Honda Car Forum

I was looking thru teggar's igniter (ignition module) test and noticed
a contradiction in reference on this line, "The igniter... will only switch
off when grounded, but not when Terminal 4 is floating." is
contradicting with the service manual.

http://www.tegger.com/hondafaq/ignit...r-testing.html

The 90 Prelude service manual (link below) says, "If the WHT wire
[comparable to Terminal 4] is shorted the igniter may be damaged"
needs some explanations why a short will damage the igniter.

http://www.imagesharing.com/files/90...gniteryrit.gif

Note that a 90 prelude igniter has three terminals and a ground.
Coil/Battery/ECU and ground.

The service manual seems to imply that a ground short may
damage the igniter, although Hondas are known as electronic
ground safe vehicles, such that accidental grounding of circuits
isn't likely to be harmful. Already, the ECU grounds terminal 4
to produce a spark so why bother. Ground or not, the question
still stands. Should grounding terminal 4 on a standard 4
terminal igniter (ignition module) cause damage?

"ECUguy" <ECUguy@none.com> wrote in message
news:GUN7f.18837$6e1.6771@newssvr14.news.prodigy.c om...
>I was looking thru teggar's igniter (ignition module) test and noticed
> a contradiction in reference on this line, "The igniter... will only
> switch
> off when grounded, but not when Terminal 4 is floating." is
> contradicting with the service manual.
>
> http://www.tegger.com/hondafaq/ignit...r-testing.html
>
> The 90 Prelude service manual (link below) says, "If the WHT wire
> [comparable to Terminal 4] is shorted the igniter may be damaged"
> needs some explanations why a short will damage the igniter.
>
> http://www.imagesharing.com/files/90...gniteryrit.gif
>
> Note that a 90 prelude igniter has three terminals and a ground.
> Coil/Battery/ECU and ground.
>
> The service manual seems to imply that a ground short may
> damage the igniter, although Hondas are known as electronic
> ground safe vehicles, such that accidental grounding of circuits
> isn't likely to be harmful. Already, the ECU grounds terminal 4
> to produce a spark so why bother. Ground or not, the question
> still stands. Should grounding terminal 4 on a standard 4
> terminal igniter (ignition module) cause damage?
>
>
Just my guess - TeGGeR is right and the manual is not as right ;-)

TeGGeR has had a lot of input that he sorted through, so I doubt he missed
something so important. Manuals have been known to have glitches. There is
also the possibility the warning didn't apply to a short to ground, but to
other random places.

Mike

ECUguy wrote:
> I was looking thru teggar's igniter (ignition module) test and noticed
> a contradiction in reference on this line, "The igniter... will only switch
> off when grounded, but not when Terminal 4 is floating." is
> contradicting with the service manual.
>
> http://www.tegger.com/hondafaq/ignit...r-testing.html
>
> The 90 Prelude service manual (link below) says, "If the WHT wire
> [comparable to Terminal 4] is shorted the igniter may be damaged"
> needs some explanations why a short will damage the igniter.
>
> http://www.imagesharing.com/files/90...gniteryrit.gif
>
> Note that a 90 prelude igniter has three terminals and a ground.
> Coil/Battery/ECU and ground.
>
> The service manual seems to imply that a ground short may
> damage the igniter, although Hondas are known as electronic
> ground safe vehicles, such that accidental grounding of circuits
> isn't likely to be harmful. Already, the ECU grounds terminal 4
> to produce a spark so why bother. Ground or not, the question
> still stands. Should grounding terminal 4 on a standard 4
> terminal igniter (ignition module) cause damage?
>

not in my experience. i tested a civic igniter unit this way last
weekend and it worked fine. no damage that i could tell. don't know if
there's any difference between the prelude & civic igniters, but it
worked for me!

