89 civic hatchback fuel problems???

[kkastl21]

i currently have a 89 honda civic hatchback 4 speed manual transmission and i believe its not fuel injected i thinks its carb. past few weeks in my 1st and 2nd gears if pushing lightly on gas pedal the car starts to flutter but when i get to higher gears and jam on the pedal it runs fine. last night while driving move in 4th gear it all the sudden fluttered to the point of dying and not starting again. when trying to start the vehicle it wants to turn over however seems like to me there is no fuel getting to the engine. any thoughts as to whats causing this problem? anything will be helpful and even more so how to replace this problem would be much appreciated! thanks

[4G4D Store]

Are you getting a check engine light??

[kkastl21]

the check engine light and oil light comes on when trying to turning key to turn over. it wants to turn over and almost starts but sometimes flutters for two secs or so and dies.

[pbrizzle86]

I had a simalr problem a while ago when i still had my b2, it felt like it wasnt getting gas, and would pick back up if you mashed on it or at higher RPM, turned out to be a bad dizzy, do you know anybody with a car like yours? you could swap it out to see. Or if you have could get the values for testing it off alldata, its availble at all librarys around here, in sunny minnesota that is. Oh wait you in minnesota too. i dont know where circle pines is though. when you get the car started does the check engine light stay on, or is just when you go to crank it over?

[kkastl21]

what is a dizzy? never heard that before and no i dont know anyone with the same vehicle as me. and how would i go about getting the values for the alldata check? i believe the check engine light just comes on while i am trying to turn it over however it doesnt run long enough to see. it barely wants to start but when it trys it just stutters. thanks for your help. also with this vehicle if it is the fuel pump do u know if its located within the fuel tank?

[4G4D Store]

the dizzy is your distributor. he he And yes the fuel pump is located in the gas tank. Um, try this, when you first turn the car on(don't start, just put the key in the on position), listen carefully and see if you can hear the fuel pump kick on. If you can, it's probably not the pump, I'd look at other options first. If you get it started and it dies, pull back the carpet under the passengers seat and you'll probably see a goldish plate with a red flashing light in the middle - count the blinks (if any) and get back to us.

[kkastl21]

i first of all wanna thank you guys for answering my questions. when i turn the key i can hear the fuel pump charge up/ turn on. my question is though would my distributor blow my spark plugs? i pulled out one spark plug and tried turning over the engine and there was compression however no spark with that spark plug. which eliminated a few things in my mind. so i found a remanufactured distributor but lost my haynes manual. i am a pretty hands on guy and have replaced everything else on this car myself in the past. it doesnt look too hard and am just wondering if it is in fact as easy as it looks? thanks again for all your help!!

[readallen]

Could you post the first 11 numbers and letters of your vin number on your firewall and the block id to your left of the exhaust manifold?

and spray some gasoline or starting fluid into your carb and see if it starts for a few seconds, if you keep spraying the right amount it can halfass kinda run, if it does actually run more then you have a fuel problem. If there is no difference then spark and/or timing is it. or maybe its the automatic choke or choke opener systems, try holding the choke open w/ a screwdriver and see if that helps it out

[4G4D Store]

If you aren't getting spark I would probably start thinking dizzy or something spark related.

[readallen]

mine did sorta the same thing about 2 months ago and it was the screw that holds the rotor on came loose, this time I put a little superglue on the treads and its good a new.