Rep Power: 270

I've had the no heat at idle issue for about a year now. I finally decided to do something about it this year since it was basically putting out no heat all the time. Got on here and did some searching to find that my headgasket was leaking, pushing most of my antifreeze into the overflow tank.

I started tearing the engine apart only to find I didn't have the time to actually do the repair myself, so I ran it to the Honda dealership. They diagnosed it as headgasket (of course) and replace it. My dad hauled it back to his house since i took it to the dealer back home. After sitting there for a couple weeks I finally made it home to pick it up...well, I made it about halfway to where I'm living now (about 100 miles) before it overheated. I'm pretty sure the engine is cooked, as it was ticking pretty bad and had no power when I drove it onto the trailer.

So, thank you Honda service department. You will now be buying me a new engine.

 
Rep Power: 0

At least you got a new engine coming to you. Though I wonder if you can take some of the internals out and say that they never put them back in and then sell them off.

 
Rep Power: 812

yeah i had a similar experience. i wanted to diy but just didnt have the time to be without a car. seems changing the headgasket is too advanced for most honda techs to accomplish. altho cross my fingers, nothing bad has happened yet aside from a sloppy job with improperly torqued bolts, stuff that wasnt reconnected, and spark plugs that were too tight or loose. and oil and coolant all over the car, and a dent on the fender.

 
Rep Power: 0

Sounds like quite a day Gearbox

 
Rep Power: 270

Sounds about like my venture...I got home and popped the hood to find hose clamps that were not tightened among a few other things. They're sitting there clearly visible, WTF? I didn't check much else, though I'm now wondering if I should have....

 
Rep Power: 0

haha, I had to laugh when I read this thread because I just got my car outta the dealership because they replaced my leaking headgasket...Same issues, no heat, and overheating, after about a week at the dealership they called me up and said the car was ready to go...ALL SET. I hop in and the car is all sorts of whack idling irratically and not holding a steady idle, the tech came out after saying, "I personally test drove it, it's fine." I told him that there is no way that I'm taking it home cause it's not running at all, by the time I got him out there the engine stalled. They determined that it was "bad" spark plugs and made me buy new ones but did not charge me for the labor, huzzah, I suppose. Everything else was covered under warranty thank goodness...

BTW...would bad spark plugs throw a code, I was getting a misfire that the dealership cleared because they couldn't detemine what was causing it, 6 months later my head gasket was leaking, I asked them if that had anything to do with it and they weren't too sure.

 
Rep Power: 812

bad spark plugs could cause all sorts of misfires and idle problems.

 
Rep Power: 270

Cracked head...I'm glad they mentioned that when they put the headgasket on...

 
Rep Power: 812

hahaha wow

 
Rep Power: 232

so your head was cracked and the dealer didnt say anything and continued with the new head gasket??? wtf
go back and they should completely fix your cuz it should be on them.

 
Rep Power: 270

Should be...but ofcourse it's not. "Must have cracked after...." Picked a new (POS) engine up for $650 and only 17k on it.

 
Rep Power: 0

When I had my Head gasket done on my sentra at nissan they sent my head unit off to some place the examined it with special x-ray machines or something. Anyways sounds like Honda was doing a sloppy job. I would be fighting this one.

 
Rep Power: 270

I will definetly be fighting it...if they suspected a cracked head, they should have had it checked.

Funny how it's not a warranty job but they still bring up the fact that I have I/H/E on it because they were cheaper than stock units and the stockers were destroyed when I got the car as a wreck (4k mi, now has 78k). Guess they caused my headgasket to go after they "fixed it"...