1991 Civic. Junk yard motor this summer ( supossedly 90 k miles. All I know is it doesn't burn any oil!) At that time I replaced the plugs, plug wires, cap, rotor. ( The rest of the car has 230 K on it)

The car turns over and if it's going to start, it fires right up. If not, it just turns over. After 2-3 short start attempts, I generally have success treating the car as if it is flooded. It finally starts like its flooded. As it finally got cold here in Ohio, the problem has become more consistent.

It runs rough for about 5 miles and then smooths out. Lately, the tach tends to bounce arounda bit even if the car seems to be running smooth. After a long drive ( approaching three hours) the car seems to back fire. The whole car shudders.

Once the car is warmed up, it starts with just the barest application of the starter. About a month ago, I replaced the coil and the problem seemed to go away. But it returned.

Could the fuel injectors be leaking fuel and flooding the engine? I replace the O rings recently as they were leaking. Didn't seem to impact the problem. Perhaps it's my imagination, but the problem seemed to go away when I make sure there is no other electical draw while starting (heater fan off, no foot on the brake, no radio, wait for the seat belt retractor to finish. I did't have this problem with the old motor.

Seems like a timing issue, but it's a new belt and much of the time, the car runs fine once it starts.

Any ideas?

 

i would do this one first:
http://techauto.tripod.com/mainrelay.htm

i did not have a solder sucker

 

Problem solved! So when I was looking in the Haynes manual, I got the mistaken impression the Ignitor was part of the coil. There was a wire on the ignitor that was soldered instead of using a connector. I kept thinking about that, but for some reason, never checked it.

So I was talking to the Honda parts guy about the relay and he suggested the ignitor and I found out I hadn't replaced the ignitor when I replaced the coil. I put on a new ignitor, fixed the wire and problem solved! I kept the old ignitor as it probably wasn't the problem. But I've been fussing with this for so long, I didn't want wait to find out if the old ignitor was good or bad.