I bought a used '88 accord LX sedan that Is sometimes near impossible to start. Sometimes to start I have to floor it to clear the carb. Sometimes a couple pumps and it starts. Always idles rough until it warms up. Then it runs pretty good. I still hear a miss though.
I may be asking the obvious here but either a plug, wire, or the distributor cap has a distinctive spark sound on one cyl.
Any help??
Thanks,
Mike

 

Start it in complete darkness & look for arcing around the distributor cap & wires. Arcing (even a dull blue glow) means that component is bad. This works best if the engine's cold when you start it.

 

First thing is to ensure good spark, for a 20 year old car you won't hurt anything by drilling in a new set of plugs, throw on a new set of plug wires, and dist. cap and rotor.
Then moving on to the rough start;
Check that BOTH diaphrams on the dist will hold vacuum, you can do this 'manually'; put a longer hose on the fitting suck hard and put your tongue over the end of the hose to see if vacuum holds.
Next yank off the air filter housing, plug all vacuum lines on the passenger side of the carb. [the one hose left over on the drivers side is a vent don't plug it]
Now look at the top front passengerside of the carb; choke pull off diaphram.
Pinch off both vacuum lines going to it while some one cranks/starts the engine.
The pull off rod should retract.
To clean out the carb jets, you can 'stuff' the carb; wrap up the rpm to around 5k then put your hand over the top of the carb venturi to seal off air.
When the RPM drops take your hand off.
The engine vacuum will pull gas thru the carb at high speed to clean out jets.
DON"T LET THE ENGINE STALL when doing this or the plugs will be flooded.