Honda Car Forum

My 1990 Accord LX has been sitting undriven for about 2 and a half weeks with a for sale sign on it. A guy came today to look at it, he turned the key and it took a few seconds longer then usual for it to start up. So we went on a test drive and it drove perfectly fine,...then he turned on the heating/air condition full blast to test it out...within a 2 minutes of him doing that, the car cut off while backing it into the driveway. Now it will not start at all. It cranks up like it wants to start but will not start up. I just replaced the Main relay which every one on the internet says is the main cause for this problem...and it still will not start. I just charged the battery with some jumper cables, now the lheadlights and all lights indside are nice and bright but it still doesnt start. I noticed that when I turned the heating/air condition ON it would make my cd player cut off, almost like it was draining its power or something. Now that I charged the battery with jumper cables it doesnt seem to be doing that now. I had someone listen at the gas cap for the fuel injector sound and that sounds like it is coming on. So ...does anyone have any idea what is wrong? The guy was just about to buy it until the f''''ing thing cut out!

I put a new main relay in the other day and it's still not starting,...I just ordered a brand new distributor so I hope to god that is the problem. If I install it and it still won't start I am completely screwed because I am out of money now.

i just had mine do the samething. you gotta test if you have spark. tested the igniter and coil. mine tested out that the coil was bad. got it on ebay for $35 seattle_guy2001 is his member name.

ps.. of course assuming you have fuel going to the injectors.

I would definitely check for spark. Engines require fire and fuel. If both those are confirmed I would be supicious of a weakened battery. This seems most likely as the effect of the AC etc wearing it down.

It is most certainly either the coil or the igniter! Unless you ordered a distributor from Honda, don't bother swapping it out and DO NOT let your dist go back as a core.... Both the coil and igniter are in the dist and are both common failures with the coil being the most common. If you have no spark, get a real Honda coil first. Even if it's not the problem now, you will need it sooner than later. Only if the inside of the distributor cap looks "rusty" will you ever need to replace the whole unit. Good luck.