ECUguy wrote:
> I was looking thru teggar's igniter (ignition module) test and noticed
> a contradiction in reference on this line, "The igniter... will only switch
> off when grounded, but not when Terminal 4 is floating." is
> contradicting with the service manual.
>
> http://www.tegger.com/hondafaq/ignit...r-testing.html
>
> The 90 Prelude service manual (link below) says, "If the WHT wire
> [comparable to Terminal 4] is shorted the igniter may be damaged"
> needs some explanations why a short will damage the igniter.
>
> http://www.imagesharing.com/files/90...gniteryrit.gif
>
> Note that a 90 prelude igniter has three terminals and a ground.
> Coil/Battery/ECU and ground.
>
> The service manual seems to imply that a ground short may
> damage the igniter, although Hondas are known as electronic
> ground safe vehicles, such that accidental grounding of circuits
> isn't likely to be harmful. Already, the ECU grounds terminal 4
> to produce a spark so why bother. Ground or not, the question
> still stands. Should grounding terminal 4 on a standard 4
> terminal igniter (ignition module) cause damage?
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++=
The Civic ECM/ECM (computer) pulls the igniter down to within the
saturation voltage of a NPN power transistor. Less then .2V Not
theory measured with a good 'scope during operation. I have trouble
accepting that a short to ground would harm anything. This applies
to the 1990-1991 civics. I suspect that other Hondas would be very
similar.

Terry

"ECUguy" <ECUguy@none.com> wrote in
news:GUN7f.18837$6e1.6771@newssvr14.news.prodigy.c om:

> I was looking thru teggar's igniter (ignition module) test and noticed
> a contradiction in reference on this line, "The igniter... will only
> switch off when grounded, but not when Terminal 4 is floating." is
> contradicting with the service manual.
>
> http://www.tegger.com/hondafaq/ignit...r-testing.html
>
> The 90 Prelude service manual (link below) says, "If the WHT wire
> [comparable to Terminal 4] is shorted the igniter may be damaged"
> needs some explanations why a short will damage the igniter.
>
> http://www.imagesharing.com/files/90...gniteryrit.gif
>
> Note that a 90 prelude igniter has three terminals and a ground.
> Coil/Battery/ECU and ground.



The igniter on my test page has those connections as well.
I think all newer Honda igniters are basically the same.


>
> The service manual seems to imply that a ground short may
> damage the igniter, although Hondas are known as electronic
> ground safe vehicles, such that accidental grounding of circuits
> isn't likely to be harmful. Already, the ECU grounds terminal 4
> to produce a spark so why bother. Ground or not, the question
> still stands. Should grounding terminal 4 on a standard 4
> terminal igniter (ignition module) cause damage?
>
>
>



Whether that wire was actually a ground or whether it was
something else was a subject of considerable debate
in the Honda groups a while ago. The consensus ended up being
that it was much more than a ground, hence my diagram.

Adding fuel to the fire was a diagram I came across
from the Rover Group in Britain, which built Hondas for a while
under license. It too showed that wire as a ground.

The thread that discussed this can be found here, for those
who wish to peer-review:
<http://groups.google.com/group/rec.autos.makers.honda/browse_frm/thread/bd92f7b580f0123e/b9ac5523075dc869?lnk=st&q=group:rec.autos.makers.h onda+insubject:ignition+insubject:updates+insubjec t:to+insubject:the+insubject:unofficial+insubject: faq&rnum=1&hl=en#b9ac5523075dc869>

Since all that started, I received two private emails
from individuals wishing to test their igniters off the car.
I had not posted the test page at that point, so simply sent them my
raw photos and text. They were both able to perform the test
to determine that their igniters had indeed gone bad. One had a
hard-on failure (sorry, Viagra won't fix it), one a hard-off.
This leads me to believe that the diagrams and instructions
are correct as written, so I don't think I ought to change
the page.

I can only surmise that Honda simplified the white wire's
advertised function for the purposes of the manual.

--
TeGGeR®

The Unofficial Honda/Acura FAQ
www.tegger.com/hondafaq/