically but thought I'd try a few forums. It's currently in a garage and even they can't explain it! Here's some facts:
Car turns over just does not spark, also back fires a bit.
Compression is good
Spark plugs and battery have been changed
No fault codes (had 3 diagnostics done)
Getting fuel and air
Immobilizer and keys check out
All fuses checked
Just won't for love or money fire up. Me and the garage are speculating it could be an ECU fault, they have tried resetting it but we think it may be something more severe. Obviously this gets into costly territory... I am currently trying to source a replacement ECU with barrel and keys, but I was just wondering if we are missing anything?
So is there spark or not ?
Is there a signal to the coils ? Is there power to the coil ? Are you seeing a proper rpm signal ?
You say it has fuel....how are you confirming this ? Fuel is actually spraying from the injectors ?
And history, or did you simply park up one day, and next time you came to the car it would fail to start ?
I am told there is spark, history is I did park up one day, wouldn't start the next day so tried to jump start it to no avail. I suspect this could have something to do with it? That's the thinking of the ECU
What you've said so far is a long way short of proving that there's anything wrong with the ECU.
It should be straight forward to test whether there is a spark and whether the spark timing is about right, and whether you are getting fuel in the cylinders and roughly the right amount. It could be something mechanical like a jumped tooth on a cam drive, which would throw the spark timing way out and prevent it starting. Don't guess and change things at random - check the fundamentals and track it down methodically.
It should be straight forward to test whether there is a spark and whether the spark timing is about right, and whether you are getting fuel in the cylinders and roughly the right amount. It could be something mechanical like a jumped tooth on a cam drive, which would throw the spark timing way out and prevent it starting. Don't guess and change things at random - check the fundamentals and track it down methodically.
GreenV8S said:
What you've said so far is a long way short of proving that there's anything wrong with the ECU.
It should be straight forward to test whether there is a spark and whether the spark timing is about right, and whether you are getting fuel in the cylinders and roughly the right amount. It could be something mechanical like a jumped tooth on a cam drive, which would throw the spark timing way out and prevent it starting. Don't guess and change things at random - check the fundamentals and track it down methodically.
If the spark timing wasn't right what would you say could be the cause of this?It should be straight forward to test whether there is a spark and whether the spark timing is about right, and whether you are getting fuel in the cylinders and roughly the right amount. It could be something mechanical like a jumped tooth on a cam drive, which would throw the spark timing way out and prevent it starting. Don't guess and change things at random - check the fundamentals and track it down methodically.
Can't see it being the Ecu. 10 years of driving EP3's never had a ECU fault and never heard of one on the Type R forums I frequent.
What's the mileage? Has the chain been replaced? Have the valve clearances been done? What oil have you been using? What service schedule do you follow and any work been done recently.
Had a friend who had a similar problem, turned out it was a stretched timing chain.
What's the mileage? Has the chain been replaced? Have the valve clearances been done? What oil have you been using? What service schedule do you follow and any work been done recently.
Had a friend who had a similar problem, turned out it was a stretched timing chain.
NicheMonkey said:
Can't see it being the Ecu. 10 years of driving EP3's never had a ECU fault and never heard of one on the Type R forums I frequent.
What's the mileage? Has the chain been replaced? Have the valve clearances been done? What oil have you been using? What service schedule do you follow and any work been done recently.
Had a friend who had a similar problem, turned out it was a stretched timing chain.
80k no they havent, I've been using the dealer recommended can't remember which type of fully synthetic it is though, it's been running fine before just used to leak oil a small bit . It's not been serviced in a while but I've heard used it for the last year. It's not as if its running terrible it just won't start at all. I take it a compression test wouldn't highlight something like a stretched timing chain?What's the mileage? Has the chain been replaced? Have the valve clearances been done? What oil have you been using? What service schedule do you follow and any work been done recently.
Had a friend who had a similar problem, turned out it was a stretched timing chain.
SootyR said:
If the spark timing wasn't right what would you say could be the cause of this?
Rather than trying to describe every potential diagnosis of every potential problem - focus on the ones you have. Do you actually have a spark and is the timing about right? Are you getting fuel in the cylinder, and about the right amount?A non start like this should be far easier to diagnose than an intermittent fault.
I can appreciate you are relaying information...but this will make it even more difficult for a remote diagnosis.
Stuff often gets lost in translation....if it even gets relayed to yourself correctly in the first place.
But it should be easy...if there genuinely is fuel being injected into the engine when cranking...that tells us a lot of aspects are working fine.
If there genuinely is no spark, then it should be fairly easy to test and diagnose why not.
I can appreciate you are relaying information...but this will make it even more difficult for a remote diagnosis.
Stuff often gets lost in translation....if it even gets relayed to yourself correctly in the first place.
But it should be easy...if there genuinely is fuel being injected into the engine when cranking...that tells us a lot of aspects are working fine.
If there genuinely is no spark, then it should be fairly easy to test and diagnose why not.
I do worry about garages sometimes they think it may be the ECU ..... FFS 
like mentioned very very unlikely to be ECU, start looking elsewhere check earths/grounds for continuity 
a scan wont always pick up power failures/low voltage/high resistance etc, diagnostic scans and are hardly infallible anyways so just keep that in mind 
sometimes good old fashioned fault finding pays off without so much as a reader/scanner
like mentioned very very unlikely to be ECU, start looking elsewhere check earths/grounds for continuity a scan wont always pick up power failures/low voltage/high resistance etc, diagnostic scans and are hardly infallible anyways so just keep that in mind sometimes good old fashioned fault finding pays off without so much as a reader/scanner Edited by Sardonicus on Friday 16th December 17:17
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