boe_d

I think they need to fire anyone in the targeted market research that took a decade to figure out that the beak wasn't popular. They might also want to can the people who thought the RLX was a money maker.

mk5

The only real knock on the RLX is the styling. If you cover the hood and fenders to the A pillar, it looks almost like a $20,000 Accord/Infiniti G/last gen Subaru Legacy, etc. Generic.

I, for one, have been on the lookout for used, cheap SH-AWD Sport Hybrid RLXs. They are like the Millenium Falcon -- may not be much to look at, but have got it where it counts.

377hp, 29 mpg, AWD hybrid, more rear leg room space than every other Honda. Perfect family sedan for the enthusiast. Waiting for the prices to drop to sub $30k, so PLEASE keep bashing them.

CheeseyPoofs McNut

I haven't seen any bashing for the Sport Hybrid model of the RLX - in fact other than the sedate styling it seems people (those that have one) love them. It's a mystery why Acura didn't market the crap out of the Sport Hybrid. That said - with all that cool tech I'm not sure I would want one out of warranty.

pyrodan007

But it's an Acura! Ok ok, I'll stop :P

atl7

Seems like Acura recently lost their reputation of reliability. I refuse to believe it, my TLX and MDX are both almost to 15k miles and have been 100% reliable. Granted the TLX had the tranny replacement (it never would have left me stranded, just jerky but this was a first model year car), and it's only 15k miles, many cars could have had some issues by that mileage. I have no fear of running the two to 100k miles without any big issues.

I don't get why they lost their status of reliability, as the '15 TLX issues were ironed out, no problems with the MDX, and I don't hear anything about the ILX or RDX. For the RLX, I'm not sure as I don't pay attention to it, I think its biggest problem is the extremely boring styling.

TacoBello

Recently lost their reliability? Acura hasn't been reliable for a decade now.

atl7

What vehicle has been unreliable and plagued with problems? I have owned a 3G TL, 2G MDX, 2 4G TLs, 5G TLX, and a 3G MDX. All have been outstanding in terms of reliability, I ran over 100k miles on all of them (except from my new MDX and TLX), with little to no problems. The worst issue I've had was one of my 4G TLs burned oil. I get that my experience doesn't speak for everyone else's, but I don't see too many consistent problems within their cars. The worst I can remember are the transmission problems in the 2G TL.

pyrodan007

You're joking about the RLX right? Go take a look at the RLX forum and see the problems people are having with the suspension and electronics.
As for all the 15 TLX issues being fixed, yes you're right. They were "fixed" (cough..patched..cough) on non-15s, the originals get stuck with whatever was done which means deal with it.

atl7

How terrible that the RLX, their worst selling model of what, 1,500 units a year has a few issues. Sure, their flagship should be more reliable but it's far better than the MDX or TLX having those problems.

pyrodan007

If their flagship sedan has massive problems, what will people think about all their flagship models in the future? Imagine someone went for a RLX instead of a 5 series. Do you think that person will ever come back to Acura? He'll just look elsewhere, far past the purchase price which is what probably brought him to Acura in the first place.

The aura related to flagships slowly starts to die off, similar to RLX (was never there) and NSX (expensive for performance).

atl7

I'm not here to argue importance of flagship status. Overall, I think Acura is still very reliable (aside from the model that accounts for 1% of their sales) and I think they get a bad rap when it comes to reliability.

pyrodan007

You think it's reliable, Consumer Reports and I think otherwise. Opinions are like asses, everyone has one lol

holografique

It's a lot more than just a few issues and it wasn't better than the MDX/TLX.

40+ TSBs for the RLX, some of which are absurd when you consider we're talking about Honda. And several problems they never bothered to fix until the 2016 model (useless NAV and horrendous suspension). I speak from experience, 60k+ miles over 3 years in an RLX Advanced (PAWS). Worst car I ever owned and is the reason I plan to leave Acura after my ILX lease is up. And that's coming from someone with 30 years of the brand in my family.

