Mark Arnold

Review of Royal Honda

My son recently had an issue with his 2011 Accord ...

My son recently had an issue with his 2011 Accord V6 with about 90K miles....the problem, the engine is needing replacement at his expense. The cars history; 85-90% of the oil changes and 100% of all work on this car was performed at certified Honda dealerships. (there is documentation to prove this record). Royal informed him that they found a "bolt" that was located in and floating around in one of the cylinders which caused the engine to fail. Supposedly this bolt came into the engine through the air intake and was there for quite some time (Royals words not mine). Hang on folks, this is where the story gets interesting. My son spoke with American Honda which settled a class action lawsuit against this 3.5 V6 engine for failures due to poor design with piston rings. Honda issued this Technical Service Bulletin (TSB #11-033) in July of 2011 that quietly acknowledged the problem. (interestingly, no recall was ever mailed to customers) The engine now miracualously has a bolt in a piston, ruining the engine, even though this region of the car hasn't been touched by a mechanic for thousands of miles. Forgive me here, but it walks like a duck (3.5 liter V6), and sounds like a duck (class action suit) but we're told it's an elephant (bolt in a piston)....How could this be? The last hand(s) to be near the air intake area of this car was Royal Honda. Sadly, we took Honda dealerships workmanship in good faith that all work would be done professionally and with expertise. Should we have filmed/Go-Pro'd the mechanics work to verify it being done correctly? Is Royal Honda or American Honda pinnocio-ing the issue? We've owned numerous Honda/Acura vehicles over the years. I'm normally hard to convince otherwise and change my mind but Royal Honda with the help of American Honda sure did a great job to turn this family into Toyota fans. Shame on you Royal Honda! Shame on you American Honda! Disppointing to say the least. Truely disappointing.

Thank you for responding to my concerns but there is another issue I have to ask. Why then when my son asked you numerous times to remove the said bolt, was it not completed? I still feel the loose item was a faulty ring that broke loose and ruined the engine. Now that he had to wholesale the car for a fraction of the price he should have received, I guess we'll never know. I realize American Honda has/had the final say so in the matter but I question their decision on the "facts" you provided. If you couldn't remove the bolt after numerous requests (3 or more conversations) I really question your mechanic's assessment. How did they know it was a "bolt" if they in fact didn't or could't even remove the item from the piston? You could have acted as an advocate on his behalf but instead chose to go a different route. One that I call lackadaisical. Not the best way to conduct ones business and advertise your service center as "Fixed Right the First Time" First time???? To my knowledge you had three times or more to remove the object. The automotive world is just too competative to not listen to customers requests.