Dual Carb periodically flooding

[EDCivic]

Our old ED is becoming a pig to start more often than not in recent months whether it's cold or hot ! The usual symptoms are that you can smell fuel even before you start it and need to keep the pedal to the floor and numerous crankings to get it going. It eventually coughs into life and after some black (fuel enriched) smoke it runs perfectly fine. Any help will be really great as apart from this it's still a good car in very good nick considering its age and k's.

[EDCivic]

Update... good old UPullit. Found a sorry looking 200k donor Civic and removed the carbs. Took around an hour to do being careful not tearing hoses and damaging wiring etc and $44 later it's home ready for the transplant.

[EDCivic]

It's fun writing to myself. Anyway I goofed by "that much" with these carbs. In all of the excitement in taking them out I was doing final prep work checking out vacuum lines etc and then realised that these carbs are from a manual i.e. the kick down carby cable from our Civic doesn't have a linkage to attach to !!!!!

Geezeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee

[SLOBRO]

lol thats effd

[EDCivic]

Now that I have your attention what model Keihin carby are these. I have found someone in Oz that sells service kits.....

http://www.ebay.com.au/itm/NEW-CARBURETTOR-KIT-KEIHIN-2-BARREL-DA76B-HONDA-CIVIC-1-5L-EC-CARBY-KIT-KN-450-/270973052693?pt=AU_Car_Parts_Accessories&hash=item3f1740a715

[SLOBRO]

man that's for 1974/78 civics so don think it would be the same

[EDCivic]

Your're right there just testing.....myself. Can you get kits for these ?

[SLOBRO]

not sure ask shops that specialise in carby stuff :D

[EDCivic]

Ok, note to self (and anyone willing to help)...removed carbies and

1./ cleaned and replaced needle, seat and floats from donor carb
2./ replaced diaphrams that looked better than original carbies

Surprisingly our carbies that have done 366k's were cleaner inside than the donor carbs that had done 200k's, but after replacing them it made no friggen difference so now I suspect it must be solenoid related but which one ? Something new now is that if the car sits on idle for a few minutes you can smell fuel from inside the car, BUT it idles ok ????
In the mean time I'll keep looking for that elusive dual carb from an AUTOMATIC

H E L P !

[willskiez]

umm not sure if this is right but just going off the info, it might have something to do with the fuel pump or the fuel cut off solenoid. i would check both and also change the fuel filter just in case theres a blockage. i'd also double check the level of fuel in the carbs when the car is idling and tighten the fuel mixture screw if its still running rich..
229702297122972

[EDCivic]

Willskiez.... had good times with our Civic after "fiddling and playing" but 10 months down the track the old Civic is showing the previous signs of flooding after the ignition is turned off. You mentioned the (mechanical) fuel pump could a cause ??? Any help would be very much appreciated !

[EDCivic]

Ok am having a gut full of the way our little Civic is misbehaving with its carbs. I've researched this to the nth degree and surprised at the few articles I have found that remotely talk about the fix with this issue we have i.e. wt....they made tens of thousands of these Civics. ECU-Man has posted some good info but I need more (from him ???). To summarise I have done the following....

1. Stripped a donor carb (though from a manual) and replaced the solenoids and any suss diaphragms, floats, needles and seats.

These mods have "seemed" to have eased the issue where it now may occur once or twice a week as compare to almost eve
ry day. So after further research I found another article from ECU-Man that mentioned how the ECU managed the carburettor (pistons and solenoids) so fortunately I found another poor old donor Civic identical to ours with slightly less K's and ....

2. Replaced the ECU.

This has done zip as the poor old Civic displayed the same flooding issues at start up later that day.....dang !

So all that I have now is the complete set of carbs from the donor to swap with. If this fails and apart from putting it down, then I'm out of ideas. Honestly apart from this it's in very good condition for its age and I would love to keep it going.

Cheers
Ron

[Drifter995]

Oooh, you found a carby service kit for my exact civic's engine. Yoink

[EDCivic]

Glad to help ! So what about me ;-)

[Drifter995]

So tell me, it floods when it's not being driven?

If so, check the solenoid if you haven't already. Maybe check the mech that the pedal moves on the carby.
Check the foot pedal, make sure it's not getting caught when you park or something, keeping it on.
Make sure power to the solenoid isn't staying on or something, keeping it flowing a bit.

Also, give us a description of what it's doing, if you can. Like, if it's doing it when you try to start it, or when you leave it, etc. If it's doing it when you start it, you're probably pumping it too much, or the choke isn't operating properly, or something?

[EDCivic]

The usual symptoms are that you can smell fuel even before you start it and need to keep the pedal to the floor and numerous crankings to get it going. It eventually coughs into life and after some black (fuel enriched) smoke it runs perfectly fine. It must be a solenoid as if it were a vacuum line or diaphragm it would be gradually getting worse which it isn't. We have the car for about 13 years so I know it's peculiarities fairly well. I'd imagine the total swap out will be the clincher ???

[Drifter995]

Yeah, solenoid sounds about right.
Get a spare one that's the same, then take it to a carby place to get rebuilt if you want a decent one. if you haven't already rebuilt this one mostly

[shake]

Check the choke opener, right hand side of inlet manifold. Black, three retaining Phillips head screws, two vac lines. It opens and closes the choke. It contains a diaphragm which is prone to getting holes in it and a spring.

