CRX help

I've run into a problem with my '91 CRX Si... need you'lls thoughts

the tach has started acting "funny"

crank the car and the tach will swing across the dial when you rev the motor and it will act somewhat normal when accelerating, but at idle or just trundling across a parking lot it drops to the peg and stays there ... 'til you rev or accelerate again then back to the peg

Jinx Jordan of Civic and CRX building and racing fame opined that it is the distributor going bad ... a common problem with CRX's (per him)

any one here have any thoughts (I tend to believe any thing Jinx says) before I go spent a couple of hundred $'s

thanks

In reply to wbjones:

It's definitely something in the distributor. If it's an original, the years may have gotten to it. Is it still running smoothly?

Whatever you do, DON'T use parts store replacement parts/remans for Honda distributors. You will be returning them under warranty ad infinitum.

Sometimes the plug on the back of the gauge cluster can shimmy loose and create problems. When that happens though, the needle will just flutter back and forth.

In your case, I would replace the distributor that was suggested already.

Ignitor (inside of the distributor...)

Sometimes you can just smash down the female blade connectors a bit so they engage the male blade of the ignitor; sometimes the ignitor is just shot.

GL

In reply to wbjones: Yes, it's the distributor. I've seen it a half dozen times. I'm not sure exactly what in the distributor, since I've always had a spare and just swapped them, but if you don't do something soon, the car is going to die on you while you are driving.

My suggestion would be to do whatever Jinx suggests.

Had something like that happen one of the many times my AE92's distributor was going out. The tach would drop to zero and I'd lose power, then it would kick back in. Last time my Samurai's distributor went out, the tach was wiggling around the day before, including leaping up for no reason like you describe.

no loss of power and the tach reads sorta ok when at speed... just at idle ...nadda...

even though sobe_death said not to use a parts store replacement I've already bought one before reading his post... (my bad ) but it does have a life time warranty... maybe wasted money and have to get one from Honda someday... we'll see... thanks for the advice all of ya...

Yes, it's the ignitor on the way out. Easy button solution is to get a Distributor King replacement distributor off of ebay. $150 or so for an all new dizzy.

I suppose a +1 at this point is extremely redundant, but yeah - distributor. Been there, done that, more than once. In fact I have a spare ignitor sitting right here in front of me from a bad distributor I took apart.

thanks guys.....

revisit of an old thread.... put in the new (reman) distributer and every thing was beautiful for ~a month... started it up for the first time since coming back from a track day and POW same problem zero rpm at idle ( or at low speed in higher gear.... < 30mph in 5th) but then > 1k rpm too high when at highway speed ( 70 - 80 mph)

just a bad reman...??? should I let loose the $'s for a new or just trade in the reman's until I get a good one..??

I know nothing about Hondas, so how difficult is it to swap a distributor?

pretty easy, big question does anyone think it worth the extra $'s to get the new...v another reman ?

sobe_death wrote: Whatever you do, DON'T use parts store replacement parts/remans for Honda distributors. You will be returning them under warranty ad infinitum.

I don't know squat about this subject, but this post seems on point.

Honda guys?

Yeah. At the very least, get one from Distributor King. A used, but functional OEM distributor will work equally well. The parts store chains are notorious for using crap ignitors in their distributors.

http://www.distributorking.com/

wbjones wrote: revisit of an old thread.... put in the new (reman) distributer and every thing was beautiful for ~a month... started it up for the first time since coming back from a track day and POW same problem zero rpm at idle ( or at low speed in higher gear.... < 30mph in 5th) but then > 1k rpm too high when at highway speed ( 70 - 80 mph) just a bad reman...??? should I let loose the $'s for a new or just trade in the reman's until I get a good one..??

Since you've already dropped coin on a reman, I'd keep swapping them since it's easy. Should have gotten a Distributor King new one though.

should have...... didn't know about them at the time

DILYSI Dave wrote: Yes, it's the ignitor on the way out. Easy button solution is to get a Distributor King replacement distributor off of ebay. $150 or so for an all new dizzy.

And the Rich-Porter Tech ones Distributor King sells seem to handle heat better than the OEM ones do.

hondaworkshop wrote:

DILYSI Dave wrote: Yes, it's the ignitor on the way out. Easy button solution is to get a Distributor King replacement distributor off of ebay. $150 or so for an all new dizzy.

And the Rich-Porter Tech ones Distributor King sells seem to handle heat better than the OEM ones do.

I had missed this from DILYSI Dave the first time around.... what I'll probably do is get one from Distributor King and get the free replacement from AZone and keep as a spare....

wish i'd noticed the Distributor King reference to start with...

That's cool, it has happened to alot of people. I went through 3 parts store alternators in as many months on my old CRX before finding out about Distributor King.