Some of the issues in the RLX were examples of just flat out laziness on their part for QA and ensuring good build-quality. If they couldn't ge that right in their $60k flagship vehicle, then tell us exactly what type of confidence that is supposed to create for customers looking at the rest of their product lineup?

atl7

I can promise you that the issues the RLX (their worst seller) has had, are far less damaging than if they were on the MDX, their best seller. I'm not justifying the problems, I haven't looked into the suspension/nav RLX issues but if they're as bad as you're making them to be, then that's unacceptable. I have confidence in the brand because I guess I'm lucky to say I haven't experienced quality control issues or poor reliability in all the Acuras I've owned, but it's a bummer to those who can't say the same.

holografique

I would also add that the majority of the TSBs for the RLX weren't just for specific batches of VINs, or even specific years for that matter. Most were for ALL vehicles in a given year, and a number of the recent handful still apply even to the 2016 year model.

This tells me that for those issues, possibly one of two things occurred: 1) the issue was due to faulty design and would cost too much for them to change due to the already low selling numbers or 2) the issue was due to faulty 3rd party components/parts, and they would have to absorb a tremendous amount of cost trying to replace large stocks of inventory on those parts (likely due to volume discount pricing done during prior to running production on the vehicle).

I wouldn't be surprised if it was both scenarios in the case of the RLX.

holografique

That's exactly the point and it is a total bummer, because I've loved the brand for years and still wanted to. But some of the issues were flat out unacceptable for a car manufacture who's been in the business for 30 years. I don't care if it was the first car straight off the damn factory line. This wasn't their first nor last car ever produced. And for some customers (like me) that leased early, (I got my 2014 RLX in June of 2013), in total we ended up spending enough money to have bought the car (and own it) for what you'd pay now with going prices, yet I got nothing. No car, not even a good ownership experience during the lease.

So when you stated earlier that you didn't get why Acura is loosing their reputation of being reliable, I'm giving you a real-world example of exactly why. Reliability for me goes far beyond just knowing that your engine will start everyday, that your breaks work all the time, and that you'll never end up broken down on the side of the road. Reliability for me reaches into the confidence that a manufacture of any product can build it with quality and precision that is expected when you market something as your top of the line, best of the best, no frills, pay top dollar.

atl7

I think they should take a small hit for the RLX being unreliable, but the rest of their lineup (the other 99% of their sales) seems to be doing fine. If the RLX were a big seller, then I could see why their reputation is tainted. Obviously we have different opinions when it comes to their reliability, but I'll definitely agree that 2 model years of the RLX with the same issues is unacceptable. You mentioned the '16 and newer have been ok so far and those issues were ironed out?

holografique

Some of the issues were ironed out in the 2016, mainly the suspension was completely re-designed (you can read all the specs in the 2016 product launch news release) and the NAV processing power was increased (or something else was done) to eliminate what was otherwise extreme sluggishness in the 2014-2015 models, to the point where it was unusable at times. Put it this way, the NAV in my 2006 TL was significantly faster than the NAV in my 2014 RLX.

All you have to do is go over to the RLX forum and sit down and look through the list. It's all there. And you can easily see which ones still effected even the 2016 models.

atl7

That's good to see they somewhat attempted to fix it. Ridiculous that 2 model years had to suffer through it, though. My best guess would be because of how few they sell and didn't want to invest the money it?

hddnav

What you read here is that the demographics of many on AZ are such that they don't necessarily do research before buying. I completely agree with you and CR; CR's reliability rating is not an opinion, but a summary of hundreds of thousands of data points. They haven't always forward predicted accurately, especially when there's limited data, but their reliability assessments looking backwards have been very accurate. An Acura with VW reliability is not worthy of the Honda name.

My first Honda was a brand new 1990 Civic hatchback, so I'm really not coming from the perspective of a Honda hater.

RDX10

I am going to give you an example to help explain why people are no longer associating reliability with Acura. Ok so you have 2 kids in school, one is always bad and therefore after some time when he does really bad things, he is not really reprimanded and people don't really react. The other kid is always good and then does something minor, he is handed a larger punishment than the other bad kid would have been for the same thing and people react a lot more because they don't expect it.

Now this isn't to say that Acura's don't have problems, it is just that people
hold the brand to a higher regard and a lot of little things have been very wrong and they have been extremely slow to respond. Every model they currently have, have had a lot of issues that were not expected in an Acura product and that is why people don't beleive the whole reliability shtick. Keep in mind I am mentioning the latest gen for ease and also the first year (which is likely to have sold the most copies as well).

