Strange engine problem

[integraleo]

right i will try to explain this as best i can.My car has been having strange episodes,usually after a spirited drive.
what happens is all of a sudden the power level drops massively like it can barely run ( fuel starvation maybe) and the car struggles and the sound changes to a really low noise and if u push the throttle down it sounds positively horrid.once it happened after going over some mud in the road and i thought some had blocked the air filter (currently running an AEM V2) so just knocked it into neutral for a while then engaged another gear and it was fine.car had oil and filter change the other day (gulf ester based 0-30 and hamp filter) and today i fitted a brand new AEM replacement filter to see if that was it,went for a drive and the car pulls strong and revs freely...half an hour of spirited driving then all of a sudden it done it again.20 seconds later all is well,so confused!
Now this doesn't happen very often,ive had the car since June and its done it about 4 times in total since then.today when it happened i had almost full tank of BP ultimate which is what i usually use but it has happened when i used to run the 99 ron tesco fuel too.
No warning lights on the dash and i consistently get 300 miles to a tankfull and only mods to the car are the V2 induction kit and trust back box.
Any ideas anyone?

 

[mikegsi]

What's your mileage mate?

 

[integraleo]

just clocked 85000 miles,have bimta milage verified so im pretty sure its accurate,have reciept from honda from about 12 months ago when valve clearances were checked too

 

[mikegsi]

Have you had yor fuel filter checked/changed at 70k??

Might not be the cause but god to eliminate it? There's sometimes an issue with the pump coming off the filter brackets and floating in the tank, causes starvation as its sucking in air instead of fuel.


Other obvious thing is check your oil, renowned for starvation, and if you suffered after a 'spirited' drive its just something else to eliminate as a possible cause

 

[integraleo]

have reciept for new fuel filter fitted at honda dated about 3 years ago,had oil change on wednesday this week with top quality ester based fully synthetic oil and hamp filter,checked weekly always and never been lower than half way between min and max (my 5th type r in 8 years so used to doing this) to be honest some times ive thought about changing fuel filter just to eliminate the possibility.sometimes have had a few occasions in normal everyday driving when ive had minor power lose for short period of time,the feeling when your using about 10% throttle then try and increase it to about 20-30% throttle and it bogs down a bit

 

[mikegsi]

Might be worth just checking the pump is still attached to its brackets, just to rule it out. Mine was poorly for 4 months before I found that to be the cause

 

[integraleo]

thanks mikegsi,will get it checked out and maybe get new filter as well,at least that way it rules it out.last i heard it was about £40 i think for a filter.with christmas and one sons birthday on the 17th of dec and the other sons birthday on the 28th of dec might have to wait til after christmas now tho

 

[mikegsi]

Might not be the cause mate, especially if it's been changed so recently. Worth a look first rather than buying the filter hough

 

[danny100]

Hi Leo??, i think it may be the coil packs....?? but do not buy 2nd hand!!

 

[C&S Evo7]

coilpack failure is pretty rare tbh. i would suggest getting someone with a code reader to read the obd error codes, while the blink method works ok if you have a light on, it doesnt always show some of them

 

[integraleo]

just an update to this,ive now had new fuel filter fitted just to rule that out and its still happening.seems to happen after the car has been running for a while.happened today as i was on a trip out the back roads,been driving for about 30 miles with no vtec whatsoever just cruising and it bogged down really bad,even made drivers seat vibrate quite bad as soon as i used more than about 10% throttle.was so worried just knocked it out of gear and then slowly put it into 4th with like 5% throttle.about a minute later tried more throttle and it was fine again.is that a common coil pack failure on its way or something more dire do u think with the bad vibration through the car?

 

[civicjordan281]

when was the last time the plugs where changed?? i just changed mine after i had a misfire/hesitation in vtec i think the plugs are ment to be changed at 70k,so could be worth a go to rule another thing out.

 

[integraleo]

got reciept for new plugs that were fitted within the last 2 years and milage is about 12,000 on these plugs and they are the correct ones and iridiums too.because the problem comes and goes at random (yesterday was first time it happened in about 3 weeks) and the fact i never get a warning light im wondering if it could be blocked cat?

 

[PeteMTBer]

I had similar problem on my old Civic EK4 VTi. Turned out to be one of the dizzy rotor arms had started to corrode.

 

[integraleo]

just an update on this,before a diagnostic i thought i would pull the plugs to check them just for piece of mind.like i said before i had reciept for new plugs when bought the car but anyway they were f***ed.they had brown heat rings around the base of the plug and the plug gap was wayyy too big.ordered new set and seams to be running fine now.its been about 10 days since fitting new plugs and no bogging down issues as yet.im gonna pull them out and check them in couple weeks to make sure all is ok.
After reading up on plug gaps it seems if the gap is too big the spark can effectively be blown out which would have meant car was only running on 3 cylinders hence the bogging down and the randomness of when it happened.i will keep u posted if i have any more problems

 

[Coldfuse]

sounds like a soloution :xyes: