For the past two months or so, the engine in my 1995 Honda Civic Lx (standard) has been getting progressively worse.It lugs down all the time at way higher RPMs than it should be lugging down at.Often times, it will lug down all the way up to 4200 RPMs or higher.When going up a hill, it is particularly bad.For example tonight, l ran it up to past 6000 RPMs in 2nd gear going up an easy hill, and it was still lugging down.When l say lugging down, l am talking about the power getting shaky.It will also sometimes be really weak when I am first accelerating onto a highway, and then the power will get strong for a second, and l will lurch forwards before settling down again.In general, the car runs much smoother at higher RPMs (between 3500 and 4500)

Also, when the car is idling, the RPMs are not constant.It starts out around 1000 RPMs, but then slowly drops down to around 400 or so before revving back up to 1000.Also, it sometimes does the same thing creeping up to 1200 before fallingback to where it should be.

Last Thursday, the car lost all power while l was on the highway, two hours from home.The engine would turn over, but nothing would kick in.l got it towed to a garage in the area that specialized in foreign cars.He said that the distributor broke, and replaced it with one pulled from a junk yard.l thought this would fix the problem, but it didn't.

Does anyone have any ideas as to what the problem might be?(Other than the fact that the car has 172,000 miles on it)
l tried fuel injector cleaner, fuel system cleaner, and some of that alcohol-based stuff for getting water out of the engine, but none of them did much.

This sounds like a compression problem. l would have someone do a compression check on the engine. Chances are you will find that you are getting low compression on one or more cylinders. This is very common on cars where people do not change the oil regularly.

l have a acura that did the same thing . The rpm is would go up & down just like yours does. You may need to change your fuel filter it could be clogged up and not letting the right amount of fuel to flow.

Check and re-gap your plugs,and clean your throttle body.That should do it.

also clean you maf sensor.