Honda Accord Question

B

Boozehound

250+ Posts
My wife's 98 Accord LX (4cyl) is hesitating upon putting it into gear and "stumbling." It's doubtful it's either the plugs or wires, but I'm thinking it could be the fuel filter (car has 116K on it). I dont have a shop manual for her car (one of these days Id like to find it on CD), so I was hoping some of you Honda afficianados (Accuratehorn and others) could point me toward the fuel filter and check me on my "diagnosis." Thanks.
 
I dont think it's the tranny - it doesn't slip gears at all, and the problem occurs mainly in 1st, 2nd, R, and occasionally neutral. It seems pretty dependent on engine load, for example, if you have the wheels cut and you're just idling forward, it starts dropping the RPM and acts like it's going to stall - if you straighten the wheels out, it lessens. Along those same lines, it gets worse when you have the AC on, and if you give it juice, the issue seems to go away pretty quick.

I'm not so sure of my fuel filter diagnosis of earlier - it doesn't have problems when you put the engine under heavy demand going down the road, or in neutral or park - this mainly seems to happen in 1st and R when you're just idling forward, or lightly applying the gas.
 
I may have the answer? This happened to me with a 1995 Accord. Supposedly there is a screen in or near the EGR valve that clogs with carbon. All it needs is a cleaning.

The Check Engine Light was throwing a code for an electrical problem, but it was the screen. After the cleaning, no codes and running fine.
 
Any of the maintenance items could cause this. The EGR system can cause a stumble, but usually you will have the check engine light on with a code that can be read-is check engine light on?
If not, it is most likely distributor cap and rotor (get genuine Honda, lasts at least 60k, aftermarket lasts 30k if you are lucky) or plug wires (genuine Honda or NGK only-many cheap aftermarket brands that you will be lucky to get 30k out of-throw away the Bosch wires you just bought and go buy the genuine Honda set which will last about 120k). Then there is valve adjustment, fuel filter, or fuel injector cleaning service, which probably are not the cause of the symptoms, but slight possibility they could be if you never do 30k services.
 
Thanks guys. Am I correct (I hope I'm wrong) in assuming that the fuel filter is in the tank along with the pump, and there's not an inline filter?
 
Sounds very much like you need to replace your spark plug wires. Accuratehorn covers all the other bases. I have had this happen on two cars that I took up past 100,000 miles where I thought initially I might be having some transmission problems. In both cases a new set of wires did the trick.

What basically happens is the heat, vibration, and wear on the wires causes little cracks inside the wires which will cause the spark to miss. At higher RPMs the missing isn't noticable. It courld be the fuel filter or EGR valve as accuratehorn mentioned.

with 116K on it tossing on a new set of wires is a very cheap option to see if it clears up your problem. I thought my wifes caddilac was having tranny problems and the wires were the fix. Though on her STS they were a complete ***** to change out.

good luck.
 
I suppose it's possible it could be the plugwires, but I just replaced those things ~15-20K miles ago. It made a world of difference at the time, I just can't imagine they went bad so quickly.
 
look at the wires and see if there is any place that they may have a "wear point" with the engine. Or have come out of the little plastic routing pieces that might cause undue wear.

I might pull the ends and pull the plugs. If you have a plug with more residue on it than the others it may be a sign of incomplete detonation due to lack of spark.

take it to accurate horn he is both fair and honest and that's his business.
 
Call Robert Ramlal at Upland Honda Pros 713-468-0870. I guarantee he knows the answer. Tell him you were referred by Pat Ennis.

He took care of my Accord all the way up to 232k miles. It was still running like a top when I sold it. His prices are very reasonable.

Bernard
 
I definitely have some things to check this weekend...

I'm all about honest mechanics (they can be hard to locate sometimes), but I'm a big fan of shade-treeing as much as I possibly can. Her car's not as complicated as others, I dont mind the work, and I'm all about learning while I do it too. If I can't figure it out or fix it, then I'll usually take it in, but by and large I'm going to give it my best shot(s) first.
 
There's nothing wrong with shade-treeing, but if you've gone 116k miles without changing the fuel filter, you aren't shade-treeing the right way.

Whatever the problem ends up being, I bet it's something that wouldn't have occured if you would have followed the regular maintenance shedule.

Call my guy before you start replacing things. He's the kind of guy who would be happy to diagnose you problem over the phone and let you do the work yourself.

He's also the kind of guy who will save you money whenever he can. Example: Honda recommends replacing the water pump every time you change the timing belt. They do this because it's a lot less expensive to replace the Honda water pump when you are already working on the timing belt. When I was having my timing belt replaced, he put his ear close to the water pump and said it sounded fine. No reason to replace it now. Wait 60k miles and replace it with the next timing belt.

Good luck.

Bernard
 
Meh - leaving the fuel filter in place too long does very little in the way of long term damage to the car. Basically you'd just starve the engine for fuel and at the worst burn up the fuel pump. That doesn't matter too much either, especially if you have an in-tank filter. If I'm pulling all that ****, it's getting replaced at the same time. I'd apply that same logic to the water pump too - it's a real ***** to get the timing belt off, so while you're in there, I'd rather fork over the additional $ for a new water pump than to have to do it all over again when it goes out. Replace a difficult timing belt sometime and tell me it's worth taking all apart again in 15K miles just to replace the water pump.

I'm for preventative maintenance, but something like taking down the fuel tank just to preventatively replace the filter is a little much for me. All of this goes on top of the fact that my wife got the car with 75K on it (so who knows how it was maintained before that), and since then, it's gotten what it needed.
 
re: fuel filter-yes there is no in-line filter on the 98 Accord LX, just the "fuel strainer" in the tank. The only way to tell if it is clogged is to test the fuel pressure with a screw-in fuel pressure gauge. There is a plug on the main fuel rail for this.
Or you can just replace it, but it is in the tank. There is an access hole somewhere to get at it-either in the trunk, or under the back seat.
Sometimes they get pretty clogged up, and sometimes even though it is old, it will still be pretty clean-depends on the cleanliness of the gas you got over the years.
 
You still need to start with the cap, rotor and plug wires-what brand did you buy and how old are each of them? If you bought plug wires at Autozone, they might very well be bad after 20k.
 
Yeah, I'm definitely going to start with the ignition stuff. I'm not going after anything in-tank unless I have to. The plugs and wires have ~16K on them, with bosch plat plugs and bosch wires. I think it's time for a new rotor and cap, and if that doesn't do it, maybe new wires if they look bad.
 
Beware of that god damn Philips screw in the rotor. I bet you strip it before you get it out! If you do get it out, put some blue Locktite on the new one or it will back it's self out.
 
Sorry to say this, but Bosch wires on Hondas suck. Most likely source of the problem after cap and rotor. ONLY use NGK wires, or OE wires, and forget about them for 100,000 miles. You probably threw away much better wires than what you have on there now. And get Honda cap and rotor only. While I'm at it, use NGK or Denso nonplatinum plugs.
 
Meh - you're not offending me by bashing bosch. I've had decent luck with them on my other vehicles, but I didn't go out of my way to pay another $30 for wires when I was at Autozone when I did the last tune-up.

We'll find out shortly what the issue is...
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Weekly Prediction Contest

* Predict HORNS-AGGIES *
Sat, Nov 30 • 6:30 PM on ABC

Recent Threads

Prediction Results Threads

2024 Schedules

Back
Top