Hi all,

My girlfriend's Honda Civic (1993 EX model) died within 3 blocks of her workplace the other day. Not being able to troubleshoot the problem in 5 deg weather, I towed it to my house to have a closer look.

The car turns over just fine... the engine is not seized, the starter works fine (therefore it's clear I'm not faced with an alternator/battery problem).

Next was fuel. I popped off the line leading to the fuel rail from the fuel filter. As soon as the car was turned to ON, gas pumped out of that like a fountain. That eliminated a frozen line/faulty pump.

I just stuck an inductive timing light on all spark plug wires and got NOTHING. Now I'm down to the coil or the igniter. Can somebody tell me the next troubleshooting approach to use here? Unfortunately, I don't have a service manual on hand...

Thanks!

If you have a multimeter, check the conductivity of both the primary wiring and the high voltage wiring. If either is open, or the 2 are connected except through ground, the coil is bad.

So what is an igniter? I have never seen the term except here on Honda questions. Do you mean the spark plugs, the ignition module? The coil should be getting pulses of 12 volts from what ever feeds it.

To be all out honest with you, I don't know the purpose of the igniter outside of the fact that IT is the device delivering the required signals to the coil. Without a service manual, I haven't even been able to locate this thing.

However, I'll have a closer look at the coil and do as you suggest; I do have a multimeter.

So, is it possible that a coil can give out just like that? With no warning whatsoever?

Thanks for your response.

-C

Sometimes a coil will go thrugh not working when too hot before failing completely, but yes, if a wire burns through inside, it quits then and there.