Hello everybody. I've recently bought a December 2009 Accord 2.2 GT Diesel Auto. I have a number of issues with it and wondered if anybody might be able to shed some light on some of them.
1. A kind of rumbling/droning noise which appears intermittently but fairly regularly usually when cruising at speeds of over 80 mph. It's quite similar to a wheel bearing kind of noise but I can feel that the source seems to be closer to the centre of the car. I took the car into the garage next to where I work and they told me that one drive-shaft was definitely gone and the one on the other side was most likely gone (although it could also be a gearbox bearing on that side - they wouldn't know without removing the drive-shaft). The guy showed me the play in one side by grabbing it and moving it.
The garage suggested that I contact Honda UK as a car of under four years with 43,000 miles on the clock should not have these issues. I contacted Honda UK who said I needed to take it to a Honda garage. I took it to Honda Newbury who said there was nothing wrong with it. Honda UK say they can't do anything, I'm stuck with a very annoying fault. Any comments? Is this a known fault?
2. Steering. It's simply awful. Never driven anything like it, and I've driven a lot of cars. It wanders all over the place on country roads, you have to be constantly vigilant if you don't want to end up in a ditch because of some tiny indentation in the road that my previous BMW wouldn't even have noticed. I believe this is known as tramlining. The second issue is the 'stiffness' of the steering, not so bad at lower speeds around town but dreadful when cruising on motorways, dual carriageways etc. The best way to describe it is to image a two mile stretch of dual carriageway which is on a very slight curve so you have to hold the steering at a slight turn. It actually makes my hand ache it takes so much effort to hold it there. It's like the car desperately wants to go straight - unless it hits a tiny indentation lol, when it then wants to drive into a hedge. I've checked all the type pressures and they're normal.
I will be getting new front tyres soon and having the car geometry done. I'm hoping this will improve things. If it doesn't I'll have to get rid of the car, it's just too rubbish like this to keep.
3. MPG. I'm getting on average 36.4 MPG. 90% of the mileage I do is cruising at about 80-85 mph down dual carriageways and motorways. The combined figure for this car is 46 MPG. If I drive really, really carefully, I can get it up to about 39 MPG by keeping it at about 70 MPH on motorways. My last car, BMW 525D, much much older, six cylinders was better than this. I know of somebody with a 7th Gen Diesel Accord who gets close to 50MPG. Any ideas? Is this normal for a modern car to be so inefficient?
4. The locking. This is driving me absolutely nuts. I have scoured the manuals which contain no instructions for switching off all this autolocking nonsense - why is that? I found some instructions on the internet but they don't appear to work. I have lost count of the amount of times I've had to do the annoying double click to open all the doors, gone inside to get some luggage, come out with my arms full and the retarded car has locked itself, grrrr. I just want to switch it off so I can lock it and unlock it when I want to - I'm an adult, I can be trusted to do this all by myself lol. I don't understand why this seems so hard to do, my mate has a nice menu on the screen in his car where he can switch his off. Everytime I fiil the car up, I have to get out the car, double click to open the fuel flap, start fuelling, retard car then locks all the doors half way through, I roll my eyes and finish fuelling, fuel flap won't close because it thinks it's locked lol, double click to unlock, close fuel cap. If there's any passengers in the car then the alarm goes off as well.
5. When I get into a diesel, for many many years, I have switched the glowplugs on and then put my seat belt on whilst they are warming up. I MUST put my seatbelt on first, then switch the ignition on and wait for the glowplugs. If I don't I get six very annoying beeps because I have the cheek to be sat in my car and put the ignition on without having my seatbelt on. This is seriously nannying. Can this be switched off?
All in all, I'm sad to say I'm very disappointed with this car. I'd never had a Honda before and bought one because they have a reputation for reliability. I wanted a car that just kept going and would be hassle free haha. Some of the issues above I can live with and some I can't. I'm hoping that with some help I can resolve the ones I can't live with, but sadly if I can't it's going to have to go.
