95 civic still won't start

I've posted this question before, and tried all of the suggestions with
no luck, so here I am again.

1995 Honda Civic LX, manual transmission, fuel injected, 150k mi

The engine was running rough this spring, so it was figured that one of
the cylinders wasn't firing. To test which was the dead cylinder, the
plug wires were pulled one at a time. Pulled #1 wire, engine died, #1
not the culprit. Put wire 1 back in, started engine back up, pulled #2
wire, engine died, #2 not the culprit. Put wire 2 back in, and the
engine never started again. Engine cranked over and over and over but
would not start. Didn't even try. Pulled engine, a valve was blown, put
in new valves, new rings, new alternator, new clutch, reinstalled
engine, all new fluids, all connections hooked up. Still, cranks
forever but does not start.

-All cylinders have compression.
-All plugs are firing.
-Fuel pump engages when key turned on.
-Cylinders are getting gas.
-Timing just reset to perfect

If my new alternator was bad, would that prevent the car from starting?
Is it possible my ECU is fried?
Is it possible there is fuel but no air coming in?
Would a bad ground prevent the car from starting?
Is it possible something else was fried when the plug wires were
pulled?

Pleeeeeeeease someone's gotta help me here, that Civic was my baby!

 

firing sequence is 1-3-4-2. #1 on the distributor is bottom left if
you're standing at the passenger fender looking end on.

 

and rotor rotation is clockwise.

 

Timing is on 100% correct.

 

"timing" usually means the # of degrees the spark fires from top dead
center. "firing sequence" is the order in which the plugs fire. if the
plugs fire and fuel injects but it won't start, check the firing sequence.

 

and how did you check the timing if the motor won't run?

 

Well, I suppose I didn't "check" the timing, I just set it. When the
distributor rotor was pointing to plug wire 1 ( bottom left ) the
number one cylinder ( 4 3 2 1 ) was at top dead center. The belt was
put on, and then tightened.

 

It sounds like you are confusing valve timing and ignition timing. Valve
timing is set by lining up the timing marks on the camshaft and crankshaft
gears when the timing belt is installed. Ignition timing is when the spark
occurs at the spark plug and is set with a timing light with the engine
running.

 

You have timing problems by the sounds of it.

As mentioned before, you have 'TWO' top dead centers on cylinder number
one.

One is the compression stroke that you find by putting your finger in
the spark plug hole and hand turning over the engine. When the crank
pulley comes up to the 'timing mark', this will show compression under
your finger. Setting it by the rotor just does not work.... You must
use the timing marks.

The 'other' top dead center is when the exhaust valve is open so no
compression will show under you finger. If you used this TDC, the
engine won't run 'usually'

You also 'can' use a timing light to verify that you have it correct.
The timing light will spark with just the starter turning things.

Mike
86/00 CJ7 Laredo, 33x9.5 BFG Muds, 'glass nose to tail in '00
88 Cherokee 235 BFG AT's
Canadian Off Road Trips Photos: Non members can still view!
Jan/06 http://www.imagestation.com/album/pictures.html?id=2115147590
(More Off Road album links at bottom of the view page)

 

check the ignition timing and the firing sequence for the spark plugs,
not the cam belt timing. cam timing is important and it's vital it's
set right, but the motor will run with cam timing a little out, same for
ignition timing. it will /not/ run if the plugs are firing in the wrong
order.

 

No, because the alternator does not actually charge the battery
until after the motor is running, an engine will run for quite some
time on the battery alone

Possible but unlikely, it usually takes a bad input signal to
fry electronics, which you would not have created by pulling plugs

Yes but if you have spark this is not the case

I'm not sure how you would do it in this model, but it may be worth
checking for air flow. I cant think of any way that pulling a plug
could permanently disable an engine, aside from creating a loose
connection to the spark plug itself. This cant be what is happening if
you are getting a spark though

 

At least in Honda engines, opening a spark lead can zap the coil. My own
experience in that is visible in
http://tegger.com/hondafaq/badsecondary/internal-arcing.html (d'oh!) In that
case there was no detectable spark, but the damage can be less so that a
spark can be seen but it won't produce enough voltage to fire the plugs
under compression. If the coil can produce a half inch spark that ought to
do the job.

Mike

 

that's one of the most impressively perfect examples i've ever seen for
component failure like this!

 

When you pulled these ignition wires, what steps did you take to ensure
that current from the ignition coil, which normally arcs across a
sparkplug gap, has somewhere to go?