1994 honda accord EX (manual transmission) with 189898 miles, bought a couple months ago.

This is the first manual trans. car I dorve.. I bought this one cause I wanted to learn how to drive manual car. Well, the car runs very well... except feew minor problems due to its age. Now, lets assume I am driving the car in 4th gear and due to some reason, I ahve to slow down suddenly and then start driving again.. of course, the car speed is lower then 4th gear range, so I should downshift, which I normally do. If I didnt downshift, the car struggles to run in 4th gear and will have a lot of jerks until the speed rises enuf to be in 4tgh gear range. A friend of mine, who has driven manual transmission cars says that this jerking and struggling indidcates that the engine is misfiring and spark plugs and leads will need to be replaced.

Can someone explain "misfiring" and give suggestion regarding this situation? Do I really need to change spark plugs and leads?

Thanks

 

if the car was misfire you would most likely have a cel. when your car runs below a certain speed in 4th you will get the bucking that you are describing and the engine will lug and eventually stall

 

So does it mean that it isnt a case of misfire and the spark plugs & leads are fine? what is "cel"?

 

cel - Check Engine Light

Take some time and go to "How stuff works" and look up manual transmissions, engines, etc. Each gear will only operate in a set range of speeds, and those correspond to certain RPMs. If you go below it, the engine will stall; above it, and you blow the engine. Most vehicles have rev limiters to avoid blowing the engine, but it is up to the driver to mind the lower limit.

 

OBD 1 would not kick the cel lite if engine misfires

 

sounds to me that it is working properly,, engine will buck and lacks power in you go at low speed and high gear

 

Yeah, the CEL never flashes... at least has not flashed until now. So can I conclude that it is my faulty driving and not the faulty spark plugs and leads ?

THanks

 

New spark plug are probably not a bad idea, unless you KNOW they're fairly new. Do the plug wires look bad? Start the car in complete darkness & look for arcing along the plug wires (dull blue glow). If you see any of that, get new wires.

It's easy for us to blame your novice technique, especially since we can't drive it ourselves (with our exceptional skill level[sm=gears.gif]). But it's possible that it IS misfiring. Like Desert says, your OBD-1 car doesn't have enough sensors to detect misfiring directly.

 

if you try to take off in first gear and don't rev the engine up to high enough RPM's it will buck just like you described and then stall (possibly) I'd imagine that if you're just starting to drive a manual you have had that happen (lord knows I did it a few times...) with that being said if the car does the same thing in the situation you are describing as it does when you don't give it enough gas to take off in first gear then that proves that it's a matter of driving/gearing/rpm's and nothing to do with misfiring, Hopefully that makes sense *L* basically if you're driving down the road and shift between 3k-4k rpms and everything feels fine then chances are it's more to do with your shift points and less to do with the engine possibly misfiring...

 

DH I could have sworn that the 94+ accords will flash a CEL when there is a misfire since code 15 indicates a failure on the ignition module output

unless these codes are wrong?

1 Primary Oxygen Sensor (HO2S).
3 Manifold Absolute Pressure Sensor (MAP).
4 Crankshaft Position Sensor (CKP).
6 Engine Coolant Temperature (ECT Sensor).
7 Throttle Position Sensor.
8 Top Dead Center Position Sensor (TDC).
9 No. 1 Cylinder Position Sensor (CYP).
10 Intake Air Temperature (IAT) Sensor.
13 Barometric Pressure (BARO) Sensor.
14 Idle Air Control (IAC) Valve.
15 Ignition Output Signal.
16 Fuel injector.
17 Vehicle Speed Sensor (VSS).
20 Electric load detector.
21 VTEC Solenoid Valve.
22 VTEC Pressure switch.
30 A/T FI signal A.
31 A/T FI signal B.
41 Oxygen sensor heater.
43 Fuel supply system.