my coworker is having problems with his prelude, and i just wanna get some input from u guys... car is a 95 prelude with 180K on the motor... timing belt job (including water pump) has not been done


symptoms:
1. car would not start. Temp gauge shows normal temp, but my coworker said it felt hotter than usual when he popped the hood. He let it cool down for 10 mins (the fan was running btw and he waited till the fan to stop) and it started back up

2. at idle, while waiting for the traffic light, car almost stalled.


My diagnosis:
1. Bad temp sensor, thus temp reading not precise. Not sure abt why the car won't start up tho

2. fuel pump on its way out?

Any ideas?

 

the gauge for the temp sensor gauge and the ECT for the ecu are seperate. If the car wouldnt start how is the sensor reading normal temp? or do you mean after it wouldnt start.

 

^^i meant the temp shown before he shut off the motor... and it never overheats during normal operations either (according to the gauge anyways)

 

What happened when it stopped starting? Was it running, and then shut off...only to not start again? Was it running oddly?

 

well, from his story, it goes like this... he went to the post office, and the car was fine... came out, tried to start the car up, and nothing.. it cranks tho... also, he noticed the cooling fan was on, so he waited for 10 mins till the fan stopped. Started the car again, and it worked... car was bogging down, so he stepped on gas to up the rpm and everything was normal again.... something clogged?

 

reformat ftw

 

:slap: be serious here.... trying to impress my senior who's having the problem h:

 

Was the CEL on? Does it continue to start up rough? Does it run normally after starting, no sluggishness?

 

CEL has always been on cos he swapped in a new motor last year and they forgot to fix the CEL thingy...

after the car started up, it was sluggish, and there was power loss...

HOWEVER, when he started up the car from a cold start, it was running fine... but after some driving, it became sluggish again

 

Fuel pump, fuel filter, cam timing. It's possible that the timing belt jumped teeth on the cam gears...that would cause the motor to run rough and sound like it was misfiring, and be sluggish.