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Honda Civic: Problems & Solutions
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I am due to take my car in for buffing,(at dealer's expense), some minor scratches in a few weeks. Is this paint looking defect area something that I can expect the dealer to fix?
Thanks
Doing a search on "heater + gurgling" in Google, I found a number of problems from people (mostly with GM vehicles) that had observed the same problem as my Civic.
I'm headed back in a few days to have a defective trunk lock release replaced and will ask about the flushing, and about the coolant and fill amount.
BTW: I'm figuring it must be the heater because the sound disappears when the temp. control is rotated from heat to cold.
1723-Have you taken it to the dealer to diagnose the problem. You should be under warranty. I had a similar problem on my 1995 Civic EX and the dealer said my clutch master cylinder was bad(luckily under warranty at time).
This UI is awful for responding to a message and reading responses.
Are these touchless car washes too rough for this car?
Also later on while driving I noticed all gauges were not working.(I had only driven about a mile when I noticed this.) The car was driving ok so I pulled over and restarted the car and all gauges worked fine then as well as later during the day after a few more stops and start ups. Could something have gotten wet in the car wash?
Thanks only have 350 miles.
Thanx!
From what I have been reading during the normal break in period you will get lower than expected gas mileage. It should improve with mileage.
Do you have static problems w/ your Civic? How about the gauges not working? (After driving about 1 mile I noticed that the gauges were not working so pulled over stopped engine and then restarted all was fine afterwards.) I called the service writer again and they told me this is nothing to worry about that outside electrical interferance can cause this and that turning motor off and then restarting was the right thing to do. Seems strange.
When at a stop and in neutral as I put my foot on the brakes I hear a clicking type noise. Have you heard this on your Civic?
How is your car's MPG so far?
Does you Civic's vin# start w/ a 1, 2 or J?
American Honda strongly recommends this special oil be left in the engine long enough for these wear patterns to develop, usually until the first maintenance interval specified in your Owner's Manual, based on your specific driving conditions.
Help assure your vehicle's future reliability and performance by paying extra attention to how you drive during the first 600 miles (1,000 kilometers). During this period:
Avoid full-throttle starts and rapid acceleration.
Avoid hard braking. New brakes need to be broken in by moderate use for the first 200 miles (300 km).
All cars tend to burn some oil (1,2 or even 3 quarts during the first 3,000 miles).
In the case of the Si, if you are worried, just do it every 5k miles. I believe the manual says the filter only needs to be changed every 10k. But if you are driving what they consider as severe condition, they recommend changing the oil every 5k I believe. Since the filter is only $4 bucks or so, might as well change that as well.
Obviously you can buy relatively cheap Mobil 1 full synthetic and ask them to use those instead. If you do not want to DIY, you'll just pay for washer, filter and labor.
When it first became noticeable I thought it was due to having a tire patched and then not balanced. Took the car in and had all 4 tires balanced. The problem was still there and only changed a little with the next tire rotation. Not trusting the first shop, I had them balanced again, problem was still there.
I considered that the problem might be high mileage (50K miles) on my tires even though there was plenty of tread left and even wear patterns. Almost decided to replace them.
A couple of weeks ago while going over a speed bump, noticed a funny noise from the left front that has gradually gotten worse. To accompany this, irregularities in the road at highway speed now cause visible side to side movement in the steering wheel. Also getting a bouncy ride over those bigger bumps, floating like an old Cadillac.
All this to say the left front strut is shot. I'm sure it relates to the leak down that this model year experienced, just took mine a little longer to get to that point. I thought about the options of going back with the Honda strut and finally decided against it based on not knowing what quality strut I might get this time.
As some of you might already know, there isn't an after market strut that replaces this one directly. For some strange reason Honda decided to make the steering arm part of the strut and none of the after market suppliers have ventured into this unusual application.
What is available is a Koni strut that drops into the original strut housing. That oversimplifies things a little. The original strut housing is gutted by cutting the top off it, removing the piston, shaft and oil. After that the Koni insert is pressed into the original housing and bolted into the bottom through a hole that must be drilled in the housing.
A lot of work but I think in the end I'll be happier and this time have a set of struts that are warranteed as long as I own the car.
Just a posting to make others aware of how this symptom started in case you are, or might experience the same thing. I haven't ventured far enough into the wheel well yet to determine if oil can be seen around the top of the strut indicating a leak, there has not been any indication on the strut housing itself.
This weekend the project is to replace both front struts. I'll let you know how it goes.
Regarding the other noises in a new Civic, or any other new car, I don't think it's normal to hear any types of noises thinking that they will subside after a break-in period.
Regarding the question of whether the tires on my 2001 Civic EX seem to slide easily on wet roads - they do seem to slide more than other cars I've owned - but I'm sure it's the type of Firestone tires that came with the car.
The weekend project was to replace the front struts with Koni cartridges inside the original strut housing.
If you are thinking about this yourself, I suggest that you have some experience working on a car, experience along the lines of replacing water pumps, alternators, etc. not just oil change experience.
Tools that you will need: Pipe cutter (hack saw would work but would take a lot of time), tool to separate the steering arm ball joint from the tie rod, I found mine at MSC industrial supply, called a "Tie rod end lifter", about $5. A Macpherson strut spring compressor. I found this at Auto Zone, they have a plan where you borrow it by buying it, after use you return it and get your money back. A drill press is nice but the holes could be drilled with a large hand held drill.
I bought the Helm shop manual for the car, if you don't have one and want to do your own maintenance, I suggest you get one. For this job, it is not absolutely necessary. If you go to the NHTSA site you can find a PDF file explaining a TSB for spring replacement which is the same procedure. Also Honda Tuning magazine has an article explaining the procedure.