RDX: Noisy shocks and harsh engine vibrations due to VCM.
TLX: Horrible 8 and 9 speed issues as well as various electronic glitches.
MDX: Rear shock noises coupled with many electronic issues.
ILX: Harsh ride with weak power trains and noisy.
RLX: A wide variety of fit and finish issues, quality control issues, electronic issues..etc.

Now if these were issues on a BMW or Mercedes forum you would consider yourself lucky but because these are not at all expected in an Acura people react much harsher. In that same respect, the issues are not just recent either. My 2007 MDX currently has the too common Navi-dvd player issue where it says disc missing/open door, my bluetooth unit is gone as well, my magnetic shocks are fine (knocking on a variety of exotic woods) but that is a very common and VERY expensive repair on the MDX as well. None of the issues on my MDX are a special case either so it isn't that and in all honesty if I had known all these issues would happen (barring magnetic shocks, I was aware of this), I would have stayed FAR away. I had a 2007 RDX tech before my MDX, not a single issue ever. Nav worked perfect 100% of the time, so did my HFL so I assumed they ironed it out by that time and bought my MDX in confidence of the brand. Suffice it to say, this will be my last Acura-Honda product for a VERY long time because I don't like any of the newest models and I have already owned all the older models that I liked/would like to own at this time.

holografique

That could be one reason. But hard to know for sure.

In the end it left me with no real options other than to:

a) buy the car after the lease and be stuck with pretty severe product issues for as long as I owned it. (remember, they did NOT fix the NAV/Suspension issues for 2014/2015 models, if you own those model years, you are stuck with these issues as of today)

or

b) walk away wasting $45k with no car to show for it.

And you know what Client Relations offered me for my "troubles"? A $300 gift card.

holografique

Exactly the same situation for me, except with my 3G 2006 TL. Best car I've ever owned, and as a result got the RLX based largely on brand confidence, thinking that for twice my money ($25k versus $61k) I would surely get an amazing product.

Isn't that the goal of any product brand? To achieve a standard soo high, to the point where your customers trust you on the brand name alone? Where they dont have to be savy buyers, or need to know how to scour the far reaching corners of the Internet (including forums like this one) to know whether you're about to buy a good product or not?

Sure I could have waited 1-2 years, poke around here and see what others were experiencing before I signed my lease, but should I have had to?

Do you think Jon Ikeda would tell you that's how he wants to sell cars? By having potential buyers wait it out to see what happens before making a move?

RDX10

Exactly. When I sold my RDX, I was also looking at some Kias and infinitis and decided that the MDX would be the best choice for me based on the fact that it should be bullet proof and that I would not have to worry about anything. I find that it makes me nearly as anxious as it did when I owned a German car which I will never do again. If/when the MDX sells I am going to be moving on to other brands. Simply put, I feel that I have seen the best of what Acura can offer at the moment and I after owning 2 Acura products in a row, it's time I see what's up with other brands.

wlkeel

Another thread turned over to the haters. This crap really gets old!

holografique

You know what got old? Paying $980/month for 3-years for a failure of a product and having no choice but to suck it up.

If you don't like this thread, then you dont have to read it. There are plenty of other threads that may suit your liking.

This is a forum. Where people share the good and the bad. And it's important that people share both sides. With no way to share these things directly with Acura that has any meaningful impact, this is the only other method to put the pressure on them in hopes that maybe it creates real change and prevents others from being negatively effected and lose money like I did.

mk5

This is the main issue. Rule of thumb here is to stay away from first year models.

I was the first one in line to get a 2008 Accord. That car was fine, good really, but the brakes wore prematurely (there was a class action lawsuit over it) and it had the nasty VTC Actuator sound on startup. Sounded like you were trying to start a chainsaw. The brake issue was fixed and the VTC was a nagging issue fixed once for free. I didn't fix it again under protest. Enter my TLX, again a first year model. The only real gripes I have about the car are some interior rattles and some finish quality issues. I count myself lucky that I didn't get the V6.

