unuselectus

Man I'm not one to bash Honda, but they have dropped the ball on this one. I have a 91 EF wagon and they absolutely can't fix the automatic motor assembly and I'm sure they won't have my cars seatbelts in stock either. Reniging on a seatbelt warranty is kinda sketchy.

tony_2018

Damn...It is a discontinued part. What are your plans? Take em to court?

Caoboy

They're almost 30 year old vehicles, what are you expecting them to do?

They have 'useful life' stated in their warranty. Ask them to determine what the 'useful life' of the vehicle is.

They can't stock every possibly belt for every possible car still on the road. The amount of overhead this would take is not feasible.

TLR

Hi Caoboy,

I assume you're referring to my posts . . . and you asked what I'm expecting Honda to do.

I expected them to honor their warranty. Nothing more, nothing less. Period. That's it.

You do realize that their position is, "we have a lifetime warranty--as long as we have the spare parts", right?

So, an owner of a ten year old car, or a five year old car, could get the same answer from Honda. That is, "sorry, we have no seat belts for your 2010 Honda in stock."

I expected more from Honda.

We visited the Honda museum in East Liberty, Ohio. Great place to visit, if you're ever in the area northwest of Columbus. When Soichiro Honda, the founder, was alive, he mandated that there would be spare parts available for every car they ever made. After he died, Honda changed the policy. Yep, the overhead would have killed them, maybe, but a warranty is a warranty, and their's is plainly stated, with no exceptions or qualifications.

I found a seatbelt for my car at a junkyard, and they shipped it to me. Dealers would not install it, due to liability. I contacted a body shop I've dealt with, and they let me come in and help me replace it. It took about three hours, and the back seat and side panels had to come out. The technician and I took pics of the assembly before we removed it, so we'd get all the washers and spacers back properly, and it was actually a fairly complicated process. The body shop had me "do the replacement" due to liability issues. They technically didn't touch the installation of the new seatbelt; I did that. Total cost to me was about $200, for the junkyard part and about 2.5 hours of their shop time. It's done and works fine. (Except, when we were all done, we had one black screw left over and neither of us could figure out where that went, *#&*@*#!!)

Seems to me, Honda should pay for that, but I'm too busy to push this with them. So, case closed, but that's the information for you all.

If you have ANY Honda, and keep it a few years, and you have a bad seatbelt, just understand you might get the same answer from Honda.

Caoboy

I'm still curious what you think 'useful' stands for in the warranty disclaimer.

There may be a further definition into what Honda thinks is the 'useful life' of the vehicle.

snobordboy

Wow TLR,
Pretty sure Caoboy was replying to the posters from the last 2 days, not your post from 2015!

In any case, I am amazed that you are so upset about the fact that a manufacturer has put a limit on their "limited" warranty. Most auto manufacturers would look at the "useful life" of a vehicle as the average length of ownership for the first owner and maybe second. That is when many people will start doing more of their own maintenance as opposed to dealer service departments, and they buy parts from aftermarket suppliers instead of OEM. That would generally be around 5 years or 150-200K miles in the eyes of the manufacturer. Hell, the American auto industry only expects their vehicles to be on the road for 100K miles, maybe 200K in a high use vehicle. Back in the mid 90's VW was offering 100K mile warranties on their cars, and it was unheard of, and created a huge surge of people buying cars from them.

Not to mention, all suppliers phase out parts that they manufacture, purchase, or stock over time, it's the way of life in any industry. Old stock eventually deteriorates, costs more to store, inventory, etc than it is worth, and ultimately takes up financial space on the books.

Sometimes it is the maker of parts that just doesn't have any justification to keep tooling around, or set-up to make parts. I deal with that at work all them time, where a part that we pay $10 each for, all of the sudden they tack on a $1000 set-up charge on top of the cost, and we have no choice but to stop stocking the part, as our customers won't pay $1,020 for a $ 20 part. This is for vehicles that are 2 generations out from our current offerings, not a car that is 4-5 generations out, and the last generation ceased production 16 years ago.

TLR

Hi guys,

Good questions and comments, and here are my answers:

Useful life: My Prelude had 222,000 miles on it, and ran as good as it did when new. No rust. For a Honda, I'd say it was within its useful life. Would not say that about a Chevy, from what I know of how GM builds its cars.

Most Honda fans, friends, neighbors I've known agree. Most people told me it had at least another hundred thousand miles left on it, in their opinion, of course.

Look around your garage. What's the useful life of any of your tools, hammers, screw drivers, compressors, lawn mowers, anything. What's their useful life? I'd say its not definable. Simply not definable. It's a useless term--depending on how a thing is built. Obviously, some things are disposable. Some things are cheap. Some things have a "useful life" of forever, depending on how they are taken care of. Specifically, some tools WILL last forever, whether they're handed down to grandchildren or buried in the landfill. The fact that some people take great care of their cars and some people trash them creates an "average" life, but not a "useful" life. I accept that my 222,000-mile Prelude is beyond the "average" life, but most definitely NOT its "useful" life.

Otherwise, the discussion is about Honda's warranty, which I repeat: If the lifetime warranty, plainly, clearly, and simply stated--which has NO exceptions--actually depends on having parts in stock, then it means nothing. That's a loophole big enough to drive a truck through. And it has nothing to do with "useful" life. Instead, it has everything to do with finance.

And, as far as cost to make more: Your experience is valid, as is mine. (28 years in international procurement and manufacturing at HP, focused mostly on hi-tech Japanese/Malaysian/Thai/Singaporean/Chinese manufacturing.) Honda could make a few more, and what costs they would assign, overhead, etc., would be something I would not want to guess at. But they could do it, if a court ordered them to do it. The part numbers are set up, still in their system, as are drawings, etc. And they could do it to comply with their warranty. And they should do it. Or else re-write their warranty to state it's limited--NOT by useful life--but by part availability. But, then, how would that sound to the average car buyer reading it?

Good discussion, guys.

ROKem1