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Tom Schindler

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The class-action suits, filed in federal court in Texas in 2004 and 2006, charged that many of the 6 million Hondas and Acuras bought or leased from spring 2002 to fall 2006 hadn't really rolled as far as their odometers indicated.
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That could be a powerfull tool in improving gas mileage.





Tom



 
Maybe I misunderstand, but it doesn't seem all that powerful to me. If you traveled 250 miles and used 10 gal that would equal 25 MPG. If the reading on the odometer was off by the average stated in the article, 2.5 miles, the odometer would read 256.2 and the MPG would equate to 25.6 MPG. I do see how it could effect lease costs and warranty claims.
 
Im hyjacking this thread!:lol::lol::p:p:p:lol::lol:

See what i just bought my wife:

[Broken External Image]:

Just getting a laugh out of you all!:lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::lol::lol:

Paul H

 
BB,

IF the odometer over that 250 miles went up 6.2 miles and you only went 250,



that means that on a 36,000 mile lease ( 36,000 / 250 = 144) then that (96.5 x 144= 1,000)



That the car actually went 35,000 miles not the 36,000 that was on the odometer. It throws off the MPG and the car now has more mileage than the odo says and may have dirtier filters and stuff like that..



BUT 1,000 miles doesn't hurt any thing... The question here is how off they really were ???



Todd Z
 
The whole point of the suit is that people were being cheated regarding warranty mileage and lease mileage charges. Example: you own a Honda with 36,100 miles on the odometer and something breaks. It now costs you $xxx to get it fixed. However, the odometer has a 5% error and your car really traveled only 34,295 miles...still under warranty and you don't pay to get it fixed. It's not about MPG or maintenance schedules. In fact, the odometer error being discussed would cause one to get maintenance done a bit ahead of schedule. It's all about knowingly cheating buyers and violating a legal contract.
 
LOL Paul.



Regarding what Bill-E said, if Honda was trying to shave off 705 miles from their warranty to reduce the cost of warranty repairs (you would have to first show "intent" in the class action suit on that), then one would wonder exactly how much money they could save (which would help make the case for intent).



Hondas are not like the Fords that have tranny timebombs at 36K...and are somewhat faulty in that they often go off earlier. ;)



TJR
 
The ones that got burned over the whole situations are the ones had leases. A little money here, a little mone there.



Honda made out.



I do not honestly think Honda did it with the intent to screw its customers.



And as for the side comment about better gas mileage, that was just a joke. Though, it could be a slight cheat. A 3% mileage error will produce a 3% increase in gas mileage. With a vehicle that gets 40 MPG that would show 41.2 MPG.





Tom
 
I was always under the impression that the federal law required that speedometers and odometers in all new vehicles had to be accurate within 3 percent. With a 2.5% error, Honda would be within that range?



Unless the manufacturers make vehicles with a GPS guided Speedometer and Odometer, I don't think you can expect much more accuracy. Just tread wear alone will decrease the diameter of the tire and will throw the speedometer/odometer off.



The standard tire tread depth is 7/32", so during the normal wear life of the tire, you would have decreased your tires diameter by nearly 1/2" which for a standard 28" tire is about 2.5%



Also nearly every vehicle on the road has a speedometer/odometer that reads higher that the actual speed even with the OEM tires. I have never encounter a vehicle speedometer/odometer that did not read a little on the high side. I check into this many years ago and was told that the federal law limits the speedometer/odometer error to within 3%, and the manufacturer always error on the side that benefits them.



I doubt that the Sport Trac or any vehicles speedometer/odometer is any more accurate than the Honda's. There are too many things that effect the calibration and accuracy of the speedometer/odometer, and to make them more accurate would be cost prohibitive.



...Rich
 
This is the part that was is misleading...



Chris Martin, spokesman for American Honda, acknowledged Monday that the company had calibrated odometers in such a way that driving 100 actual miles might have registered up to 103.75 miles on the vehicles' dashboards.
Click to expand...





Tom
 
The ASE has a recomendation of 2.5% error.



Honda admits to a 3.75% error. Saying driving 100 miles actually logs 103.75 miles.



What gives?





Tom
 
Forget about speedometer error, not a factor with the suit. Odometer error is, and they claim that Honda purposely built in an error to overstate actual distance driven. Whether it's a gear driven or a digital odometer, each can be designed to be very accurate since the number of revs of the driveshaft per mile with standard size tires is known. For that type of device, a 3% error is intentional and has to be designed into the gearing or the pulse processing [digital]. It's not a calibration issue, analog speedometers are calbrated, odometers are not. it's an intentional design issue.
 
That is different. They have admitted that their speedometers/odometers exceeded the 3% limit by 0.75% in their favor. Not a huge difference but never the less, it is wrong and the people should be compensated.



...Rich
 
Oh, I get it, Caymen, you are saying that Honda was intentionally misleading. I thought you meant the article was misleading.



I dunno....102.5 miles actual is okay and within the error tolerance of the standards, but 103.75 gets people's panties in a bunch....I don't see it myself.



The class action suit will result in $100 off coupons for a new Honda for those that signed up, and millions and millions and millions for the attorneys.



TJR
 
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Caymen- My 05 F150 does the same thing, it reads 5% higher and faster then what I am doing. I took it into Ford and they said it is "with in specs". So yeah, when I drive 100 km's it will say 105 km's. Because it is within specs there isn't a damn thing I can do about it. And Yes, I am running stock tires.
 
A digital odometer's reading is a function of it's design and software. For a given size tire there will be xxx revs per mile and the drive shaft rpm counter will deliver yyyy pulses to the CPU. Software does some math, calculates and displays distance. Where the error comes into play is that there is a variance in the circumference of standard tires. Inflation pressure has an effect. Speed has an effect...at high speeds, the tire diameter grows due to centripatle force. Tire wear reduces the diameter. So even though a properly designed odometer will be perfectly accurate under optimal conditions, there will be some level of error under real-world conditions. The issue with Honda is that the error was designed into the odometer so that it would purposely display a higher mileage than actually driven.
 

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