Car has no spark after running rough :S...

[JohnL]

The ignitors (aka ignition control modules) used in most Hondas tend to die after extended km, so it's not a surprise for one to fail in a higher km car.

They are also damaged by becoming excessively hot, which might be as a result of the engine overheating, but more likely as a result of excessive resistance in the high tension leads (i.e. spark plug wires). If you find a faulty ignitor then also check the HT lead resistance, because resistant old leads may cause the new ignitor to fail quickly (been there...)

The same thing might occur during an extended period of misfiring? When a plug fails to fire or the lead falls off (without the spark being able to jump to earth), then effectively the resistance on that HT circuit goes to infinity

[Chriskoss]

So JohnL your pretty confident its the ICM then?

Is it an expensive part to replace?

Thankyou so much for the detailed info

[bennjamin]

got a friend with the same car ?
Borrow their dizzy - try it and see if you get the same issue.

[Chriskoss]

unfortunately not.. ill see what the mechanics say

[beeza]

My mechanic didn't know shit!

A lot of old school mechanics just don't.

That's one of the main reasons most of us here try to fix everything ourselves.With patience and a willingness to learn this can be achieved.Fixing ya car is not a daunting task as I would believe.3 years ago I knew jack about cars,it wasn't until I got in there and got my hands dirty that I started to really learn (not just read).

[Chriskoss]

Yeh I explained it to him that its only the ignition and could be only ICM, dissy module, Coil and to replace whatever is needed. Getting it towed there on thursday so hopefully its all okay

The main thing is to tell them what you only need, i've been to a mechanic before who did all sorts of useless shit to the car without asking me and charged like 600 for a service

[JohnL]

So JohnL your pretty confident its the ICM then?

Is it an expensive part to replace?

Thankyou so much for the detailed info

"pretty confident" is overstating it. From your description of the symptoms it seems the most likely cause, but I'm not an auto electrician.

From vague memory the ignitor for my CB7 Accord cost $180 (or was that $120...?). But then I had to buy two in about two weeks because the auto electrician from whom I purchased the first replacement didn't think it was important to tell me that my old ignition leads were most probably what had caused the first failure, but then maybe he didn't know...

[Chriskoss]

Hahaha thats unlucky John,

I know its not my old leads as me stupidly braking the lead caused the car to stop and it was going fine before that so hopefully its not too expensive to fix!

[revjunkie]

its always ignitor module... place at wilston sells them for $100. i always replace my own ones.. easy as.

[Chriskoss]

Wish I knew how

[Bludger]

have you even opened it up to try?

[JohnL]

I know its not my old leads as me stupidly braking the lead caused the car to stop and it was going fine before that so hopefully its not too expensive to fix!

If all is well then breaking one lead shouldn't prevent the engine from running, it would just run on three cylinders (and roughly). If you were already running on three cylinders (at idle) then losing another may well stop the engine from idling at all (though on two cylinders it might still run extremely poorly above idle).

Losing a lead might concievably cause the ignitor to fail if it was already close to doing so (especially if the spark can't find an earth), and when they stop working it's like it was just switched off. The ignitor may well start working again after it's cooled down, which might be in one minute, 10 minutes, two hours, or tomorrow morning. However, in this case it will stop working when it gets hot again, and will soon fail completely.