63vette
Full Member
- Make
- Honda
- Model
- CR-V
- Year
- 2001
- Miles
- 245K
- Engine
- 2.0L B20
I am adding a preface to this detailed description. Since cleaning the injectors and replacing one, P0302 & P0304 codes are nearly non-existent. Through this journey and especially at the point of servicing the injectors, the CR-V runs fine. The usual misfire issues of low power, running rough, poor idle, etc. are gone. If it wasn't for the check engine light coming on (and often flashing), you wouldn't know that there are any misfires. The P1399 code has me at the "end of my rope".
I have had this vehicle in my shop off and on for a few months. This CR-V has close to 250K miles and had not had much love in recent years. This is a 2.0L B20 engine & auto trans. Initially, it had misfire codes of P0302, P0304 & P1399 (a Honda specific random/multiple misfire code) and infrequently will set a P0300. As part of a maintenance service about 6+ months and 8K miles before the misfires started, I had replaced the plugs & wires. So I checked the plugs and checked resistance of the wires and they still seemed fine (just to be sure, I swapped 1 & 2 and 3 & 4 plugs to see if the single cylinder misfires changed cylinders). I pulled the cap and there was a good bit of corrosion inside the cap and the rotor was none too wonderful so I replaced them. No perceptible change. I pulled the plugs and did a compression test and all 4 cylinders were very close to each other at about 190#s. Because of the deep plug wells, I couldn't get my cylinder leak down tester to thread into the plug holes. At a later visit, I pulled the cam cover and checked the valve adjustment. Some were off slightly but not too bad. Again, still the same 3 misfire codes. I connected a vacuum gauge and the vacuum looked fine. I tried spraying some carb cleaner around the intake and such but the access was tight so that really didn't accomplish much. I checked the ignition timing and that was nearly dead on. I put an inline tester on the plugs and the spark was orange (maybe weak) so I replaced the coil. No change. Then I focused on the injectors. I listened to them with a stethoscope and measured resistances. I pulled all 4 and using a tester/cleaner, I cleaned and tested them. One of the o-rings on cylinder #2 was questionable and I couldn't find o-rings anywhere so I replaced that injector. After the cleaning, it ran even better and the 2 individual cylinder codes didn't come back but the P1399 came back right away. While out on a test drive monitoring misfires (my scan tool doesn't show me individual cylinder misfires dynamically for this like it does for most other makes, only total misfires) I found that while accelerating or maintaining a steady speed, the misfire counts increase with engine speed. BUT, I discovered when I would slow down by coasting, the misfire total stayed steady. I went through numerous cycles (that day and ever since) and it has consistently done the same thing.
So, the owner had had the head rebuilt/replaced years ago but he didn't know how many miles he had driven it since that work was done but he/we estimated that it had probably been a minimum of 80K miles - probably around 100K. So I figured that some slop in the timing belt might cause the cam timing to be off enough to cause misfires under load but when there's no load, the misfires cease. As much as I didn't want to go down that road, I installed a new timing belt kit with water pump (what a pain-in-the-ass that was). You guessed it, a test drive was the same as before., misfires under load, no misfiring on decel.
Since, I have tested the fuel pressure which seems OK. Statically, it starts at 45#s and settles back to 43#s. Dynamically, at idle it drops to about 39#s and when I raise the RPMs, it goes up to 43#s.
So far, the only part that I somewhat regret replacing is the coil. Everything else either clearly needed to be replaced or in the case of the timing belt, was likely due to be replaced anyway. I am leaning toward replacing the distributor - mainly for the ignitor/ignition control module. I just don't know if the ICM gets weak with age/use and could cause the persistent symptom of random misfires under even slight load but work adequately with no load...HELP!
Thanks in advance for those of you who have waded through my tale of woe.
I have had this vehicle in my shop off and on for a few months. This CR-V has close to 250K miles and had not had much love in recent years. This is a 2.0L B20 engine & auto trans. Initially, it had misfire codes of P0302, P0304 & P1399 (a Honda specific random/multiple misfire code) and infrequently will set a P0300. As part of a maintenance service about 6+ months and 8K miles before the misfires started, I had replaced the plugs & wires. So I checked the plugs and checked resistance of the wires and they still seemed fine (just to be sure, I swapped 1 & 2 and 3 & 4 plugs to see if the single cylinder misfires changed cylinders). I pulled the cap and there was a good bit of corrosion inside the cap and the rotor was none too wonderful so I replaced them. No perceptible change. I pulled the plugs and did a compression test and all 4 cylinders were very close to each other at about 190#s. Because of the deep plug wells, I couldn't get my cylinder leak down tester to thread into the plug holes. At a later visit, I pulled the cam cover and checked the valve adjustment. Some were off slightly but not too bad. Again, still the same 3 misfire codes. I connected a vacuum gauge and the vacuum looked fine. I tried spraying some carb cleaner around the intake and such but the access was tight so that really didn't accomplish much. I checked the ignition timing and that was nearly dead on. I put an inline tester on the plugs and the spark was orange (maybe weak) so I replaced the coil. No change. Then I focused on the injectors. I listened to them with a stethoscope and measured resistances. I pulled all 4 and using a tester/cleaner, I cleaned and tested them. One of the o-rings on cylinder #2 was questionable and I couldn't find o-rings anywhere so I replaced that injector. After the cleaning, it ran even better and the 2 individual cylinder codes didn't come back but the P1399 came back right away. While out on a test drive monitoring misfires (my scan tool doesn't show me individual cylinder misfires dynamically for this like it does for most other makes, only total misfires) I found that while accelerating or maintaining a steady speed, the misfire counts increase with engine speed. BUT, I discovered when I would slow down by coasting, the misfire total stayed steady. I went through numerous cycles (that day and ever since) and it has consistently done the same thing.
So, the owner had had the head rebuilt/replaced years ago but he didn't know how many miles he had driven it since that work was done but he/we estimated that it had probably been a minimum of 80K miles - probably around 100K. So I figured that some slop in the timing belt might cause the cam timing to be off enough to cause misfires under load but when there's no load, the misfires cease. As much as I didn't want to go down that road, I installed a new timing belt kit with water pump (what a pain-in-the-ass that was). You guessed it, a test drive was the same as before., misfires under load, no misfiring on decel.
Since, I have tested the fuel pressure which seems OK. Statically, it starts at 45#s and settles back to 43#s. Dynamically, at idle it drops to about 39#s and when I raise the RPMs, it goes up to 43#s.
So far, the only part that I somewhat regret replacing is the coil. Everything else either clearly needed to be replaced or in the case of the timing belt, was likely due to be replaced anyway. I am leaning toward replacing the distributor - mainly for the ignitor/ignition control module. I just don't know if the ICM gets weak with age/use and could cause the persistent symptom of random misfires under even slight load but work adequately with no load...HELP!
Thanks in advance for those of you who have waded through my tale of woe.