In my case, after removing the left front strut assembly I found it covered in light oil. If you suspect your car has this problem, you can check it by removing the front wheel and running your hand over the strut assembly. There is no reason for oil to be on the strut unless it is leaking. This oil is very light, about the weight of water.
I didn't pursue this with Honda due to the mileage that my car has on it (close to 70K miles). Since others have had this problem they might be receptive to replacing it, I decided to avoid the hassle.
After removing the strut, and drilling a pilot hole to drain the oil, I marked it 40mm down from the top to cut off and remove the internals as listed in the Honda tuning article. I found this was not possible with the pipe cutter that I was using and marked and cut around 30mm down. Note that Koni included instructions that advised cutting the housing around 7mm down from the top although the instructions didn't match the insert number that I had. 30mm worked fine.
Drilled the pilot hole in the bottom to 14mm. Note that centering this hole is not easy to do if you try to measure from the sides due to the welds for the mounting bracket. This one was a little off but still worked fine. For the right front strut, I used a barely visible machining mark that indicated exact center of the strut housing. This mark was also visible on the left strut.
After cleaning the housing, inverted the Koni strut shaft end down between two 4 X 4 wood blocks that were on top of the opening in a concrete block. Then fit the Honda strut housing on top of the Koni, wooden block on top of that and using a large hammer drove the housing onto the Koni strut. If you have access to a press this process doesn't seem as shade tree, but the end result is the same, the Koni strut pressed into the Honda housing.
After that the Koni strut is bolted into the housing through the 14mm hole and reassembled back in the spring.
Only point that wasn't real clear is the reinstallation in the car. To get the bottom of the strut housing to line up with the mounting point, I finally figured out that the wheel assembly could be pulled down further. This is pulling the assembly down working against the bushings that this assembly is mounted through. An extra hand to insert the bolts makes this a little easier.
This side took about 4 hours. To contrast the right side only took a little over an hour due to the experience gained on the left side.
Note that the right side strut still had gas pressure and had not leaked any oil. Based on this I think the left strut failed prematurely.
Cautions, use the tie rod end lifter to avoid damaging the rubber boot on the tie rod end. Be careful about the strut housing and the CV joint boot to avoid damaging the boot during removal and installation of the strut assembly.
And to conclude, the Civic is once again a pleasure to drive. I need to take it in for an alignment now, but the improvement is remarkable. The ride is probably a little firmer than stock but not unpleasant. I'll probably replace the rear struts as well in the next year even though they haven't indicated a problem.
Now...does anybody else feel like tackling a job like that by themselves?
Not me!
I am impressed!
Greetings from sunny Miami.
Does driving in the snow belt of the northeast US qualify as "severe" or should I follow the normal maintenance schedule?
Thanks,
Thanks!
eternalblue
1. The stock firestone tires suck big time in new england weather.
2. flat plastic panel under dash, just behind and above hood release latch keeps "unhooking itself" and causing a rattle that sounds like the left rear door is still open.
3. This is more of a nitpicky "I wish I had" kinda thing, but I find myself longing for a remote trunk release on the keyfob. That would be SO convenient.
4. Random faint-sounding "buzzing" rattles in the front dash that I've yet to localize. Only happens occasionally.
other than that I've been extraordinarily pleased with the car - even on my 3rd tank of gas I got 37mpg (on a long road trip). Gas mileage has consistently been 33 mpg+. I do a lot of city stop-and-go short driving, so I especially take note on the long distance stuff.
I'm quite concerned about the stock tires that came with the car - it pains me to think of replacing brand new tires, but I have no faith in them. They slip and slide like it's nobodys business.
QUESTION: (not sure if this is the right place) - I want to get a honda civic cargo net for the trunk - i thought the installation would be pretty easy but the dealers all want to charge me like, an HOUR of labor to install it. The total cost with net would be like over $110. That's hard to stomach for a little cargo net. Anyone been able to install one of these on their own??
I didn't care for that, so I installed the cargo net from my 1997 civic. It mounts with four anchors by removing the plastic hole plugs on the sides of the trunk. You have to pull back the trunk liner to tighten the nuts from behind.
This is pretty easy. It all goes back like new and looks original. Install time was about an hour.
Hope this helps.
We also had a rattle which sounded like it was coming from the steering column but it was actually the wires underneath. We used a zip-tie to cinch them down and haven't heard a creak or rattle since.
They suggest to change oil and rotate tires at 7,500 miles interval. I was 2500 miles too early.
But my Honda dealer also mails me 3750 miles service reminder for my 01 Odyssey. Since 01 Ody owner manual says to change oil at 3750 for severe and 7500 miles for normal driving conditions. Maybe Ody is much heavier than Civic so dealer suggests to follow severe driving for Ody and inbetween for Civic?
and u wanna put 5w-20 type oil on civic
anyone put nitro on new civic?? tell me how fast it goes from 0-60?
my stock civic , i got 11.6 seconds .mine is automatic.
y civic is so slow/?
needs nitro...
but its too slow...
and they use cheap quality fabric on seats...
but still love my civic
I bought an used Civic (98) a months ago. Every morning when I start and warmup the car, I smell the gas (quite strong). But after I drove out to work, I didn't smell any for the rest of the day during I start the car again. It seemed that I only smell it first time during I start the car everyday. Does anyone know what would be the problem? Is it common to used cars?
Thanks for your help!
Vince
Greetings from sunny and warm Miami.
Sometimes when I start up I have to try once or twice. Hasn't really been a big problem though.
Otherwise love the car.. Fun to drive but try to park it away from other vehicles due to sensitivity of black paint..
For a minor dent on trunk and bumper, I won't worry about depreciation factor. You are not going to sell your 02 Civic in a near future.
Regards,
bjk
Greetings from sunny Miami