[RackCity]

i thought that was normal with these twin carbs at this age, mine turns on straight away on cold but on warm i have to turn it on at WOT. Plus my car always smells heavy of fuel but im still getting decent mileage, 450km a tank.

[EDCivic]

...well almost. Ours usually starts with no issue, but when you walk in the garage the odd morning and smell what is like 10 gallons of petrol on the floor you know you are going to have a challenging "start" to the day. I'll suss out Shake's reply, but with what I have changed over the last 12 months, I'd better start a new base line and after checking the choke opener I'll swap out the carbies.

Update #1 for Shake...did find a few perforations in the diaphragm so dabbed a drop of super glue on them. Time will tell.....

Update #2 .....afraid that the issue is still there. Time for the transplant

[EDCivic]

Update #3 Transplant in place. Not using anti-rejection drugs as it has come from the same build year, month and gearbox ! Let's see what happens.

[EDCivic]

Very early days but so far so good.....

[EDCivic]

What a croc of sh*t !!!!!!!!! 2 days after transplant and the signs of rejection have begun. Same issue..pull up turn of engine, get out of car, strong smell of fuel, go to start car, crank, crank, crank, crank, cough cough, black smoke fires up. There isn't much left to replace other than the car ! What is going on...

1./ Total carby swap
2./ Total ECU swap
3./ Total magic vacuum box swap.
4./ New fuel filter

All that is left are the air cleaner and vacuum lines, but even then I'd be surprised as its not consistent. The only other ongoing issue I have is the "electronic air control valve" or EACV which is disconnected as it makes a weird fast drumming sound in the carby when connected, especially under acceleration (note it never did this before until the flooding issues became more frequent). I was advised by a Honda mechanic that there is no drama if this is disconnected. The ECU picks this up as it flashes 14 times but that is the only error code but hey perhaps it is the culprit. HELP :confused:

[Drifter995]

Go for it... It could work.

[shake]

Silly question, but your mechanical fuel pump isnt leaking is it? Where is the strong smell of fuel coming from when you pull up?

[EDCivic]

Not a silly question as it can be quite strong, but when viewed from the top of the carbies you can't see any spilled fuel from in and around them including the fuel pump. I'm imagining that it's coming from the carby throats as it flows into the intake manifold ??? I've replaced so much that I would have thought that replacing the entire carburettor/s would have clinched it for sure.

[shake]

I only mentioned this as when i first had my ed the fuel pump failed and started leaking under the car.

[chargeR]

No insight to add, but keep at it! I'll be following this thread. I had a serious misfire issue with my EF2, but rather than try to diagnose and fix it I just swapped the whole carb setup from a known running car :).

[EDCivic]

I won't give up as it is a great car and still in great nick AND still very economical to run e.g. 35 to 37 mpg on every tank full which still frustrates me to think that if the carby was that stuffed with leaky vacuum hoses and worn pistons and needles it would surely run like shite all the time ??? I did similar to chargeR but unfortunately I didn't know the state of the car when it was left at the wreckers but judging by service stickers etc it did appear to be mechanically looked after and the issue that I have is to coincidental to happen with 2 separate carbs.

[salman_m5]

i'll post a picture tonight of how to fix...helped me atleast..no flooding now

[EDCivic]

Kool...as long as it doesn't involve a match LOL

[EDCivic]

All good today.....no issues at all but there will always be a tomorrow !

[shake]

So what was the solution?

[EDCivic]

Still waiting from salman_m5 for his fix, but as I said before, it's periodic (and dam frustrating)...today it started repeatedly like a bought one !

[EDCivic]

Still waiting from salman_m5 for his fix, but as I said before, it's periodic (and dam frustrating)...today it started repeatedly like a bought one !

Salman_m5 where are you ? On a side note it ran without issue for 5 days and only played up once (yesterday).

Update 4/10/13...car played up bad yesterday. Researched the charcoal canister and it can cause flooding so in desperation I swapped it out with another one :-(

[salman_m5]

very sorry for being late,
well the thing is I have a eg hatch dual carb, in the morning it would puff black smoke for like 5-7min and would sound like farting and misfire :P
the carb was getting flooded over night or if parked for like more than 6 hours..got it to some carb specialist who does Holley carbs :P, honest guy told me that i'd need to replace the choke and would be looking at $800-1000 mark.

what I did was I positioned one of the choke at off position and tied a cable tie with it. next morning woke up, turned the ignition key and started without any coughin or black smoke. the rpm would be low for the first 4-5 seconds then it gradually rises bcoz of the cold temp of the engine...

only sometime in winter (early cold mornings) I have to pump the pedal twice and then start it...there it goes...the fuel avg has increased..coz the flooding fuel is not being wasted any more...
I did clean my carbs this sunday with nulon foaming carb cleaner..the result is great..better acceleration..i don't have any issues with idling coz m running 98 all the time..i think that's the reason pretty much...

plz have a look at the attached pics

[salman_m5]

pics not uploading :S

[salman_m5]

still not uploading :S

[salman_m5]

any update??

[EDCivic]

it started to play up over 2 days since my last post, but then came good again and has continued behaving. Tell you what it is really driving me around the bend !

Cheers
Ron

[salman_m5]

did u try that fix I sent you??

[EDCivic]

not yet salman_m5 as the carby has been performing like a new one for the last 3 or so weeks so as the old saying goes best let sleeping dogs lie before I use your fix.