I have a 98 Honda Accord ex 5 speed. It started leaking oil really bad after I put it in the ditch last winter... Don't ask. Anyways it turns out it was the crankshaft or camshaft seal I ended up replacing both of them and the oil pan gasket but while I was in there I also did the water pump and timing belts balance shaft belt valve cover gasket. Anyways first time doing a timing belt. After I got it back together I started up and it sounded probably a little better than it did before I did all these repairs. Only thing is when you press on the throttle it's like the vehicle has a governor on it. It revs up and then cuts out and revs up and cuts out over and over repetitively. I took it apart and put it back together and timed it a couple more times I think three or four times total and every time I get the same result. The last time I did the timing on it I had watched a video where somebody was talking about how the oil pump and balance shaft are on the same pulley... Something about there's three revolutions to everyone revolution on the crankshaft. So apparently there is a bolt on the back of the motor that you take out and you insert a screwdriver or something in it and when you get it to clip into place that's where you need to set your timing mark at is on that revolution anyways I did that and got the same results yet again... I hope somebody out there has had a similar problem and was able to figure it out who reads this because I'm at a loss and I really would hate to describe the car. It's a good little car and runs like a top aside from this little issue. Someone please help!

 

First, I see a couple sketchy bits in your discussion, so please bear with me because I don't like to take anything for granted.

1. On Honda F-series engines (like your F23) the oil pump is concentric with the crank shaft, not one of the balance shafts.
2. The balance shafts spin at twice the crankshaft speed, not 3x. But the rear one spins the opposite direction and it has a little gearset to drive it. That gear ratio means the sprocket doesn't spin the same speed or direction as the shaft.

Can you tell us specifically what videos you watched for the belt-install procedure? I'm curious whether they glossed over anything that might be important.

 

Here's the timing belt install procedure from the shop manual. How does this compare with the instructions that you followed?

 

Jim-thank you for responding to my post. I looked for a second for the video and I could not locate it. The notes that you gave me I read through the first little part of it and I can tell you that it has a lot more detail and a lot more information in it than the chiltons did that I was using. I didn't get a chance to read all of it yet but I can tell by reading the first few notes there that it is the exact proper procedure for installing the timing belt. The chiltons was very vague and had very little description of what it was telling me to do. Thank you for the information and if you have any other tips or pointers or info on it let me know. I'm going to start wrenching on it tonight and finish tomorrow morning hopefully with it running properly. I'll let you know how it goes. Again thank you.

Kiel from mn

 

The "official" shop manual is published by Helm and it IS amazing compared to Chilton (in details, pages, and price). You might want to find one somewhere, especially if you're going to do more wrenching on the car. I sold mine sometime after I sold the car.

 

Hey jim, sorry for the delay in reply. Just got out of treatment. I'm going to dig into the Honda tomorrow. I tried to finding the helm edition of the service manual and I couldn't even find one on eBay or anything which surprised me. Do you know where I'd find one of these manuals? Thank you for your replies and your help with the issue. I'm really hoping the timing notes you gave me are going to fix the issue tomorrow. I'll keep you updated.