Frying ECU's

Ok guys I need some advice. I have a 92 Integra with a B16 swap in it with a VAFC. I have owned the car since 2004 and it has never ever really given me problems. The car hasn’t seen much driving since 2008 ish. Everything on the car was great but when I moved to Florida in 2010 there were a couple bad rains and I had a passenger side floor leak so I got some water inside. I dried everything out and the car was great. One day in 2012 I went to start the car and I had nothing no power or anything I diagnosed it to the ECU being bad (Big burn spot on the board) I assumed it was probably due to the water so I bought a replacement. Installed the replacement and the car started and ran but I still never really drove it. I moved the car to a storage unit in 2010 and that’s where it has sat since then. I went to pull the car out of storage yesterday and had problems.

The car started and idled great for about 10-20 minutes no leaks no misses nothing. I got in the car and was going to drive it around the storage place to see how it is doing and that is when problems started. The car was at normal temp about half way on the temp gauge and was idling properly maybe a little high. I sat in the sit and blipped the throttle and everything was good went to put it in gear but before I could it bogged down really bad threw a CEL light and the ECU started smoking. I pulled it open and the main capacitor blew. I have no ideas on what could cause this I’m looking for any ideas or suggestions.

Does anybody have any ideas I have no idea where to start.

You either have a harness problem or shitty luck with ECUs.

Sadly water damage is almost impossible to trace down and completely fix.

I don’t wanna throw another ecu at it without testing a little first. I’m just lost cause you’d think if it were water damage it wouldn’t run for a while then kill the ecu. I’m not 100% sure the problem is due to water damage but I can’t rule it out. Does anyone have any troubleshooting advice?

Mod’s can we move this to the Electrical Section I think it might fit better there

Here are some pics of the ECU.




Capacitors go out… If it was another part of the ECU that blew I’d be nervous of hooking another up… Not that you want to “throw an ecu” at it, but I’m thinking your wiring is fine.

I might try to re-solder a new cap on the ECU and see what happens