What's wrong with my 2006 Honda CR-V engine?

The engines in these Hondas are considered pretty solid and reliable performers. But as with any car now celebrating its 15^th birthday, things can go wrong that can affect performance. With that in mind it could be time to give the engine a comprehensive once-over and a full service. Having the car electronically interrogated would be a good idea, too, as any faults noted by the on-board computer will have been logged and could tell you a lot about that’s going on under the bonnet. Just because the car hasn’t illuminated a dashboard warning light, doesn’t mean that the computer hasn’t noticed something strange going on.

The problem is obviously an intermittent one (or the car would never run properly) and that really does point towards something electronic. That said, a good mechanic will also go back to first principles checking things like fuel delivery, ignition timing and even engine compression.

Any information you can gather when the problem occurs will help enormously, too. For instance, does the engine blow smoke or make any odd noises when it loses power? Does the car shudder or suddenly start using more fuel when the problem occurs? The more observations you can pass on to a mechanic the better idea he or she will have of where to start searching. Fundamentally, you could be looking at anything from a collapsed catalytic converter or muffler, a faulty fuel pump or injector, a damaged spark-plug lead or literally any one of about a thousand other things.