hesitation under acceleration

So recently my teg has been sort of hesitating under acceleration, like it sort of just coughs for a second then it keeps going. This seems to happen more when

  1. I have extra people (weight) in the car

  2. Under high loads, for example accelerating hard from low rpm in 4th or 5th or going up a hill in 4th or 5th

  3. I’ve been driving around for a while

To a much lesser degree, it will also backfire occasionally under hard acceleration, though this is much less pronounced than the hesitation. I had problems with the fuel system towards the end of last summer and as a result of leaving for school the teg sat until winter break when I got it running and inspected again. At that point I replaced the MFR, fuel filter, and plugs. The distributor has a sticker indicating that it was manufactured in 2006 so it seems relatively new but who knows, still sounds like ignition or timing to me. Any thoughts?

is the car puffing black smoke under accelaration? If so, you are running rich and might want to check your timing

Well, mystery solved I guess. The car died right as I was pulling into my driveway yesterday. Its not getting spark so I’m thinking its the distributor. Any other thoughts?

When my distributor was pooping out the car would cut out under high load situations too. Got to cutting out pretty consistently one day, and then the car died at a traffic light the next.
Autozone and similar distributors seem to have short lifespans, these guys offer a lifetime warranty on theirs:
http://stores.shop.ebay.com/DISTRIBUTOR-KING__W0QQ_sidZ42323083?_nkw=integra&submit=Search

Try swapping for a known good set of spark plug wires first.

If that doesn’t work, try replacing your ignition coil.

I’ve had those same adverse effects with both bad plug wires and faulty ignition coil. And they aren’t too expensive or difficult to replace :slight_smile:

It never hurts to open up your distributor by removing the cap and take a look around. I was having weird inconsistent hesitation and stumbling and turns out my distributor rotor was breaking off!

Well I pulled the distributor the other day and the cap and rotor appear to be fine. So I suppose step one is going to be plug wires and ignition coil.

Ok, so I replaced the ignition coil yesterday and lo and behold still no spark. Took the coil back to Autozone today, got another one and still nothing. Tested input voltage to the ICM as per the instructions in this article http://www.team-integra.net/sections/articles/showarticle.asp?ArticleID=1115 . Now, I’m getting 12 volts on the black/yellow wire but nothing on the blue, either at the spade connector to the ICM or at the plug to the distributor. What does this mean??

That’s the ignitor isn’t it? I believe that’s a pricey little component. Do you have a copy of the Helms manual?

I had the same drama in the last week. The engine was hesitating at first, like it would miss a beat every now and then. The other night, it freakin’ sounded like 3 out of 4 cylinders were firing intermittently, to the point where the engine sounds like it’s sputtering but not quite dying. So I replaced the fuel filter (suggestion of a friend of mine)… of course that wasn’t it, but hey, I have a new filter. Then I replaced the ICM, cars runs freakin great now, the old purr is back. Just because I was already in there, I changed out the coil too, and now it’s ready again for my daily abuse. Premium (close-to-oem) coil is $89, and premium ICM is $109, not bad, both made in Japan. Cap and rotor are only months old and I cleaned the contacts with my trusty dremel brush just to be sure. Note: I have a TD-44 distributor on a JDM-ITR, when I pulled the old rotor off, it just sorta slips on with no set-screw. If you guys can’t find the rotor screw, just pop it off. Can’t wait to drive it tomorrow!

just save yourself the time, and return ANYTHING electrical back to autozone. i’m not saying that some things don’t work, but they have a really bad rep for cheap parts (as in quality). i’ve had to repair so many different cars due to them buying cheap relays, or cheap switch boxes, etc. autozone is useful for things but this is electrical stuff.

get yourself a known good working distributor, and go from there.

Well I did ultimately solve it with the ICM. I know Autozone parts are shit, I’m just kinda to the point with this car where I really don’t care any more, nor do I really have the money to spend on OEM quality parts. I’m a broke college student.

I do love to hate on Autozone though. My friend and I were trying to get a bleeder screw out of a BMW E30 caliper one time and sheared it off, then broke off an easy out in the screw (so much for drilling it out). Ultimately we tried using a dye grinder and f*cked the whole thing up. So we took it to Autozone, laid it on the counter with the gaping hole facing down, and still got our core charge. No one even bothered to look.

[QUOTE=Moose;2034990]Well I did ultimately solve it with the ICM. I know Autozone parts are shit, I’m just kinda to the point with this car where I really don’t care any more, nor do I really have the money to spend on OEM quality parts. I’m a broke college student.

I do love to hate on Autozone though. My friend and I were trying to get a bleeder screw out of a BMW E30 caliper one time and sheared it off, then broke off an easy out in the screw (so much for drilling it out). Ultimately we tried using a dye grinder and f*cked the whole thing up. So we took it to Autozone, laid it on the counter with the gaping hole facing down, and still got our core charge. No one even bothered to look.[/QUOTE]

ICM’s go bad? only time i’ve had to mess with one is when someone didn’t connect it properly or a wire got messed up. glad to hear u fixed ur issue tho.

Well apparently it’s not quite fixed. The past few days the CEL keeps coming on and the car goes into limp mode. If I turn it off and turn it back on again the CEL goes away and the car is drivable again. Its doing this almost exclusively when I’m accelerating away from a stop, however if I give it about 2500-3k rpm and slip the clutch a lot (ouch) it’s fine. It’s also somewhat inconsistent. Sometimes it will do it several times in a row and other times I’ll drive 20 miles without any problems. The idle also gets erratic before this happens, like it just kinda hiccups a bit.

The ECU is throwing a code 15, ignition output. Do I have a bad ICM again?