Would really appreciate any help or advise anybody can offer.
Regards
Tony
1. A kind of rumbling/droning noise which appears intermittently but fairly regularly usually when cruising at speeds of over 80 mph. It's quite similar to a wheel bearing kind of noise but I can feel that the source seems to be closer to the centre of the car. I took the car into the garage next to where I work and they told me that one drive-shaft was definitely gone and the one on the other side was most likely gone (although it could also be a gearbox bearing on that side - they wouldn't know without removing the drive-shaft). The guy showed me the play in one side by grabbing it and moving it.
The garage suggested that I contact Honda UK as a car of under four years with 43,000 miles on the clock should not have these issues. I contacted Honda UK who said I needed to take it to a Honda garage. I took it to Honda Newbury who said there was nothing wrong with it. Honda UK say they can't do anything, I'm stuck with a very annoying fault. Any comments? Is this a known fault?
2. Steering. It's simply awful. Never driven anything like it, and I've driven a lot of cars. It wanders all over the place on country roads, you have to be constantly vigilant if you don't want to end up in a ditch because of some tiny indentation in the road that my previous BMW wouldn't even have noticed. I believe this is known as tramlining. The second issue is the 'stiffness' of the steering, not so bad at lower speeds around town but dreadful when cruising on motorways, dual carriageways etc. The best way to describe it is to image a two mile stretch of dual carriageway which is on a very slight curve so you have to hold the steering at a slight turn. It actually makes my hand ache it takes so much effort to hold it there. It's like the car desperately wants to go straight - unless it hits a tiny indentation lol, when it then wants to drive into a hedge. I've checked all the type pressures and they're normal.
I will be getting new front tyres soon and having the car geometry done. I'm hoping this will improve things. If it doesn't I'll have to get rid of the car, it's just too rubbish like this to keep.
3. MPG. I'm getting on average 36.4 MPG. 90% of the mileage I do is cruising at about 80-85 mph down dual carriageways and motorways. The combined figure for this car is 46 MPG. If I drive really, really carefully, I can get it up to about 39 MPG by keeping it at about 70 MPH on motorways. My last car, BMW 525D, much much older, six cylinders was better than this. I know of somebody with a 7th Gen Diesel Accord who gets close to 50MPG. Any ideas? Is this normal for a modern car to be so inefficient?
4. The locking. This is driving me absolutely nuts. I have scoured the manuals which contain no instructions for switching off all this autolocking nonsense - why is that? I found some instructions on the internet but they don't appear to work. I have lost count of the amount of times I've had to do the annoying double click to open all the doors, gone inside to get some luggage, come out with my arms full and the retarded car has locked itself, grrrr. I just want to switch it off so I can lock it and unlock it when I want to - I'm an adult, I can be trusted to do this all by myself lol. I don't understand why this seems so hard to do, my mate has a nice menu on the screen in his car where he can switch his off. Everytime I fiil the car up, I have to get out the car, double click to open the fuel flap, start fuelling, retard car then locks all the doors half way through, I roll my eyes and finish fuelling, fuel flap won't close because it thinks it's locked lol, double click to unlock, close fuel cap. If there's any passengers in the car then the alarm goes off as well.
5. When I get into a diesel, for many many years, I have switched the glowplugs on and then put my seat belt on whilst they are warming up. I MUST put my seatbelt on first, then switch the ignition on and wait for the glowplugs. If I don't I get six very annoying beeps because I have the cheek to be sat in my car and put the ignition on without having my seatbelt on. This is seriously nannying. Can this be switched off?
All in all, I'm sad to say I'm very disappointed with this car. I'd never had a Honda before and bought one because they have a reputation for reliability. I wanted a car that just kept going and would be hassle free haha. Some of the issues above I can live with and some I can't. I'm hoping that with some help I can resolve the ones I can't live with, but sadly if I can't it's going to have to go.
Would really appreciate any help or advise anybody can offer.
Regards
Tony