Hey all! It's been a long, long time since i've been to the forum here but I wanted to post my main relay fix. I know there are a lot of threads about it already but what I didn't find are pictures showing what a bad soldering looked like, etc.
So.
Car - 1992 Honda Prelude Si, H23A3 swap.
Symptoms of my bad relay. Began probably two years ago. It first started by not wanting to start after a short trip in hot weather. Just like everyone else had said, getting gas was the worst. Last summer is when it became it really bad. Basically if it was above 70 degrees outside, it wouldn't start. Over the winter it always runs fine but this spring it became pointless to even TRY starting it in even warm weather.
So yesterday I looked out the window at the poor thing just sitting there. Hasn't run all summer. Flat tire, spider webs in the wheels, battery dead (forgot to unhook it, lol), you know. So I researched online and found the main relay, which is RZ0139, on Ebay. I had called a local part store and they said they showed R4804 as the part number. I'm wondering if that is the Accord one? I called Honda to verify but the parts guy there wasn't sure. Anyone know about that? Regardless. RZ0139 is the one you need for sure. I ordered the one from ebay and decided to go outside and take a look at the old one.
I have already done a lot of electrical work near the main relay from my remote start and alarm, so getting to it was rather easy. I unplugged the batter, unplugged the relay, and use a flathead screw driver to pry the relay out of the socket rather then looking for the bolt.
This is what I found: I'm going to post these with photobucket to keep the size and detail.
Notice the two cracks all the around two of the circuits. This is the best picture I could grab for those wondering what you're actually looking for the on a bad main relay.
Picture002mod.jpg picture by HondaPerson - Photobucket
Since I already had a new one on the way, I decided to tinker with soldering it. Let it be known I have actually never soldered anything in my life. I even had to go to my parents and dig up some crappy soldering gun that was probably 20 years old. You'll see in my picture the soldering job was bad and I decided to solder every point, just in case.
Picture006.jpg picture by HondaPerson - Photobucket
I plugged it back in last night in the dark. The car immediately accepted a charge and started right up. I drove around for an hour last night and intentionally parked out in my yard facing east so it would get a good deal of sun today.
I let it sit until 3pm today. Its around 90-92 degrees outside, so should be well over 100 inside. Got in, turned the key, cranked 1 once and turned over. I let it run for several minutes, turned it off, let it sit for about fifteen seconds and it still cranked right back over. I couldn't believe it. I almost fell over. lol.
So anyway. I mainly wanted to share those pictures with you guys because I couldn't find anything like that. I'm not sure how long my soldering job will last but I'm not going to swap it out until it does go bad. I'll have a new main relay sitting around til then I guess
Edit - Drove all today to several different places, never once gave me a problem. So my suggestion to anyone needing to replace your main relay is to solder it yourself at first! took 15 minutes and solved the problem.
Linear Mode
