I'm not a car expert so I don't know if I'm being alarmist or not but this problem just started happening the past week and seems to be getting worse fast. Hopefully the terms I'm using is helpful in describing my problem.
So, I have a 2005 Honda Accord LX with automatic transmission and 170k miles. The car has been good to me thus far and I've brought the car in every 10k to the dealership as the manual said.
My car is parked in a garage and I live in California so the temperatures aren't extremely cold in the morning. Normally, when I start my car cold in the morning, the idling RPMs will be about 1500rpm. After about 1-2 min of warming up, it drops to about 800-900 and drive from pt A to pt B.
This problem just started 1 wk ago. What happens is on a cold start, the rpms are unusually low (about 400-500 rpms). I waited a few minutes but the rpms didn't go back up. This has happened 3 times the last 7 days. Luckily, I've been able to drive to my destinations without problems (no knocking, no loss of power these 3 times, no engine dying)
Today, the problem got worse in that the engine didn't have power when I shifted to reverse to back out. Usually, I just shift to reverse and let the automatic transmission back me into the street. Today, there was no movement. Stepping on the gas helped inch the car out of my driveway but there was not much power when gassing it.
Also, the car died twice while stepping on the gas to back it out. I was able to drive to work without incident (no knocking, no loss of power, engine didn't die on the way to work). At first I thought I had a spark plug issue or a cylinder issue but since I was able to drive on the highway without incidents, I'm guessing that's not the case.
I know it's hard to diagnose something w/o seeing or hearing what's happening but does anyone know what might be happening from what I'm describing? I read some other forums and sites and people who had similar problems were advised to check the spark plugs, the idle screw or something with the throttle body, check for vacuum leaks or something, etc.
I don't know if their situation is the same as mine so I don't know if the solutions proposed to them would be the solution for me too. Thanks in advance for any help you can give me.