prwood

I'm a shade tree mechanic in Massachusetts with past experience repairing 2000-2004-era Subaru, Toyota, Honda, and Volvo cars. I'm now looking for a used car for myself. Two of the options are Honda Civics, same price for both:

- 2006 Honda Civic EX with 85k miles, 1 owner, good records showing service at dealerships throughout most of its life
- 2008 Honda Civic EX with 113k miles, 3 owners, no service records, only state inspection records

So we've got an older car with lower miles, and a newer car with higher miles.

I've test driven both of them on highway and local roads and both of them drove fine. During the test drive, I didn't notice any issues with the drivetrain, suspension, steering, or brakes. Performance seemed about what I'd expect from a 1.8L 4-cylinder engine. I took a look under the hood of both - the '08 had the engine bay cleaned so everything looked a bit more pristine there, but both engine bays looked decent. I didn't see any signs of fresh leakage under the hood or drips from the undercarriage after the test drives, but assumedly any longer term leaks would have been cleaned up.

The interior condition was decent in both; the '08 had a bit more wear and tear inside, probably due to the three owners and more extensive usage. The exterior on both was in good shape and didn't show any signs of damage or rust. The '08 had a rear spoiler which isn't really my style, but isn't really a pro or a con for me either way.

From the research I've done, the '06-'08 subset of the 8th generation doesn't have any major changes from year to year. I did however see several references to the engine block cracking issue, but it sounds like if you stay on top of your oil and coolant levels, that can be prevented. I'm not sure how to tell if either car has had that issue in the past or currently has that issue.

Anyone have an opinion on which one might be preferable? older, lower miles vs newer, higher miles... or anything else I should check out on these cars? Both of them are local so I could pretty easily drop in and take another look if needed.

av911

Nice coverage/knowledge on these cars. The 2006 do have camber "issues" that were changed in the later years (can't remember when). The earlier years had the rear cambers too aggressive, where it would eat up the tires.

Personally, I'd take the lower miles.

Ryanthegreat1

2006

The block "cracking" was porosity in the block casting and they would seep coolant. If they aren't leaking today they probably won't have any issues.

prwood

I've been reading up a bit more on the "cracking" issue here: https://www.carcomplaints.com/Honda/...ne_block.shtml

Here's an excerpt from one of the reports written 11/2/2017:

Given the scenario above, is there any possible way for me to test whether this issue is present with the limited time I would have to do a test drive? I did bring the engine up to temperature out on the highway and didn't notice it overheating, or any external signs of coolant leaking. I know measuring the coolant level would be one way to test this, but with the time I have in a test drive there isn't really time to bring the engine up to temperature and then wait hours for the coolant to cool down and contract to a level where I could take an accurate second measurement.

Any suggestions?

Chrisfrom1986

iTrader: (1)

My 07 cracked the block with 126k or so back in 2015. I'll admit that I had been running straight water for a little less than a year when that happened and just before it did the transmission oil warmer failed internally mixing the auto trans fluid with the engine water. Fortunately no damage to the transmission occurred and it was flushed on a machine after. The block cracked behind the rear oil separator cover. Maybe it was caused my running only water, maybe it was just coincidence.

prwood

Did a bit of research on the 2006 and found that it was regularly serviced at the same Honda dealer for 11 years from when it was purchased in May 2006 until September 2017 at 70,628 miles. That's well into the period where TSB 10-048 had been issued. I've emailed that service department to see if they have any records of it being serviced under the TSB/warranty extension.

It seems like perhaps I'd be able to spot the cracking if it was present in a pre-purchase inspection, at least in the front part of the block... the back would be more difficult to get at.