No money, mo’ problems

If there were ever a time I needed to win the lottery, this would be it.

Evil Twin is still sick. Besides the diabetes, for at least two weeks he’s been painting the catbox brown—when he manages to get it in the box. Sometimes he just explodes on the floor. We’ve probably spent around $1,000 on him since finding out he had diabetes in July, and we just can’t keep hemorrhaging money to find out “nothing’s wrong, it’s just his diabetes.” But we also can’t keep changing the catbox every day, cleaning shit up off the floor and wall, and worrying if he has some other sickness that could spread to our other two cats.

On to the second money-pit problem.

For about two or three months I’ve been hearing a roaring sound coming from the back wheels of my car, and as time has passed the sound has gotten louder. The car also shakes a bit when I get up around 70-75 mph. When I took my car to Reddell Honda for an oil change yesterday (I only take it to the dealer for oil changes because they send me coupons that make it cheaper than a Jiffy Lube type of place), I asked them to take a look.

They called and told me the rear control arms on the suspension were defective—something Honda “put a bulletin out on a few months ago” to all their dealers. The problem affects several Civics made in 2006-2007, mine included, but not enough to warrant a recall. It’s not a safety issue, but it causes my rear tires to wear unevenly, making the roaring noise and the vibration.

Then they dropped the bomb: I had to replace the rear control arm kit, get an alignment and two new tires. For $600.

Now, my first question to them was “I bought a new car from Honda under the impression I was getting a NEW car with no problems. If THEY made a defective product, THEY should have to fix it.”

The tech’s response was “Your car is no longer under warranty. You should have bought an extended warranty.”

My thought was “No, you buy an extended warranty in case something goes wrong AS THE CAR AGES. You don’t buy an extended warranty to protect against stuff that the manufacturer fucked up from the get-go but never told you about.”

The weird thing is that when the service tech called, he said he had already spoken to the service manager and they were willing to split the cost of the control arm kit with me. Now, that immediately set off alarms in Ian’s mind. Why, if Honda was not reimbursing them for fixing it, would they offer to split the cost of the repair with me? Right off the bat? They also told me that they would only honor the “we’ll split the repair with you” for another 5,000 miles. No explanation as to why.

I have never had any problems with this dealer before. Actually, after we dropped my car off for the oil change, I remarked to Ian how nice they always were. Hmm.

We looked online and found several people talking about this issue, but most people—in and out of warranty—are getting the repair done at no cost. Some have to pay for tires, some have to pay for alignments, but most are getting the rear control arm kit covered for them because, duh, it’s Honda’s fault.

So we are thinking either one of two things is happening:

1. Honda is reimbursing their dealers for the entire cost of the repair, and Reddell Honda is trying to get $600 out of me by making it look like they are being kind


2. Honda is not reimbursing their dealers for the repair, but the total cost really is $600. Reddell is just saying they’re splitting it with me to make me go ahead and do it

I have a hard time believing that a defective part—something that has been defective since the car was made and is just now manifesting itself because the tires have 51,000 miles on them—would not be fixed by Honda. I have had three recalls on the car and had them all fixed free of charge. Only one was a safety issue; the other two were just like this. Just defective parts that could cause more problems down the line.

This repair HAS to be done. If I don’t fix the rear control arms, every pair of new tires I purchase will wear unevenly and be ruined. I will never be able to rotate my tires because moving the front, good condition ones to the back will ruin them. My alignment will always be out of whack.

Why the hell would Honda not cover that, in or out of warranty?

I’m hoping that when I call Honda on Monday I will find out. This all smells funny to me.

Technorati tags: Honda, Civic, rear control arm, defect

~ by Megan on December 14, 2008.