If you are buying Honda/Acura, it may be good practice to wait until the MMC of the model you want. They should have the major kinks out by then.

pyrodan007

So Acura has become like every German brand now, wait until X years before stuff works as it should. I'm sorry, but no. Servicing is the crucial point here and Acura has failed. So if Acura can no longer make good cars from the beginning and is useless at fixing them, remind me why they are still considered THE reliable brand?

mk5

Honestly, I think that's every auto maker. I can't think of one that always has it right straight outta the chute on a new model. You can go on any forum and get complaints. I didn't register here for a long time because of all the negative posts I see on here -- it can be detracting. You can literally go on any auto forum and find something wrong with any vehicle. Just google something. Nissan, Lamborghini, Toyota, Tesla, GMC, whatever. Every maker has it.

pyrodan007

I fully agree with you. It seems like people think that Acuras never break down. Sure it may cost less than the Germans to fix, but you honestly can't say they're bulletproof. Actually with all the new tech, I'm not too sure an Acura is cheap to fix now a days. If people can afford to buy luxury cars, they should be able to afford to fix them without complaining. It's proportional to price of car. It bothers me when people say it's just like an Accord to fix, well yeah almost same car. But it's not like a German for other things too.

The TLX is still too new, I'm really curious to see how much it'll cost to maintain after 5 years. Just the infotainment touchscreen should be in the thousands, and without it MANY features will not work!

CheeseyPoofs McNut

I fully agree - every car has issues - doesn't matter if it's Honda or Toyota or Kia or Ford etc etc. There's nothing wrong with venting or expressing frustration about your car or the brand - however this breaks down when it ceases to be an actual discussion and disintegrates into just repeating the same frustration over and over and over. That's not helpful to anyone and as mk5 indicates - detracts from actual conversation.

TacoBello

The mods said the TLX forum is now a safe zone, so I'm not allowed to get into it with you. Suffice to say, I've been with Acura long before they even had stupid letter/number names for all their cars, and I can assure you that back in the day their cars were bulletproof, through and through. These days it's far from it. Looks to me that you didn't join Acura until around the mid-00s, judging by the cars you've purchased. No one said that everyone of their cars is unreliable. But the company as a whole is a figment of it's former self.

BEAR-AvHistory

Is the lemming who does not follow the others over the cliff a "hater" Another over used snowflake word for people who have a hard time with other opinions.

Some of my posts in the 3G forum around 2006 - 20011 talk about - drivers side taillight assembly replace 3 weeks after delivery & after 4 trips & two overnight stays at the dealer before they could see that the taillight was less than 1/2 as bright as the right side, 6MT pulled & rebuilt at 22K miles, Common fault that took Honda years to own up to before threat of class action suite prodded them to do the right thing. Reall for faulty window wiper wiring that could lead to a fire. Couple more full on recalls, think one was steering or brakes, been awhile.

F23A4

Those who have had poor experiences with Acura (or aren't satisfied with its direction) will move on from the brand and those with more positive experiences (and/or have no issue with its direction) may continue on with the brand. Honestly, it's no different than any other product on the market.

But Honda does have to make some inroads into re-establishing the Acura brand, particularly as models from Kia and Hyundai as well as domestic makes have made significant inroads in culling buyers from the the Japanese big three. Even within that big three, Toyota seems to be working very diligently at incorporating sportiness into the Lexus brand and Nissan likewise with the QC on their already sporty Infiniti lineup. (I almost picked up a base Q50 AWD instead of my TLX V6; if it wasn't for fuel economy considerations, I may have gone that route.)

Saintor

Some people need a shrink here. This TLX-bashing has been going over the top and it seems that even a few mods are siding with them. Shame.

ggesq

iTrader: (1)

^ The fact that your (previous) comment was deleted as an indirect attack on other posters for their opinion without any warning by me or any of the other staff should have been an indication to you that maybe it was inappropriate. Plain and simple. Keep it up and you're on your way to your next vacation from this site. Posts like that derail a thread. Attacks in the model forums are not tolerated by anyone.

The fact that I've been called a nazi mod by some and now you accusing me of siding with those same people is funny.

This thread is closed. For those wishing to continue these types of discussions, you are free to do so in Car Talk or in the Acura threads in the Automotive news section.