I have a 95 civic DX 1.5L SOHC, and today I decided to replace the distributor cap and rotor. Even though I'd never done it before, it seemed like a pretty straight forward repair. Bought this cap and rotor from Autozone.

Got back home and the repair seemed pretty straight forward. Cap came off no problem, took a couple tries to get the rotor screw to line up so I could remove it, but got it eventually. Put new rotor on, put the cap on, then moved the plug wires one by one to the new cap. Went to start the car and... nothing, it just cranked. No sputtering or anything. Double checked firing order (1-3-4-2), checked to make sure coil spring was still in place, and that the rotor was moving freely (it changed position so I'm assuming it was).

Thought maybe I bought a defective part, so I put the old cap and rotor back on, but the car still wouldn't start. I'm pretty well puzzled on this one, the plugs and wires were replaced less than a year ago, so they're fine. What could I have accidentally changed during that quick part replacement? What should I start checking?

 

First take one of the wires off the plug and check if you have any spark at all using a spare plug.

Do you have wire #1 on the right post? Might try moving all the wires around one position. Set the engine to TDC and take the cap off, the rotor will be pointing to either #1 or #4. Make sure the rotor screw is secure.

 

Rotor only goes on one way, and I made sure it was the same as the old when I swapped them. Engine was starting and running fine before I replaced parts.

Wire #1 connects to the top-left post when looking from the side, top right is #3, bottom right #4, bottom-left #2. I'll check for spark as soon as I can get someone to help me.

 

Also check whether the distributor connector is tightly reseated.

 

Just got my dad to help me and take a look at it. There is no spark on any of the wires. He's thinking it might be a coil problem, but that doesn't make sense because I didn't touch them, and they were working literally 20 minutes before the new cap was on.

I think we're going to end up just taking it to a shop because I have to have it tomorrow. Thanks for all the help anyways. When it's fixed I'll let you all know what the problem was.


Edit: Just got off the phone with a mechanic. He says it sounds like the ignitor probably died, most likely from vibrations when I changed the cap and just plain old age.