2011 HONDA Civic

You have disappointed me Honda

Comfort Rating: 5 Performance Rating: 5 Interior Rating: 3 Reliability Rating: 1 Safety Rating: 2 Technology Rating: 3 Value Rating: 2

Let me start by saying, I love Honda.....or should I say loved Honda. My first car was a '93 Del Sol. What a blast that car was to drive. Taking your targa top off and blasting the radio, while listen to the cold air intake give your 4 banger some grumble. The love I developed for that car as I took her to 210,000 miles made me a believer in Honda. As much as that car made me love Honda is as much as this Civic has done too make me hate Honda. Now that is a bold statement so let me explain. Honda uses the cheapest and worst paint known to man kind. After two years on the road, the front of my purchased brand new with 7 miles on it Honda looked like it had been driven in multiple sand storms in Iraq. The paint on this car chips off with the slightest of ease. If you think I am crazy read reviews on 03 to 07 Honda vehicles.... apparently Honda still hasn't figured out how to fix their paint problem....or maybe they just don't care. Further more, I have a heat shield near the manifold the vibrates. I am familiar with this happening on older vehicles where shields rust off, (hell, I drove a del sol up to 210,000. Everything rusted off that car) but a 3 year old (at the time it started) vehicle should not experience this problem. Now to the ECM. A animal chewed the wires on my O2 sensor causing my check engine light to come on. (I own that this is not Honda's fault, but what comes after is) Easy fix it seemed, I bought a new O2 sensor at Autozone and changed it out, reset my codes, took it for a test drive, and low and behold the light came back on. Next I check all the fuses, painstakingly checking each circuit with a meter (thinking it blew a fuse). Everything checked out fine, so I now ordered the Bishko repair manual for the vehicle, so I could get a detailed view at the schematics for the O2 sensor circuit. Turns out there is no fuse for the O2 sensor, so when the animal chewed the wires insulation away, the open wires now touched. When I went to start the vehicle, unknown that the wires were chewed, it shorted the circuit frying the ECM! What should have been a simple O2 repair and fuse switch out, turned into a $150 used ECM install and a $100 reprogramming fee by the dealership. If I had the dealership do this it would have cost upwards of $600. Now happy me, my car is working again, except that 4 months later I hear a clanking noise coming from the serpentine belt. So I assume this is the drive belt auto tensioner. I purchase a new drive belt and tensioner. Work for a few hours removing stuck on bolts in areas I can barely get a finger into. Cuss a lot, replace it all, get it back together, start the vehicle and the clanking noise is still there. Well now I have brought you up to the present day. My next move is to check the A/C compressor, which I have to imagine is the problem now that I have ruled out the auto tensioner. Why a vehicle with 59,000 miles on it requires a new A/C compressor is beyond me. For those of you who don't know, an after market auto tensioner and belt can be had for about $75, And an A/C compressor for about $300. Take this to a mechanic and your looking at $800 + repair bill. Take it to the dealership and you will have a $1000 + bill. I bought this Honda so I wouldn't have to work on my car anymore expecting to be repair free till at least 120,000 miles. Now at 60,000 miles I feel like this car is failing apart. This vehicle has no impressive interior features, very basic. The steel wheels are too wide for the cars weight. This gives you improved cornering in the summer, but driving in the snow, this car slips all over, even with studded snow tires. I regret purchasing this car, as it has given me the same reliability of an ex-girlfriends Suzuki, which I was forever under the hood of......well maybe not quite that bad... but it has finally made me say, "maybe next time I try Toyota".