Dear Fellow Honda/Acura owners – I need some info & advice.
Even though I live in a pretty good neighborhood, someone side swiped my 2000 RL in front of my house few weeks ago. I took it to recommended body shop to get it fixed and not even 5 min. after picking it up, (while driving) I turned on windshield wipers, but could not turn them off, then ~1 min later alarm went off!!! I immediately took it back to the body shop, they took booth left side doors that they were working on apart, didn't find anything wrong with the wiring, but alarm still goes off if you turn on head lights, turn signals, windshield wipers, etc. I just took it to the Acura dealership and after 6 hours (at $116 per hour) they found out that the left side multiplex unit ($500+) is fried. Claim adjustor from State Farm claims that this problem was not do to the accident, so they will not pay for it. Body shop owner claims that they didn't touch the electrical system, so he's also not going to be paying for it. And according to Acura technicians it is almost impossible for that multiplex control unit to go bad on its own (they have to order one directly from Japan), but they can’t tell me why or when did it fry. I’m stuck with a $1500 bill and no real help or answers. If any of you heard of multiplex unit problems please share them with me. I also need some advice on how I should deal with my insurance that by the way sent me to that particular body shop in the first place and the body shop itself. I’m pissed and I need to get to the bottom of this ASAP.
wluty

 

First of all is should have not taken that long to find the problem(6hrs) at the dealer, but sad to say, that most mechanics don't have a clue how to troubleshoot anymore. Anything past what Midas can do, they are lost. All they know is plug computer in and replace parts. Since the customer has to foot the bill for their incompetence their is not much incentive for that to change. If I were you, I would get it in writing, what the dealer said about the module and present that to the insurance company. Hindsight it would have have been nice had you not signed off on the work from the bodyshop, but then again you were not aware of the problem to after the work was finished. Try my suggestion to see what you can come up with.