Car cranks, but no start, no dashboard lights

[Ramon]

I was hoping to get some help here on my Honda. So the problem is that the car won’t start. I also get no lights coming up on the dashboard, and when I try to use the code reader to see what kind of problem I have I get nothing. The code reader says “no link.” I already tried the code reader on another car and it works fine. I put in a new battery to see if that was the problem and nothing changed. I swapped the terminals also and I still get nothing. I checked the fuses and they all look fine. The car just continues to crank but doesn’t turn on. Is this a faulty ECM?

Topic

[george gonzalez]

You swapped the battery terminals? Let’s hope not.

If you did hook the cable going to the chassis to the positive battery terminal and the red cable to the negative battery terminal, that’s bad. That will blow a lot of fuses and maybe a lot of electronics too.

[Ramon]

I meant that I replaced the terminals. The old ones were looking pretty bad.

[Its me]

No dashboard lights would steer me toward ignition switch…. Do the wipers and radio work when the key is turned forward? It may be ECU related, but that is usually the last thing that is checked….

Have you checked ALL fuses and relays? Ensure they are all good….

-Karl

[george gonzalez]

Ah, good. No dash lights implicates the ignition switch or nearby relays, both weak points on Hondas.

The ignition switch went out on my Honda Odyssey, the day after I got fired from a really quite spiffy job. Bad two days.

[Ramon]

Thanks for the help so far everyone! When I turn the key to the “on” position I am able to turn on the air conditioner. I haven’t tried the wipers yet. If those work, is it still the ignition switch?

[Ramon]

Aside from the ignition switch, what relays would be the ones to look out for?

[Ramon]

Hooray! I changed the ignition switch and it did the job! Thank you guys for helping me out. I appreciate it very much.

[george gonzalez]

Follow the thin wires from the ignition switch. The thin wires are a clue that those circuits do not directly drive anything, they just drive a relay which does the heavy switching. Basically any relay that a thin ignition switch wire goes to is a possible problem.

Sometimes just giving them a healthy tap will close the circuit and things will work for a little while. That suggest the relay is intermittent or has a bad solder joint to the PC board.

Eric has a useful video about this and how to fix it. Except the last 30 seconds where he demonstrates exactly how NOT to solder anything. The right way if to have a clean soldering iron tip, well tinned with solder, the tip gets applied so it touches BOTH the relay pin and the copper pC board. Five to 10 seconds later you touch the solder to the angle between the pc board and the pin, and avoiding touching the soldering iron tip. The molten solder should flow and form a fillet between the two parts, it should NEVER form a round blob, that indicates the solder is being repelled from the relevant surfaces, not being drawn to them.

[Kevin Criswell]

When you turn the key to the “run” position does the “check engine” light illuminate?

This page may help,

http://techauto.awardspace.com/mainrelay.html

I bookmarked it when College man linked to it in another thread.

[Bill]

Nice! Glad you got it fixed.

[Kevin Criswell]

[quote=”wysetech” post=77733]Nice! Glad you got it fixed.[/quote]

Thanks Bill 😳 if you had not posted that I would have kept giving advice for a problem that had been fixed.

[Bill]

Hahahaha….That’s why I did it.

[Ramon]

Thank you everyone! It was the ignition switch that needed to be replaced.

[college man]

Glad you got it worked out.Thanks for the update and the fix. 🙂

[EricTheCarGuy]

Glad you got it sorted out, thanks for keeping us up to date. Not sure if you replaced the entire switch or just the electrical portion. All you need in that situation is the electrical portion. It’s cheeper and you don’t need to cary a separate key.

[Author]

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